Qualitative cross-national comparisons of networking practices and experiences: exploring similarities and differences in white-collar networking in Israel, Denmark and the United States

This chapter explores three questions: how social capital is formed and activated through networking, how this process may vary cross-nationally, and what institutional forces underlie cross-national commonalities and variations. The author synthesizes two cross-national comparative studies which use qualitative methods to examine variations and similarities in the networking practices of white-collar workers. This chapter first discusses findings from a comparison of networking among white-collar workers in the US and Denmark, countries with very different levels of unemployment benefits and welfare state regimes, but with similar hiring practices. The second comparison examines networking practices among white-collar workers in Israel and the United States. In this case the comparison is among jobseekers in countries with nearly identically stingy provisions of unemployment benefits, but with very different hiring practices. Taken together, the two cross-national comparisons suggest important links between networking practices and hiring practices.