One thing to note is that Robert Putnam wrote the original Bowling Alone essay in 1995. Well before most people in America even had Internet access.
The trend of declining participation in religious organizations, civic organizations (like the League of Women Voters), fraternal societies (like the Elks or Masons), volunteer associations, labor unions, and sports leagues has been happening since at least the 1970s. Surveys of Americans have found a consistent decline in the number of self-reported close friends since as far back as the 1980s. Same for those who reported being friends with their neighbors. Indicators of social capital like the percent of people who donate blood have been falling since the 1970s.
The point is increasing levels of isolation and misanthropy is a manifestation of a broader trend towards declining social capital. And that trend has been ongoing for probably 50 years. Social media may have accelerated it, but I don't think it would have anywhere near the same impact if Facebook was introduced to the American society of 1960.
I wonder if it's a side effect of prosperity. If you're poor, you depend on your broader family and community -- when you run out of money, when your car breaks down and your uncle can fix it, etc. etc. and if you have to sleep in the same room as your extended family, you're going to have "community."
However, dealing with people is difficult and inconvenient, so when you have money you decide to leave your family and isolate yourself from other people's problems as much as possible. You perhaps gain more peace, privacy and free time, but it's harder to notice what you're losing.
I'm not going to dredge up the numbers now, but in the 60s in America, I think it's probably safe to say a lot more siblings lived in the same room, a lot more people lived in small independent farms working alongside many family members, etc. etc. People were closer together because they had to be. People in cities didn't have to be quite so adjacent, but perhaps they were closer because it was normal in society to be closer.
Speculation on my part, but it probably wouldn't be hard to find those numbers and back up the argument...
From what I've seen living a privileged community in a not so privileged country, its that culture tends to impact in a much higher degree than money or privilege. Yes, money can buy you the privilege of skipping those awkward interactions that make us human, but it is up to the person to actually want to use money with that purpose.
I know very wealthy people that keep very closed ties to their families and friends. It's true that finding real friends gets harder, but the isolation tends to be caused by a deeper cultural norm.
E.g. in Latin America the family is given a much higher importance than in the States or Europe. It is not rare to see young adults living with their parents even if they can easily afford a place of their own. Even those that live on their own tend to meet their families in a regular basis.
In the end it's all about prioritizing what is important in your life and in every society there seems to be a common list shared by it's inhabitants, if you end up in a place that values more independence than relations, maybe its time to start swimming against the current in that regard.
Well, that's true, but my argument is that cultural norms spring from necessity. In places where a lot of people must live adjacent, that kind of living becomes the cultural norm and even if you're in a position to do your own thing, you are still influenced by it.
That is, cultural norms affect people, but basic necessity also affect cultural norms. Just like your values inform what you do, but what you do also changes your values.
You're right in that we must make greater efforts to swim against the current, but so many of us must in adulthood develop tools to foster community and connection. That's hard to do, especially when you're vulnerable, there's trial-and-error involved and you don't really have a good model for what you "should" be doing.
I have a hunch than in a couple decades this issue will be amplified. The biggest problem we are seeing from the disposal of more social interactions arises from not giving it its true importance.
It may be as you say that in the past interactions were fostered mainly as a side product of the necessity to cooperate and interact with others. However as we develop and become for independent thanks to prosperity and technology we must not get rid of interaction for they are an end in itself.
The issue or even taboo is the lack of importance that is given to the interactions with others just for its own sake. Maybe we will move on from this need and become more self reliant, however in the short term it seems that we are having a hard time adapting, especially with the increase of suicides and drug use in younger generations.
-> https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21650584
>in Latin America the family is given a much higher importance than in the States or Europe
I'm brazilian. I have a sister who is married to an american, and they live in the U.S. He always jokes how my sister talks to our mother in Brazil 10x more than he talks to his, yet his mother lives 15 minutes away.
This is purely anecdotal evidence for your point but I'll mention it anyways.
When I was growing up, I lived on a dead end street, in a blue collar part of town. The houses were so close together, as a kid I could almost straddle between them and touch both houses. I knew every kid and their parents names, could recite every address on my block. The kids were constantly out playing sports games of all kinds, in every season. We made up games, went to the park and played baseball together. We had summer block parties and biked to the local pool to swim and chase girls. Everybody knew everybody else. We all helped each other out when things got tight. The few elderly people we had in our neighborhood got their driveways and sidewalks shoveled by us younger kids. We collected firewood for their fireplaces, we kept watch on their houses.My extended family all lived within a few blocks so I was always close with my cousins as well. I look back now and feel like it was pure Americana. When you think of the American Dream, this was the textbook definition of it.
Then in 1996, everything changed. My dad landed a new job, was suddenly making way more money than he used to. My sister went off to college and we moved to the other "wealthier" side of town. Bigger house, pool in the backyard, in a sea of larger homes. I was an only child, started high school and you know what? I didn't know anybody in my neighborhood. To this day, I couldn't tell you the names of the people who lived on either side of our house. No more sports in the streets, no more BMX racing down at the trails at the park by my house. No more hanging with the kids who would just congregate in their yards until we had enough kids to do something fun. After that first year, I struggled to make friends and for the first time in some 17 seventeen years, I actually felt alone and isolated. It lasted for at least another year when I was a junior in HS, I finally found some friends who like to skateboard, snowboard, mountain bike and play sports like I did and things got better.
But I agree, when we were living in a blue collar town? Everything felt close and you had a tight knit community. When we moved? I just felt alone and isolated. My neighbors treated us the same way. They stayed in their house and we stayed in ours. Doing better off financially was good, but I lost a lot on the way.
Struggles and hardship also breed empathy. If you are completely independent and self-sufficient it is hard to relate to people who need help. Breaking my leg with no family around, being broke and dropping out of college, working retail for 8 years, it all sucked, but there was no option but to commiserate with people around me. Now 5 years later I have a fancy tech job and keep to myself during my commutes.
Also a simpler example of your above point, Christmas gifts: they are helpful gestures of goodwill when you're broke and strapped for necessities, but sort of meaningless tokens of ritual when everyone has everything they need already.
A major factor is government usurping the traditional functions of community. You don't need help from your local church or a fraternal society if you are getting aid from the government. And people are less likely to participate in the community if they feel that the government is handling and taxing them to do so.
I haven't done the research at all but would it be fair to say people in at least a few European countries have a better sense of community and human interaction than US (maybe the Scandinavian countries) but a far higher tax rate? Haven't looked into it all though.
>> a few European countries have a better sense of community and human interaction than US
I would agree given a lot of the European communities are smaller in size (think "villages" instead of "cities") so there are in closer proximity and share more resources. They often share more bloodlines and have genealogical ties many generations deeper. My father came from Norway and his family is like 15 generations deep. Here in the US? His family ties are only three or four generations deep.
I have seen it commented the idea that churches are some great source of immense, direct charity. If one is in need, they should simply call upon "the church" for assistance. A bowl of soup, a blanket, and some petty cash right in hand.
Is that real? Even today instead of 150 years ago? What's the regional variation on that?
Absolutely, yes. Our church collects tithes and offerings. Tithes funnel to the head of the church and there is a council that sees to their disposition. Offerings are collected monthly and stay in the local congregation for the immediate relief of members of our Church and members of our community regardless of religious affiliation. If any offerings remain, they funnel up to regional administrators. The beauty of this system is that I can give charitably and not know who is getting the benefit. I don't have to judge whether or not my offerings is getting maximum benefit because that responsibility is on the local church leader. (who is using prayer and discernment to maximum effect)
Also, my church has food distribution channels and warehouses so nobody is going hungry.
To some extent yeah. I've had members of my church get hit with sudden costs from an accident/medical bill and someone will start up a collection to help them out. Church's might also run a food bank or similar service to the wider community.
The average household size (persons) has been declining and the average house size (Sq.ft) has been climbing. The average person has certainly much more square feet for themselves.
Prosperity is generally defined as the amount of work hours you have to do to make ends meet. That number has skyrocketed. In that era you could put yourself through college delivering pizzas. In 1950 you had to work 2 days per month at minimum wage to rent a house.
I think the size of one's house is one of the archetypal measures of "prosperity" and it's been exploding over the past 50 years. More generally, the problem with these little anecdotes is that they're not normalized to anything. Anecdotes along the lines of "you could afford X on Y hours of minimum wage work," for example, ignore the fact that almost nobody earns minimum wage today: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1M09. The percentage of workers earning minimum wage or less (some workers are exempt) dropped from 15% in 1980 to just 2% today.
These anecdotes also ignore numerous other parameters. For example, households are much smaller today than before. So looking at "median household income" understates increases in income for the middle. Without adjusting for decreased household size, inflation-adjusted household income went up 16% from 1970-2010. Adjusting for household size, it went up 34%.
Likewise, people are more likely to be single parents, etc., today, which impacts economic prosperity. From 1971 to 2011, married people with a spouse present did well: https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2.... The percentage of such adults who are low income stayed flat at about 21-22%. But the percentage that qualify as upper income grew from 14% to 25%. For those who have never been married, the opposite happened. Low income rates went from 22% to 34%, and upper income rates stayed flat at 16-18%.
Are incomes inflation adjusted? The average income when I was a kid was $50k per year, about the same as it is now, except that $50k has 50% less purchasing power today. $50k today is the equivalent of $25k 30 years ago.
Here's probably a more interesting statistic. Women's labor force participation rate hit current levels around 1990-1995, when I was a kid. Since then, the median inflation-adjusted income for a married couple with two people working has increased more than 20%, from under $90,000 to over $110,000: https://fee.org/media/30584/census3.png?width=600&height=409....
> "... in the short term, other things being equal, more diversity in a community is associated with less trust both among and within ethnic groups. Putnam describes people of all races, sex, socioeconomic statuses, and ages as "hunkering down", avoiding engagement with their local community as diversity increases. Although limited to American data, his findings run counter the contact hypothesis which proposes that distrust declines as members of different ethnic groups interact, and conflict theory which suggests that while distrust among ethnic groups rises with diversity, distrust within ethnic groups should decrease. Putnam found that even when controlling for income inequality and crime rates, two factors which conflict theory states should be prime causal factors in declining inter-ethnic group trust, more diversity is still associated with less communal trust. Further, he found that low communal trust is associated with the same consequences as low social capital. Putnam says, however, that "in the long run immigration and diversity are likely to have important cultural, economic, fiscal, and developmental benefits."
It's no secret that the racial demographics in the US have seen significant change over the last generation. According to his research, this transformative time will lead to exactly what you're describing, but he conjectures that it will be worth it in the long run.
Not very appealing to the current zeitgeist, or to Putnam himself, but it's the continuation of the 'Bowling Alone' research you mentioned.
As a potential counterpoint to what someone might read from that quote:
> "Putnam denied allegations he was arguing against diversity in society and contended that his paper had been "twisted" to make a case against race-conscious admissions to universities. He asserted that his "extensive research and experience confirm the substantial benefits of diversity, including racial and ethnic diversity, to our society."
Rampant speculation on my part, but I've always suspected that the number of community leaders is small, delicate and disconnected from governments. I've observed that informal leadership in religious communities has an enormous effect on how communities behave - I lived in a town where the baptists organised an almost suspicious number of things for the general community.
I could imagine diversity of religion with no economic incentives to standardise (as would be caused by general poverty) would lead to an element of fracturing in the community. Even without migration, rising trends towards atheism might have the same effect over the long term. It isn't obvious what is symptom and cause in all this though.
I am an Australian visiting Italy at the moment and I find the streets here are just... more vibrant and alive than the equivalent places at home. It is no data point, and shouldn't be seen as one. There are too many differences between Italian and Australian society to lay the blame anywhere in particular. But something is wrong in Australian culture that isn't as obvious in Italy.
That's easy enough to check, compare rates in denser countries/states to more spread out ones or cities vs. suburbs. I have a hunch that the correlation won't be there but it should be interesting either way.
Yes the friendly neighbour idea was last seen in home improvement, the TV show. There is too much fear of placing a foot wrong and ghosting as the norm for mistakes.
Could there have been an upwards blip in civic participation caused by, say, the shared experience of WW2, with everything since then representing a reversion to ordinary behaviour?
I would really like to read the research backing that decline. It certainly feels right but I'm naturally skeptical of anything that smacks of "the good 'ol days."
I'm not anti immigration in general, and in fact my whole family came here from eastern Europe decades ago - though I grew up American-ish, I've always felt different from the members of my communities, partly because culture in my home was not quite American. This is one of the costs of a liberal immigration policy - families from different cultures are less likely to interact closely and form civic societies. The barrier comes in the form of subtle but different social customs, and different values - there's a reason large groups of immigrants tend to self segregate, and it isn't just the convenience of language. That doesn't mean people won't be kind and neighborly, but it limits the depth of the average inter-familial relationship.
The millennials in my cohort, I imagine across the country, were raised by their schooling to be race and culture blind, in a well meaning attempt to encourage cohesiveness. This education did not erase the actual differences that drive different cultures apart, it only made most of us blind to them, which I think makes it more difficult to overcome subtle cultural barriers because it takes time for, especially "suburban white kids", to be aware of and mitigate the soft social friction that comes from cultural clash.
To me, the most obvious cause is women’s increased participation in the workforce. With women no longer free to volunteer and socialize throughout the day, a lot of these community organizations would see a decline in membership.
Even the simple decline in people who identify their neighbour as a friend can be explained by a lack of women living and socializing in the neighbourhood during the daytime. The increased use of paid childcare would similarly reduce the amount of children living and playing in the neighbourhood during the day.
Overall, this would contribute to the feeling that the suburbs are ghost towns during the day, and families arriving home from school/work would rush inside to eat dinner before chauffeuring the kids to all of their extracurriculars.
I'm sure there's a number of factors, but the problem I've witnessed the most is the general break up of the home. Most often I've seen caused by a father being absent. There has been a measurable decline in the lives of men in our society.
> To me, the most obvious cause is women’s increased participation in the workforce
Maybe. But I'll counter with my own anecdote. I raised my daughter as a single working dad. No mother in the home at all. And yet, I got in plenty of volunteering and socializing anyway.
You did a heroic job then. I was raised by a single, working dad. I spent a lot of time at my grandparents place, uncles and aunts, and at a home day care run by a family friend.
My dad spent most of his time on the road, as a travelling salesman. I did spend more time with him as life went on, however. My dad never volunteered though, and all of his social connections were former high school friends that he saw once or twice a year.
My dad did a heroic job, too. I’ll always be grateful for him raising me. I still wish I had had a mom at home though, like most of my friends did.
Interesting thought. Wouldn't you think though that women would have gained social capital by being in a workplace with other people rather than being at home alone?
One way to think of it is that the connections you make in the workplace run in one direction. The connections you make throughout the community run orthogonal to that. Combined, the two build up the social "fabric".
However, when you shift the majority of connections to those made through the workplace, you end up with just a bunch of connections running roughly parallel to each other. Not so much a fabric as a pile of string.
Probably many flaws to this analogy, but that is basically the idea of "third places". That you need somewhere where people interact based on something different from what they do for a living or who their direct family members are.
One thing that comes to mind is that women’s lives have changed so much from 1960s - 1990’s. Women having less children, getting married later and interring the workforce.
I’m not saying we need to move backwards. But we do need to find a new way forward. Perhaps the concept of full time work needs to change the most.
>Perhaps the concept of full time work needs to change the most.
This. We're at a point where many jobs could be done in 15-20 hours a week, but we require everyone to punch in and out like it's a factory.
I live in flyover country, and work in higher education. I have exempt staff. Some weeks they have 2 hours worth of work, some weeks they have 70. But, because the cultural norm is that you can't be productive unless you're filling seats from 8-5, they waste 38 hours some weeks, and don't meet the requirements of the extra 30 others.
It's just outrageous, and I don't understand it. This is 2020. It's the real future now. Let's grow up as a society.
The problem is everytime someone seems to discuss shorter work hours or work weeks, they also ship in a pay cut as well. If I can he equally as productive in 4 hours as I am in 8 hours as a salaried employee, why should I be paid less?
I agree with you, you shouldn't be paid less. The problem is in larger companies rarely are you paid according to the value you create. Mostly likely as a developer your "cost" is how much the hiring manager would need to pay for the next best equivalent worker.
I'm questioning if we're paid according to how productive we are. The more steps there are between you and revenue the less likely this seems to be true.
Because you aren't really paid based on hard results in large companies, the 8 hours becomes more about posturing than actually delivering the results.
I'm open to other ideas. I desperately want to work 20 hours a week instead of 40. I'm trying to better understand why we're stuck at 40.
One very great place to start fixing this would be all "benefits" being public.
Public healthcare (as a baseline for any luxury private care to beat).
Public vacation / family leave (pooling the liability, seniority, and policies in to a common system).
In this way the funding for these benefits becomes taxes and their distribution disconnected from the employment at any particular business, as well as from the business paying any particular employee.
I'm unsure if this would lead to an increase in socialization and not just a lot of people in their own houses playing video games and watching Netflix.
I think it would lead to an increase in socialization. I am unable to join service leagues or social organizations because the 4-5 hours between work and sleep at night are precious to me and my family. If I did not have that thought hanging over my head, I would volunteer more or just go do social things more in a formal setting.
I think this is really up to the individual, when I "work from home", I frequently go to artsy cafes around my city to be surrounded with people who are doing different things to get some human interaction (and maybe feel a bit younger than I do sitting behind a desk).
The trend of declining participation in religious organizations, civic organizations (like the League of Women Voters), fraternal societies (like the Elks or Masons), volunteer associations, labor unions, and sports leagues has been happening since at least the 1970s. Surveys of Americans have found a consistent decline in the number of self-reported close friends since as far back as the 1980s. Same for those who reported being friends with their neighbors. Indicators of social capital like the percent of people who donate blood have been falling since the 1970s.
The point is increasing levels of isolation and misanthropy is a manifestation of a broader trend towards declining social capital. And that trend has been ongoing for probably 50 years. Social media may have accelerated it, but I don't think it would have anywhere near the same impact if Facebook was introduced to the American society of 1960.