Building social capital with elders' leadership through a community hub "Ibasho" in the Philippines and Nepal.

ABSTRACT: We quantitatively study the Ibasho project-a unique, innovative community-based project that involves co-creating a building as a social hub. Ibasho's decision-making undertakes a bottom-up approach, differentiating itself from the conventional top-down decision-making process. Using sui generis data, we find that Ibasho projects in the Philippines and Nepal contributed to enhancing social capital among elders in both cases. Yet there are differences between the two communities. In the Philippines, participation in Ibasho increased the number of a participant's friends, or "strong ties," indicating that it is on the intensive margin of human relationships. In contrast, joining Nepal's Ibasho broadened weak ties rather than strong ones. This contrast may stem from the difference in pre-exis

SUBMITTER: Aida T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9985593 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature