Social capital, collective intelligence and expansive learning: Thinking through the connections. Education and the economy

The paper seeks to draw out the connections between social capital, collective intelligence and expansive learning, interrogating the terms for their progressive potential. It sets these concepts within their socioeconomic context, one which asserts that the development of social capital will be a vehicle for economic regeneration and competitiveness as well as a mechanism for the generation of social inclusion and cohesion. It concludes by arguing that the debate is set within a context that accepts capitalist relations and that this places a limit on the progressive potential of social capital, collective intelligence and expansive learning.