Reading fast a lot

Although we consider these findings to be a significant advance over more anecdotal evidence, two methodological observations can be made concerning this traditional manner of analyzing global interlocking directorates.

In the early 2000s Wellman (Wellman 2001) begun countering Robert Putnam’s claim that social capital was declining (Putnam 2000), and argued instead that social capital was moving online (Wellman et al. 2001). More recently, Wellman and Lee Rainie summarized this argument in the idea of networked individualism, the idea that individuals are no longer bound to closely-knit groups, but are instead nodes in sparser global networks (Rainie and Wellman 2012).

To our knowledge, there has been no documented evidence of the existence of a unicorn. With tongue slightly in cheek, there can be two general rationales for our failure to “discover” this legendary species. First, this animal simply does not exist. Second, we have not searched in the right place, at the right time, with the right equipment.