Realist social theory : the morphogenetic approach
TL;DR: The Morphogenetic Cycle: the basis of the morphogenetic approach 7. Structural and cultural conditioning 8. The morphogenesis of agency 9. Social elaboration.
Abstract: Building on her seminal contribution to social theory in Culture and Agency, in this 1995 book Margaret Archer develops her morphogenetic approach, applying it to the problem of structure and agency. Since structure and agency constitute different levels of stratified social reality, each possesses distinctive emergent properties which are real and causally efficacious but irreducible to one another. The problem, therefore, is shown to be how to link the two rather than conflate them, as has been common theoretical practice. Realist Social Theory: The Morphogenetic Approach not only rejects methodological individualism and holism, but argues that the debate between them has been replaced by a new one, between elisionary theorising and emergentist theories based on a realist ontology of the social world. The morphogenetic approach is the sociological complement of transcendental realism, and together they provide a basis for non-conflationary theorizing which is also of direct utility to the practising social analyst.
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TL;DR: Organization studies became institutionalized as a distinct research field in North America in the 1960s as leading universities expanded to include the new behavioural and management sciences as discussed by the authors and adopted an empiricist epistemology and an atomistic ontology that portrayed formal organizations as isolated, reactive hierarchies adapting to market selection mechanisms.
Abstract: Organization studies became institutionalized as a distinct research field in North America in the 1960s as leading universities expanded to include the new behavioural and management sciences. In keeping with the prevailing image of science, it adopted an empiricist epistemology and an atomistic ontology that portrayed formal organizations as isolated, reactive hierarchies adapting to market selection mechanisms. The further expansion of higher education in North America and Europe in the 1970s and 1980s, especially in business and management studies, together with the failure of the logical empiricist research programme in the Anglo-Saxon philosophy of science and the decline of Fordism, encouraged considerable fragmentation of organization studies around rival frameworks. Additionally, the success of East Asian firms in many international markets and continued divergence of many European forms of capitalism from the US norm led to increasing interest in the role of institutional frameworks in structuring and reproducing competing forms of economic organization. This involved a radical reconceptualization of both the nature of formal organizations and their environments, which complemented developments in evolutionary and institutional economics. As a result, organizations have come to be seen as key mediating collectivities between national and international political-economic institutions and economic outcomes in different kinds of market economy.
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors take issue with Mario Bunge's claim that conceptual and semiotic systems have "compositions, environments and structures, but no mechanisms" and argue that in social systems, social structures can be mechanisms in the sense that such structures are one of the processes in a concrete system that makes it what it is.
Abstract: In this piece the author takes issue with Mario Bunge’s claims that conceptual and semiotic systems have “compositions, environments and structures, but no mechanisms.” Structures, according to Bunge, can never be mechanisms in conceptual and semiotic systems. Contra this the author argues that in social systems, social structures (which are concept-dependent and reproduced and/or transformed, at least in part, semiotically), can be mechanisms in the sense that such structures are one of the processes in a concrete system that makes itwhat it is. As such, not only may conceptual and semiotic systems have mechanisms, but they may also themselves be considered some of the mechanisms that make the social what it is. As such, they can be said to possess powers and liabilities that neither reside at lower levels nor are explainable in terms of the lower level. To hold out the prospect of social explanation by conceptual and/or semiotic mechanisms does not represent an attempt to decouple these systems from mat...
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TL;DR: Structuration theory can be used to consistently and systematically analyse future uncertainties within a flexible sociological framework as discussed by the authors, where the actor-structure interactions over time are modeled as actors.
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TL;DR: This article investigated street-involved youth coping strategies, employing the context of resilience framework to situate an inductive thematic analysis of interviews with 10 current and former SIY, and explored three themes: social distancing; experiences of violence; and self-harm and suicidality.
Abstract: Literature on how street-involved youth (SIY) cope with risky environments remains very limited. This exploratory study investigates SIY's coping strategies, employing the ‘contexts of resilience’ framework (where resilience is understood as a process that changes over time and by environment) to situate an inductive thematic analysis of interviews with 10 current and former SIY. Three themes are explored: social distancing; experiences of violence; and self-harm and suicidality. The first two themes illustrate the double-edged nature of some coping strategies. While social distancing could contribute to isolation from social supports and violent self-defense to retaliatory harm, without alternative resources to prevent victimization these strategies must be acknowledged as reasoned responses to the risks associated with a violent milieu. Strategies assumed to be maladaptive among more normative youth may be among the limited resources available for SIY to utilize in attempts to make positive changes in t...
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors adapt a causal hypothesis from realist social theory and draw on wider perspectives from critical realism to account for the development of capacity to engage in reflection on professional practice in academic roles.
Abstract: Theories of learning typically downplay the interplay between social structure and student agency. In this article, we adapt a causal hypothesis from realist social theory and draw on wider perspectives from critical realism to account for the development of capacity to engage in reflection on professional practice in academic roles. We thereby offer a theory of professional learning that explores how social and cultural structures and personal emergent powers combine to ensure variation in the emergence of such reflective capacity. The influence of these factors on professional learning is mediated through reflexive deliberation and social interaction, with the exercise of one's personal powers specifically identified as a stratum of social reality. We consider further the role of concerns, intention and attention in professional learning, drawing together issues that are rarely considered within the same theory. We thus offer a comprehensive account of professional learning, showing how a focus on struc...
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