Abstract: Social capital is an important social resource which encourages citizens to participate in political activities in an orderly way.At the present stage，social capital in China is not well developed，which leads to some problems in citizen participation in politics：the lack of trust in society results in puzzles in collective action and further intensifies the unorderly trend in citizen participation in politics.And there are not relevant regulations to follow because of the lack of a society built on law and mutual benefits.The author concludes that social capital must be well developed to promote citizen participation in politics.In China，efforts are to be made to cultivate citizen awareness of political participation，to change governance pattern of the government，to improve relevant laws and regulations in order to achieve this goal.

Key words: social capital, democratic politics, political participation, state governance, civil society