Constructing Social Networks from Biographies

• In Event: 4349 - Issues in Social Network Data, Analysis and Epistemology

Abstract

Scholars have advocated for more research to understand the networks and networking activities of public officials. However, social network data on public officials have been limited and conventional methods for network data collection such as social surveys and participatory observations are not very effective for public officials. Based on the recent advancements in computational social science, in this article we present methods and tools (including an R package) to extract social network information from public officials' biographies and conduct biographic network analysis. We illustrate the methods through a case study of top politicians in China. We combine multiple sources of biographic data and construct five social networks for the politicians based on their shared life episodes as shown in their biographies. Then we examine structural properties of the networks, assess the relative importance of the networks, and present more rigorous and efficient ways of clustering the politicians into groups.

Authors

• Weihua An, Emory University

• Ke Deng, Tsinghua University