Compare methods

	Brokerage Analysis	Structural Holes Analysis
Field	Sociology	Sociology
Family	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Year of origin	1989	1992
Originator	Roger Gould & Roberto Fernandez	Ronald S. Burt
Type	Classification of intermediary positions in a network	Ego-network measure of brokerage opportunity and constraint
Seminal source	Gould, R. V., & Fernandez, R. M. (1989). Structures of mediation: A formal approach to brokerage in transaction networks. Sociological Methodology, 19, 89–126.	Burt, R. S. (1992). Structural Holes: The Social Structure of Competition. Harvard University Press. ISBN: 978-0-674-84371-4
Aliases	Gould-Fernandez brokerage, brokerage roles, brokerage typology, structures of mediation	structural holes, Burt constraint, network constraint analysis, effective size analysis
Related	5	5
Summary	Gould-Fernandez brokerage analysis classifies the intermediary positions actors occupy in a network. For every two-path in which an actor v sits between a source i and a target j, the analysis labels v's role according to the group memberships of the three actors, yielding five distinct brokerage types — coordinator, itinerant broker (consultant), gatekeeper, representative, and liaison. Counting how often each actor plays each role reveals who mediates within groups, who controls access across group boundaries, and who bridges otherwise separate communities.	Structural holes analysis, developed by Ronald Burt, measures the brokerage opportunities available to an actor by examining the gaps — structural holes — between their otherwise disconnected contacts. An actor whose contacts do not know each other bridges non-redundant sources of information and control and is said to be rich in structural holes; an actor whose contacts are all interconnected is constrained. The core measures — network constraint, effective size, and efficiency — quantify how much advantage an ego's network structure confers.