Assessment of Social Capital’s Dimensions in Iranian Cities through Old Persian Literature Text

Document Type : Research Article

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Abstract

Human beings are inherently in relation and interaction with each other. In fact, these interactions make them able to satisfy their needs. The set of these actions (social interaction, neighborhood ties, participation and so many other concepts) that are gathered under social capital concept, are among most important concerns of urban designers, planners and managers which has a significant role in creating a sense of place, place affiliation, residential satisfaction, place identity and other place qualities. This importance of the issue has led many of researchers and theorists to introduce place as a social phenomenon by linking place meanings with lived experiences. So, if we consider the enforcement of these social factors, called in this paper as social capital, as one of the urban plans` goal, looking at the past of Iranian society would reveal many positive and negative points of Iranian social relationship for social neighboring, civic participation and collective life which help contemporary society to achieve their goals. Therefore the current research aim in assessment of social capital dimension in Old Iranian society has scrutinized Old Persian literature as a mirror of culture and life of ancestors. In other words it seems that literature as a written heritage of the past and the brightest of each nation worldview can play a significant role in discovering and understanding people social actions and particularly social capital dimensions. Old Persian literature such as other languages literature contains rich treasures of anecdotes, fables, allegories and Proverbs that not only express philosophical and Theosophical views among people but also discovers invisible points of social capital in people’s social relationship. In fact, a part of literature belongs always to social issues and reveals myths and secrets in people ties. So the current study aims to analyze social relationship tradition in Iranian society and it has assessed triple Dimensions of social capital in Old Persian literature text by reviewing social capital’s definition. Therefore in a qualitative system of inquiry, based on historical- interpretive approach by using content analysis, this essay tries to study three dimensions of social Capital in literature books such as Khamse Nezami, Masnavi Manavi and Gholestane Saadi. The result of this paper shows that Iranian social capital is based on bonding ties and neighborhoods as a significant expression of social networks and the most determinative and predictive factor of social interaction, norms, trust in urban life of Iranian society. In fact system of neighborhoods includes community of interests (such as race, religion, occupation) and community of place which is the most important evidence of intergroup bonds and intragroup conflicts. Therefore while affective bonds inside each class or neighborhood are strong, the relation between different class and neighborhood or between people and upper class (such as government) is too weak. In other word despite western societies in which the relationships between citizens are among different groups, in urban spaces and in city scale, Iranian interactions were occurred within a group and in neighborhood scale, so that Bonding Networks are more powerful than Bridging Network in Social Networks. Furthermore, although Collaboration Norms and Trust in micro and middle level are desirable but Trust in macro level and Bonding Networks are not. It seems that People Participation in management of Public space and prioritization of NGOs as an interface of public and governmental sphere can have significant role in improving Bridging Social Capital.

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