SOCIAL NETWORKING

Social Networking

Social Networking

Most work on social networks has tended to emphasize the importance of informal structures in interaction and the way in which formal organizations are embedded within other, less-visible institutional structures. Here an influential strand of research has revived the notion of the “embeddedness” of economic exchanges within social relations (Wasserman, 2002).

Network analysis criticizes approaches that focus primarily on the specific characteristics or attributes of a given unit, be it an individual, organization, social class, or a nation-state, to explain its behavior or specific outcomes. Instead, it is argued that such characteristics or attributes only acquire meaning when set in relation to others. Ultimately, it is relationships that form the resources that pattern constraints and opportunities of actors. Whether it is cognition, practices, trust, or resource flows, exchange is understood as always already structurally biased through the shape of a given network. This type of view contrasts with analysis of structure in terms of fixed categories, such as class or race, formal institutional frameworks or strands of individual behavioralism (Watts, 2003).

In this sense, network theory refers to a type of structural analysis that locates structure, including cognitive or behavioral patterns within—and originating from—the observable form and content of relationships among a set of relevant actors or units, providing both resources and limits for action.

Whereas all network analysts agree on the fundamental importance of relational interdependence for describing and explaining social phenomena, opinions differ as to what extent network theory constitutes a proper theory. Some see it as primarily referring to a specific mode of analysis applicable to a wide range of phenomena, a practical toolbox for more precisely describing and measuring relational configurations and their structural characteristics. Others see it moving toward a more or less consistent body of theoretical propositions and explorations that speak to longstanding debates in anthropology and social psychology about the contextual nature and evolution of social life (Emirbayer, 2003).

Indeed, for its most ambitious adherents, network theory holds out the promise of bridging micro- and macro levels of social analysis by pointing to ways in which large-scale social patterns may be created and sustained by distinct individual or organizational network dynamics.

Researchers like Watts (2003) and Wellman (2004) differ in their reliance on real or cognitive data in building up networks for analysis as well as in the way a given network should be bounded. Similarly, quantitative and qualitative approaches to networks may assign different explanatory significance to the dynamics within or the stable architectural features of a given network.

There is no clear consensus about the origins of networks, yet different factors have been highlighted: Among them are age—networks develop over time. Robert Putnam's study of civic networks in Italy might prove an example where organizations that worked together over years developed ties of trust and legitimacy. Here, direct conclusions about the success and failure of societal development are drawn from the patterning of these structures (Putnam, 2003).

In other realms, work on epistemic communities has focused on professional groups working on similar issues, ultimately ...