Russian organizations social capital formation external factors

• Main Author: O. A. Igumnov
• Format: Article
• Language: Russian
• Published: Publishing House of Lomonosov Moscow State University 2020-12-01
• Series: Vestnik Moskovskogo Universiteta: Seriâ 18, Sociologiâ i Politologiâ
• Subjects: social capital; generalized trust; institutional trust; corporate culture; business culture; power distance; values
• Online Access: https://vestnik.socio.msu.ru/jour/article/view/751
• ISSN: 1029-3736; 2541-8769

The scientific approach presented in this article is based on the understanding of social capital and corporate culture as intersecting organizational phenomena however irreducible to each other. At the same time corporate culture is understood instrumentally and it is considered as a factor in the social capital formation, development and using process mediating its organizational and managerial effects. This does not negate the fact of complex iterative relations between them but allows to place the emphasis correctly both theoretical and practical, emphasizing the more fundamental and comprehensive nature of social capital directly arising from the laws of social interaction and developing regardless of the purposeful management efforts to form a single corporate culture. The analysis of various studies of social capital in Russia and abroad characterizing the level of generalized trust in Russia as low and noting the multidirectional dynamics between different types of social capital which are not typical for developed countries. These differences are interpreted in terms of differences in social relations types underlying social capital: affiliation, hierarchy and exchange. From this point of view the high level of declared institutional trust (with a certain degree of assumption) can be interpreted as a manifestation of the rational (“calculation”) mechanism of social capital construction in modern Russian society. The conclusion about insufficient account in foreign scientists of social, cultural and spiritual components researches is made. The analysis of the problems that have a negative impact on modern Russian society in the process of social capital formation at the micro, meso- and macrolevels is made. The main problems are the lack of social unity and the spread of the Russian version of individualism associated with severe problems of survival and increasing the level of interpersonal and institutional distrust.