Topic
Agency (philosophy)
About: Agency (philosophy) is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 10461 publications have been published within this topic receiving 350831 citations. The topic is also known as: Thought & Human agency.
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19 Dec 2005TL;DR: Taking Power as discussed by the authors analyzes the causes behind some three dozen revolutions in the Third World between 1910 and the present, and proposes a theory that integrates political, economic, and cultural factors that brought these revolutions about, and links structural theorizing with original ideas on culture and agency.
Abstract: Taking Power analyzes the causes behind some three dozen revolutions in the Third World between 1910 and the present. It advances a theory that seeks to integrate the political, economic, and cultural factors that brought these revolutions about, and links structural theorizing with original ideas on culture and agency. It attempts to explain why so few revolutions have succeeded, while so many have failed. The book is divided into chapters that treat particular sets of revolutions including the great social revolutions of Mexico 1910, China 1949, Cuba 1959, Iran 1979, and Nicaragua 1979, the anticolonial revolutions in Algeria, Vietnam, Angola, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe from the 1940s to the 1970s, and the failed revolutionary attempts in El Salvador, Peru, and elsewhere. It closes with speculation about the future of revolutions in an age of globalization, with special attention to Chiapas, the post-September 11 world, and the global justice movement.
157 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors propose an ontology of place, placelessness, and movement that is new, fresh, enriching and potentially empowering in a particularly politicized form of identity practice.
Abstract: The rise of and reactions to identity politics and practice have precipitated renewed debates about ontology in geography. Actor‐network theory (ANT) and ‘non‐representational theory’ have much to offer these discussions. Their de‐centered notions of ‘agency’, topological (rather than Cartesian) spatial imaginations, and what I term ‘humble’ ontologies offer a way out of the seeming paradox presented by various binarisms underlying contemporary social theory and philosophy, such as structure/agency, essentialism/constructionism, subject/object, and theory/practice. The value of these approaches is very apparent when considering a particularly politicized form of identity practice: queer identity quests. They lead to (among other things) ontologies of place, placelessness and movement that are new, fresh, enriching and potentially empowering.
156 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that the use of discourse as a shorthand for ways of talking about an issue is a sign of a growing tendency among some feminist political scientists to use discourse as shorthand for discussing an issue, and argue that subject "agency" is the extent to which subjects can use discourses or are constituted by them.
Abstract: The purpose of this article is to provoke much‐needed discussion on the uses by feminists, in particular feminist political scientists, of the language of discourse, discourses and discursive. The terms, it argues, have become ubiquitous, with considerable confusion about intended meanings. A particular concern is the growing tendency among some feminist political scientists to use “discourse” as shorthand for ways of talking about an issue. Critical to sorting through different meanings of discourse, it argues, is the question of subject “agency”—the extent to which subjects can use discourses or are constituted by them. As a way forward the article advances a dual‐focus agenda that builds bridges across discourse traditions; identifying both the ways in which interpretive and conceptual schemas delimit understandings, and the politics involved in the intentional deployment of concepts and categories to achieve specific political goals.
156 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examine the historical and contemporary discursive practices of anti-trafficking campaigns and argue that such campaigns within the global North, often led by feminists, constitute the moral reform arm of contemporary anti-immigrant politics that targets negatively racialized migrants.
Abstract: This essay critically examines the historical and contemporary discursive practices of anti-trafficking campaigns. I argue that such campaigns within the global North, often led by feminists, constitute the moral reform arm of contemporary anti-immigrant politics that targets negatively racialized migrants. As in the past, current campaigns collude with a state-backed international security agenda aimed at criminalizing self-determined migrations of people who have ever-less access to legal channels of migration. I argue that only by recognizing the agency, however constrained, of illegalized migrants can we come to understand how processes of capitalist globalization and the consequent effects of dislocation and dispersal shape the mobility of illegalized migrants. Within the current global circuits of capital, goods, and people, I argue that along with a call to end practices of displacement, a demand to eliminate immigration controls is necessary if feminists are to act in solidarity with the dispossessed in their search for new livelihoods and homes.
156 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors discuss the role of compassion in the origins of social entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurs as an embedded agent with individual motivations, and the combination of a social mission with the methodology of a business venture.
Abstract: The article presents the authors' comments on critiques of their research on the process of social entrepreneurship in which economic theories are applied to social problems. Topics include the role of compassion in the origins of social entrepreneurship; social entrepreneurs as an embedded agent with individual motivations; and the combination of a social mission with the methodology of a business venture.
155 citations