Elections to Neighborhood Councils: Do they Enhance Social Capital?
By Gila Laor
The Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and Social Welfare,The Hebrew University, Jerusalem and the Central School for Social Service Workers, the Ministry of Social Affairs
Shimon E.Spiro
The Bob Shapell School of Social Work, Tel Aviv University
In recent decades the ballot box has become an accepted means of determining membership in neighborhood councils. In this paper we report the findings of a study that tried to determine the effects of elections on neighborhoods as social systems. The question asked was whether the process and outcome of elections enhance the social capital of neighborhoods. The paper is based on an in-depth case study of elections in one neighborhood, and comparative information from
five other neighborhoods.
Our findings point to diverse, partly contradictory effects of the elections on different aspects of social capital. Elections have a positive, albeit temporary, effect on the identification of the residents with their neighborhood. Elections strengthen ties within social networks, enhancing bonding social capital, but have a smaller ,sometimes even negative effect, on bridging social capital. Elections involve new people in leadership roles, but cause others to retire from them. Elections that are held for the first time serve to legitimize local leaders vis-à-vis their constituency and the municipal government. Elections that follow do not necessarily reinforce the legitimacy.
The findings lead to the conclusion that elections to neighborhood councils may have the potential to enhance social capital, but this potential will be realized only if they are one component of more comprehensive intervention to enhance local democracy.