On How Americans Are Seeking and Forming Relationships

How are Americans seeking and forming relationships today (vis. other times in our relatively short history and perhaps vis. other cultures and time periods in world history)?

And then, more specifically, how are Christians seeking and forming these relationships vis. the rest of the culture generally?

The First Question

A few clues for the first question: Robert Putnam's work, Bowling Alone provides at least a good survey of the important categories and variables we'll need to answer this question. That is, we might not buy his arguments just yet, but he has done some good thinking about how to think about our question.

For example, he's always asking if a trend is producing a "bridging" or a "bonding" network. Bridging networks have sharing built into their DNA; social assets, information, and/or physical capital pass between diverse worlds--"out of the box" progress is made all the time because concepts and techniques are constantly borrowed and adapted from one world of action to another. In contrast, bonding networks undergird specific reciprocity and mobilize solidarity. Conformity to a strong but implicit standard--not innovation--is the underlying grammar of the bonding network.

I don't think any networks are purely bridging or bonding networks; as Putnam points out, "many [--I'd say all--] groups simultaneously bond along some social dimensions and bridge across others. The black church, for example, brings together people of the same race and religion across class lines. The Knights of Columbus was created to bridge cleavages among different ethnic communities while bonding along religious and gender lines. Internet chat groups may bridge across geography, gender, age, and religion, while being tightly homogeneous in education and ideology. In short, bonding and bridging are not "either-or" categories into which social networks can be neatly divided, but "more or less" dimensions along which we can compare different forms of social capital."

Then there's the major categories of inquiry:

• Political Participation


• Civic Participation


• Religious Participation


• Connections in the Workplace


• Informal Social Connections


• Small Groups


• Social Movements


• The Net

These are still unsorted and unrelated; but they are helpful places to start. And of course, they are the areas where Putnam provides tons of data and references for further research.

And his thesis cannot be overlooked, even if it comes off a bit strong: Americans are increasingly loath to join any organization that requires active commitment and altruism; the strong bridging community is dying.

But in his strong thesis, he misses some important trends that seem to paint a picture of restructuring community life rather than a declining one: Robert Wuthnow's book, Sharing the Journey, for example, marks out the emerging trend toward small group involvement as an important restructuring of the modern community. Surprisingly, under Wuthnows analysis, the small group movement carries a strong bridging tendency in its current.

Well, as I said, those are important starting places. I'll see where they take me.

The second Question

Right now I have no idea where to start with this question! I'll have to do some more digging.