Macrostructural explanation in the social sciences.
Several philosophers have attempted to identify how it is that “social structure” can explain phenomena. Some of the most prominent of these philosophers have posited that what we call “social structures” are sets of constraints acting on individuals that guide and regulate their actions, either coe...
| Publicado en: | Synthese Vol. 204; no. 3; pp. 1 - 24 |
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| Formato: | Artículo |
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Springer Nature
Sep2024
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=179346325&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 179346325 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 00397857 4LI jtl: Synthese issn: 00397857 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Sep2024 vid: 204 iid: 3 pid: 237 pub: Springer Nature artinfo: ui: 179346325 10.1007/s11229-024-04743-4 ppf: 1 ppct: 23 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 967KB tig: atl: Macrostructural explanation in the social sciences. aug: au: Lauer, Richard affil: https://ror.org/05pvqha70 Department of Philosophy, St. Lawrence University, Canton, NY, USA sug: keyword: Explanation Social sciences Social structure Sociology ab: Several philosophers have attempted to identify how it is that “social structure” can explain phenomena. Some of the most prominent of these philosophers have posited that what we call “social structures” are sets of constraints acting on individuals that guide and regulate their actions, either coercing agents into making choices, raising the probability that they will make certain choices, or making those actions reasonable or rational. Others have argued that social structures are factors that “program” for social outcomes. Examining historical work in quantitative sociology, I argue that both views are too narrow. I present Peter Blau’s distinction between microstructure and macrostructure, articulate their differences, and then argue that for some social scientific questions, macrostructural explanations are better positioned to supply answers. Macrostructural explanations abstract away from the relata between individuals and so do not involve constraints. Further, macrostructural explanations draw on facts about population structure, and so do not fit the form of programming explanations. I motivate this category of explanation by considering social scientific research that comports with macrostructural explanation. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y custom: Synthese is a copyright of Springer, 2024. All Rights Reserved. item: Synthese holder: Springer Nature dt: @attributes: year: 2024 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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