The Role of Social Capital in Scottish Education Policy

This paper explores the relevance of social capital to the construction of education policies. In particular, it examines the four central social capital concepts of trust, norms, reciprocity and values and how these could be more explicitly employed in the construction of Scottish educational policy to enhance relevance and accountability. We draw on work from the Schools and Social Capital (SSC) research network of the Scottish Applied Educational Research Scheme (AERS1), and particularly from the work of the SSC policy review group. This and other reviews are published in the digital repository of the AERS web site. This paper also incorporates elements from other reviews conducted by the SSC network. The paper concludes that for policy to promote the kinds of social capital that will improve the lives of the most marginalised people a more inclusive and well resourced policy process is needed.