As individual, you can build social capital, and those actions can benefit you, but the social capital you build is not yours. Rather, social capital is more like a commons. You can contribute and benefit, but it is not your property. It's shared.

Here's the problem with this individualistic and inaccurate framing social capital. It's a linguistic enclosure of a commons. We should not fence off that which is common property in our minds or in real life. If we do, we destroy that which we depend on for our very survival. Our fates are tied by those collective structures which bind us together and give us the capacity for adaptation.

Great job to Tara for identifying and expounding on the concept so well – for the socially backwards (like me), this should lead to the consciousness of the idea that can lead to some positive growth and change –

Thanks for the incredibly valuable site and leadership role Andrew -