Elder-Vass on the Causal Power of Social Structures

In this review essay, I examine the central tenets of sociologist Dave Elder-Vass’s recent contribution to social ontology, as put forth in his book The Causal Power of Social Structures: Emergence, Structure and Agency. Elder-Vass takes issue with ontological individualists and maintains that social structures exist and have causal powers in their own right. I argue that he fails to establish his main theses: he shows neither that social structures have causal powers “in their own right” (in any sense of this expression) nor that they exist

Agency (philosophy · Epistemology · Individualism · Methodological individualism · Ontology · Political science · Politics · Power (physics · Social ontology · Social science · Social structure · Sociology · Structure and agency · Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice · Critical Realism in Sociology · Emile Durkheim and Sociology · Psychology · Law · Philosophy · Social Psychology

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