Networks in the Global Village examines how people live through personal communities: their networks of friends, neighbors, relatives, and coworkers. It is the first book to compare the communities of people around the world. Major social differences between and within the First, Second, and Third Worlds affect the opportunities and insecurities w

Barry Wellman

Preface -- The Network Community: An Introduction -- The Elements of Personal Communities -- The Network Basis of Social Support: A Network Is More Than the Sum of Its Ties -- Neighbor Networks of Black and White Americans -- Social Networks Among the Urban Poor: Inequality and Integration in a Latin American City -- The Diversity of Personal Networks in France: Social Stratification and Relational Structures -- Network Capital in Capitalist, Communist, and Postcommunist Countries -- Getting a Job Through a Web of Guanxi in China -- Personal Community Networks in Contemporary Japan -- Using Social Networks to Exit Hong Kong -- Net-Surfers Don't Ride Alone: Virtual Communities as Communities