Download full text
(136.3Kb)
Citation Suggestion
Please use the following Persistent Identifier (PID) to cite this document:
https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-58840
Exports for your reference manager
Lze najít pojítko mezi vysvětlením a porozuměním?
Can Explanation and Understanding Be Linked?
[journal article]
Abstract The problem of linking 'explanation' & 'understanding' remains unresolved -- as Weber left it. This paper challenges the view that their reconciliation is impossible, as some theorists have maintained. Their case is that the entities involved -- subjective meanings & objective relationships -- are t... view more
The problem of linking 'explanation' & 'understanding' remains unresolved -- as Weber left it. This paper challenges the view that their reconciliation is impossible, as some theorists have maintained. Their case is that the entities involved -- subjective meanings & objective relationships -- are too ontologically different to be combined. From the stratified ontology of Social Realism, which acknowledges that different properties & powers pertain to different components & levels of social reality, this is no barrier in principle to their combination. However, in practice Realists have not given an adequate account of how 'subjectivity' & 'objectivity' are linked, which also weakens Realism's solution to the 'problem of structure & agency.' This paper offers a refinement: the human power of reflexivity is viewed as mediating between our subjective concerns & our objective social contexts. Reflexive deliberations account for what agents actually do -- and they do not all do the same thing -- under very similar social circumstances. The introduction of reflexivity enables the (socially) objective & the (personally) subjective to be combined into a single account of socially structured & structuring action.... view less
Classification
General Concepts, Major Hypotheses and Major Theories in the Social Sciences
Free Keywords
Social Theories; Reality; Agency and Structure; Reflexivity; Ontology
Document language
Czech
Publication Year
2008
Page/Pages
p. 7-22
Journal
Sociologický časopis / Czech Sociological Review, 44 (2008) 1
Status
Published Version; reviewed
Licence
Deposit Licence - No Redistribution, No Modifications