"There Ain't No Bond in Town Like There Used to Be": The Destruction of Social Capital in the West Virginia Coalfields1

There is a paucity of research focusing on the circumstances that cause or contribute to a decline in social capital within communities. Furthermore, relatively few researchers employ qualitative methods in their studies of social capital, despite the multidimensional and many-layered nature of this concept, characteristics that make social capital well suited for qualitative analysis. To address these two gaps in social capital research, I explore the mechanisms that have led to a depletion of social capital in the southern coal-producing region of West Virginia. I examine whether the coal industry, which has caused bitter conflicts among residents over environmental degradation and union loyalties, has also undermined social capital in the region. My principal data include 40 semi-structured, face-to-face interviews with randomly selected individuals in a coal-mining town and a demographically similar non-coal-mining town in West Virginia. I analyze the experiences of residents in each town, assessing the qualitative differences in community and personal life associated with social capital. I find that the loss of social capital in the coal-mining community has arisen through a combination of depopulation and the community-wide conflict that arose when an anti-union coal company bought out the union coal mine at which many in the community worked, challenging the union identity so engrained in this region.