The Logics of Social Structure [Paperback]

An interesting approach to the study of social structure, drawing on developments in the physical, biological and cognitive sciences.In this book, the author proposes an interesting approach to the study of social structure, presenting a conceptualization of the processes of societal formation by drawing on developments in the physical, biological and cognitive sciences.In this book, the author proposes an interesting approach to the study of social structure, presenting a conceptualization of the processes of societal formation by drawing on developments in the physical, biological and cognitive sciences.In this book, the author proposes a fundamental new approach to the study of one of the most central concepts in social analysis, that of social structure. He critiques the leading models and argues that each is inadequate to the task of explaining the complexity of structures that make up society and the processes by which these structures are formed and are interlinked. A new conceptualization of the processes of societal formation is then presented, drawing on recent developments in the physical, biological and cognitive sciences. This new conceptualization allows for the multiplicity of processes of structuration, which the author refers to as logics, some of which function at the individual or micro level, others of which function at the organizational or meso level, and still others of which function at the society-wide, or macro level. The author terms this new conceptualization a theory of heterarchy, and it is the first truly comprehensive theory of societal structuration.Preface; Introduction; Part I. Metatheoretical Considerations: 1. Epistemic strategies in contemporary science; 2. The dynamics of emergence: the case against reductionism; 3. The nature of hierarchical and heterarchical organization; 4. Some formal theses on hierarchy and heterarchy; Part II. Compositionist Logics: 5. Methodological individualism; 6. Constructionism/compositionló+