Free Will

Category: Fields of research

Free will refers to the ability of individuals to make completely free choices, regardless of any external or internal limitations. While the existence of absolute free will has been the subject of many philosophical and scientific debates, for social scientists more important question is whether people possess enough reflexivity to make decisions that are not limited by social, economic, cultural, and political structures.

According to the individualistic approach, society and its characteristics are the product of the actions of actors who act freely, because they have the ability to understand themselves, society, and their own position in society. Actors pursue their own goals and based on that, they can direct or reshape the society in which they live. Examples of the individualistic approach are symbolic interactionism, ethnomethodology, phenomenology, existentialism, and rational choice theories. According to the collectivist approach, society and its characteristics are the product of a social structure, which shapes, directs, and limits the activities of individuals and groups; examples of the collectivist approach are functionalism, structuralism, and Marxism.

Anthony Giddens’ structuration theory is in the middle between those two opposing sociological ontologies - individualism and collectivism. Structuration theory rejects the extreme views of both approaches, but at the same time incorporates the best aspects of both approaches. The essential difference between a collectivist and an individualist approach can be reduced to the contrast between emphasizing the importance of structure (collectivist approach) and actors (individualist approach). The main goal of Giddens' structuration theory is to overcome this, in his opinion, the apparent dualism between the actions of actors (agency) and structures. He proposes a very different conception of structure. He believes that structure should be understood as abstract models that exist as "virtual" because they exist "outside of time and space" and are "subject-less" and represent, most often, unconscious products of the reproduction of human practice. This view of structure corresponds to the way language is viewed in Lévi-Strauss structuralism. The product of this view of the structure is what Giddens calls the "duality of structure." The structure no longer acts only as something external and limiting, but also gives active and acting potential to the actors. The structure provides rules (syntax) by which actors direct their activities, but, on the other hand, it gives them the freedom to act. In that sense, the structure is, at the same time, a medium, but also a product of action. It is this duality of structure that forms the basis of the process of structuration.

Giddens also gives a new view of the actions of actors (agency). Similar to the individualistic approach, Giddens believes that actors act freely, have the ability to understand themselves, society, and their position in it, strive to achieve their own goals, and are therefore able to direct or reshape the society in which they live. He adapts the scheme of dividing the personality into three parts by dividing the actor's consciousness into three aspects: 1) discursive consciousness, 2) practical consciousness, and 3) unconscious. Three psychic mechanisms are active in the action of the actors: reflexive monitoring, rationalization, and motivation. Practical consciousness and rationalization represent common knowledge that allows actors to act, in a rules-limited, social life. Analysis of practical consciousness is most important for understanding the structuration process.

Actors acquire knowledge of the rules through previous activities, and apply these rules in new situations, but, at the same time, they react in a reflexive way to the specific circumstances of each situation. That reflexive reaction is the core of Giddens's concept of “reflexivity”. Actors are free in their actions, but they generally follow the rules to avoid ontological uncertainty. Ontological security is the product of the unconscious part of human consciousness, and it represents a state in which the actors feel calm and secure while performing activities, and the state of greatest security is achieved when the activity is performed routinely. As soon as the actors become unable to carry out routine activities, they feel the psychological effects of anomie and thus tend to create new routines, which are adapted to the changed circumstances. Routine behavior gives individuals ontological security but also rules for everyday social life. Discursive consciousness is the ability of actors to express and explain in words their own knowledge of the structure and its rules and resources. Actors always have an unconscious and practical consciousness of routine activities, but often do not have a discursive consciousness of these activities, that is, they are not able to interpret and explain to themselves and others the rules of the structure that manages routine activities.

References:

Archer. Culture and Agency: The Place of Culture in Social Theory (1988);

- Realist Social Theory: The Morphogenetic Approach (1995);

- Critical Realism: Essential Reading (1998);

- Rational Choice Theory: Resisting Colonisation (2000);

Crozier. Actors and Systems: The Politics of Collective Action (1980, in French 1977);

Douglas. Everyday Life: Reconstruction of Social Knowledge (1970);

- Understanding Everyday Life: Toward the Reconstruction of Sociological Knowledge (1971);

- Existential Sociology (1977);

- Introduction to the Sociologies of Everyday Life (1980);

Fromm. Escape from Freedom (1941);

Giddens. The Constitution of Society: Outline of the Theory of Structuration (1984);