List of tables and figures -- Acknowledgements -- 1. Reflections after a long day in Moscow -- 2. On the rational choice of culture -- 3. On the theory and practice of social capital -- 4. Social capital in the social democratic welfare state -- 5. How is social capital produced? -- 6. The...

The importance of social trust has become widely accepted in the social sciences. A number of explanations have been put forward for the stark variation in social trust among countries. Among these, participation in voluntary associations received most attention. Yet, there is scant evidence...

Social trust is a crucial ingredient for successful collective action. What causes social trust to develop, however, remains poorly understood. The quality of political institutions has been proposed as a candidate driver and has been shown to correlate with social trust. We show that this...

Social trust is a crucial ingredient for successful collective action. What causes social trust to develop, however, remains poorly understood. The quality of political institutions has been proposed as a candidate driver and has been shown to correlate with social trust. We show that this...

The main question addressed in this paper is how the great variation in the level of social trust in different countries can be explained. Most empirical research on this question has been based on survey data which has limitations when it comes to capturing the causal mechanisms. Building on...