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Keywords Intangible assets, Intellectual capital, Corporate governance
Abstract The rapid and well-known evolution - considered by many observers to be revolutionary - from industrial society to knowledge society, defined by the importance of knowledge creation processes, is showing the relevance of the social capital of organizations. This study seeks to contribute to the development of this new concept. First, presents the theoretical background of social capital. Second, based on an intellectual capital approach, tests the situation of social capital in some Spanish companies, with a reference to the international landscape. The findings oftlie research support the convenience of the development of an integral framework for the. management of intangibles that create future benefits, considering the relations with several social agents. Concludes by proposing a model of intellectual capital that expressly includes social capital.
Introduction: social capital as a key factor in the current socio-economic environment
This epigraph[l] exposes some reflections about social capital and its importance in the current knowledge based economy.
An initial approach to social capital
According to the World Bank (Kliksberg, 2000), we can distinguish different kinds of capital:
* natural capital, consisting of the natural resources that a country owns;
* built capital, created by human beings. It includes different modalities such as: infrastructures, equipment, technological capital, financial capital, comercial capital, etc...;
* human capital, defined by the nutrition, health and level of knowledge of the population; and
* social capital, as a new concept derived from the multiagent relationships of current economy.
Specifically, social capital could be defined as a "sum of current and potential resources incorporated in, available in, and derived from the network of relations posessed by an individual or social unity" (Nahapiet and Ghoshal, 1996). From a corporative point of view, which means that social unity is the organization, social capital could be understood, according to Bourdieu and Wacquant (1992), as a "sum of resources accumulated in the organization by a stable network of intraorganizational relationships". In the same vision, Coleman (1990) define the concept as the "appropiateness of social structure, strategically legitimized in the organization". Nahapiet and Ghoshal (1996) distinguish three challenging dimensions for the organization:
(1) Structural dimension: people can perceive themselves as a part of a network.
(2) Relational dimension: a sense of...