Meta-power, social organization, and the shaping of social action

Journal/Book: Symb Interact. 1997; 20: 55 Old Post RD-#2, PO Box 1678, Greenwich, CT 06836-1678. Jai Press Inc. 397-418.

Abstract: Interactionist analyses of social organization stimulate examination of how social situations and collective activity are shaped. Meta-power, the creation and control of distal situations, and organization as a structuration of metapower are used as tools for exploring the shaping of situations. Five metapower processes are presented: strategic agency, rules and conventions, structuring situations, culture construction, and empowering delegates. These processes illustrate how situations are created or altered. This paper offers a view of social organization that emphasizes relations among situations, linkages between consequences and conditions, and networks of collective activity across space and time. The conclusion calls for additional research to make more explicit the nature of social organization and its social conditions.

Note: Article Hall PM, Univ Missouri, Dept Sociol, 109 Sociol Bldg, Columbia,MO 65211 USA

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