“Agency” as a Red Herring in Social Theory

Abstract

The central argument of this article is that there is no fact of the matter, no evidence, however tentative or questionable, that will serve adequately to identify actions “chosen” or “determined” for the purposes of sociological theory. This argument will be developed with reference to the two theorists of the greatest importance in advocating the sociological value of the concept of agency: Talcott Parsons, with his “voluntaristic theory of action,” set the scene for the whole agency and structure debate in modern sociology, and Anthony Giddens, in his theory of structuration, provides the most comprehensive recent account. Both theorists put forward grounds and justifications for their use of the concepts of “choice” and “agency,” but it will be argued here that in the last analysis, none of them has any sociological merit.

Modeling Self-Agency among People with Schizophrenia: Empirical Evidence for Consumer-Based Recovery

“…Some theorists may doubt whether there exists any truly autonomous decision and behavior [59,60,61], whether researchers have overromanticized Western conceptions of the individual agency, or whether nonconsciousness rather than one's sense of agency is part of, or the key driving force behind, human choice and behavior [62,63,64]. These doubts will continue but have provided little clue as to the possible directions of remedies and development towards the recovery of people with severe mental illness.…”

A socio-ecological model of agency: The role of psycho-social and socioeconomic resources in shaping education and employment transitions in England

“…Although the concept of agency is a central term in life course theory (Elder, 1998) it has remained an elusive ('slippery') and underspecified theoretical concept (Hitlin & Elder, 2007). As a non-structural factor agency is not universally accepted or valued in sociological theory (Fuchs, 2001;Loyal & Barnes, 2001). Yet, there is a growing interest within sociology to render the mainly theoretical notion of agency into a tangible concept for empirical research.…”

Gender and migration from Albania

“…However, the unique nature of the Albanian migration exodus and the richness of our data provide an opportunity to shed some light on these questions. While avoiding a direct entanglement with long-standing debates on agency (Hitlin and Elder 2007;Loyal and Barnes 2001), we aim to shed light on the growth or decline of independent female action as evident from the evolution of female participation in the international migration process.…”