Social capital theory offers a compelling explanation as to why people are committed to making resources available to others outside of formal institutions. In this article, we build on social capital theory to explain how actors overcome two practical problems endemic to these resource transfers. We present Viviana Zelizer’s relational work theory as a complimentary framework which accounts for when an individual may act on commitments to offer resources and which commitments to act upon when they are in conflict. Drawing on our empirical work on almsgiving to social outcasts and resource transfers at mourning ceremonies in Azerbaijan, we describe how people identify and ascribe their relationships to others by relying on available cultural conventions to mark economic transactions and other media as appropriate or inappropriate. By conceptualizing social capital in this way, we also obtain a process-tracing methodology useful for social researchers and for community activists to generate ideas on how to expand social capital in their own or others’ communities.

社会资本理论提供了一个令人信服的解释，解释为什么人们致力于将资源提供给正规机构之外的其他人。在本文中，我们以社会资本理论为基础来解释行动者如何克服这些资源转移所特有的两个实际问题。我们将 Viviana Zelizer 的关系工作理论呈现为一个补充框架，该框架解释了个人何时可以根据提供资源的承诺采取行动，以及在发生冲突时根据哪些承诺采取行动。借鉴我们在阿塞拜疆的哀悼仪式上向社会弃儿施舍和资源转移的实证工作，我们描述了人们如何通过依赖可用的文化习俗来标记经济交易和其他媒体适当或不适当来识别和归因与他人的关系。