Healthy communities: the challenge of social capital in the Lisbon Metropolitan Area

The debate about social environment, sustainability and health has been highlighted by the interest in social capital. It has been suggested that social capital varies from place to place and that such variations are relevant for explaining variations in health. This paper explores the association between neighbourhood social capital (making a distinction between linking, bonding and bridging social capital) and self-rated health. The study has involved 4,577 residents in 143 neighbourhoods of the Lisbon Metropolitan Area. Logistic regression was used to measure the relationship between social capital and self-rated health. The results show that social capital was strongly associated with self-rated health, even after an adjustment for individual attributes. It is not possible to divorce health planning from urban planning and from the promotion of social capital. A sense of place, identity and belonging needs to be at the core of all healthy planning interventions.