Institutions, Interaction and Social Theory

220 Pages·2017·2.347 MB·English

by  Will Gibson, Dirk vom Lehn

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institutions,
interaction and
social theory
will gibson & dirk vom lehn
THEMES IN SOCIAL THEORY
Series Editor: Rob Stones
This series explores how cutting-edge research within the social sciences relies on
combinations of social theory and empirical evidence. Different books examine
how this relationship works in particular subject areas, from technology and
health to politics and human rights. Giving the reader a brief overview of the
major theoretical approaches used in an area, the books then describe their
application in a range of empirical projects. Each text looks at contemporary
and classical theories, provides a map of primary research carried out in the
subject area and highlights advances in the field. The series is a companion to
the Traditions in Social Theory series, founded by Ian Craib and edited by Rob
Stones.
Published
CRIME AND SOCIAL THEORY
Eammon Carrabine
HEALTH AND SOCIAL THEORY
Fernando De Maio
INSTITUTIONS, INTERACTION AND SOCIAL THEORY
Will Gibson and Dirk vom Lehn
POLITICS AND SOCIAL THEORY
Will Leggett
TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIAL THEORY
Steve Matthewman
HUMAN RIGHTS AND SOCIAL THEORY
Lydia Morris
INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION AND SOCIAL THEORY
Karen O’Reilly
ENVIRONMENTS, NATURES AND SOCIAL THEORY
Damian F. White, Alan P. Rudy and Brian J. Gareau
Forthcoming
GENDER WORK AND SOCIAL THEORY
Kate Huppatz
IDENTITY AND SOCIAL THEORY
Stephanie Lawler
TRADITIONS IN SOCIAL THEORY
Founding Editor: Ian Craib
Series Editor: Rob Stones
This series offers a selection of concise introductions to particular traditions
in sociological thought. It aims to deepen the reader’s knowledge of
particular theoretical approaches and at the same time to enhance their wider
understanding of sociological theorising. Each book will offer: a history of the
chosen approach and the debates that have driven it forward; a discussion of
the current state of the debates within the approach (or debates with other
approaches); and an argument for the distinctive contribution of the approach
and its likely future value. The series is a companion to the Themes in Social
Theory series, edited by Rob Stones.
Published
PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE (Second Edition)
Ted Benton and Ian Craib
CRITICAL THEORY
Alan How
MARXISM AND SOCIAL THEORY
Jonathon Joseph
THE SIMMELIAN LEGACY
Olli Pyyhtinen
MICRO SOCIAL THEORY
Brian Roberts
WEBER AND THE WEBERIANS
Lawrence A. Scaff
STRUCTURATION THEORY
Rob Stones
Forthcoming
POST-STRUCTURALISM AND AFTER
David Howarth
Institutions, Interaction
and Social Theory
Will Gibson and Dirk vom Lehn
© Will Gibson and Dirk vom Lehn 2018
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work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published 2018 by
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Contents
Series Foreword vii
1 Introduction 1
Institutions and Interaction 1
‘Interactionist’ Approaches 3
The Sociological Study of Interaction 5
Contemporary studies of institutions 12
Theory and the Study of Social Institutions 16
Organization of the Book 17
How to Use This Book 21
2 Symbolic Interactionism 22
Symbolic Interactionism and the ‘Chicago School’ 22
Institutions and Meaningful Action: E.C. Hughes and the
‘Chicago School’ 24
The Conceptual Aims of Chicago ‘Institutional’ Studies 25
Erving Goffman 36
Conclusions 43
3 Ethnomethodology and Conversation Analysis 44
Institutions and Social Practice 44
The Emergence of Ethnomethodology 45
The Principles of Ethnomethodology 47
Adequate Description 47
Context and Action: Reflexivity 49
Conversation Analysis 51
Some Basic Features of Conversation Analysis 52
Conversation Analysis and Institutional Interaction 56
Summary 64
Workplace Studies 65
Conclusions 66
v
vi Contents
4 Healthcare 67
Introduction 67
Interactionist Studies of Healthcare 72
Conclusions 85
5 Education 88
Introduction 88
Educational Policy, Practice and Identity 93
Pedagogy and Classroom Action 99
Conclusions 108
6 Markets 110
Introduction 110
Markets and Embeddedness 111
Institutions and Markets 112
Markets, Culture and Community 114
Market Transactions in Interaction 118
Price and Value 126
Conclusions 132
7 Art and Culture 134
Introduction 134
Art and Industry in Contemporary Society 135
Art Production in the Age of New Media 136
Art Worlds and Organizational Theory 138
Praxis and Technology 141
Investigating the Audience 148
Conclusions 155
8 Conclusion 158
‘Institutionalisms’ and Social Action 158
From ‘Interactionism’ to ‘Interactionisms’ 162
Differences between Symbolic Interactionism and EMCA 162
Methodological Implications of Variations between ‘Interactionisms’ 165
‘Interactionism’, ‘Mainstream Sociology’ and the Study of Institutions 169
Interactionisms and the Study of Institutions 171
Endnotes 174
References 175
Index 197
Series Foreword
Institutions, Interaction and Social Theory is a valuable, original contribution to
the currently existing literature on organizations and institutions. These entities
are at the very heart of social life, and are constantly analysed and discussed
precisely because of this. Too often, however, this sustained attention fails to
pay sufficient attention to the standpoints and perspectives of those involved.
Will Gibson and Dirk vom Lehn’s volume directly and effectively addresses this
weakness in the literature. They set out quite explicitly to promote and foster
an understanding of the ground-level perspectives of the participants whose
practices make institutions and organizations what they are. Their book com-
bines this mission with a commitment to the methodologies appropriate to
it. That is, qualitative methodologies that are sensitive and alert to the many
aspects of the micro processes involved in unfolding practices and interactions.
In emphasizing the importance of these elements, Institutions, Interaction and
Social Theory challenges social theory to come down from the mountaintops,
to descend from the lofts and garrets of abstraction.
Steeped in the spirit of the major forms of interactionism – symbolic interac-
tionism, ethnomethodology and conversation analysis – Gibson and vom Lehn
are sceptical of the kind of social theory that creates concepts and categories far
from the fray of real-world interactions. More subtly, the authors are equally
as wary of ideas and concepts that are originally derived from close observa-
tions and involvement in the messy goings-on within social life, only to be then
given too much of a life of their own. Gibson and vom Lehn insistently caution
us against freezing and reifying theoretical categories created in response to
a particular context; they warn us against simply adopting these unproblem-
atically in examining other contexts. Revealing their affinity with the ethos of
grounded theory, they advise us not to simply pick up and use such concepts
when addressing other new settings. They note the perils of misunderstanding
lying in wait for those who are too unrefined in the way they transfer concepts
across situations, making too few adjustments in response to the unique quali-
ties and characteristics of each new case.
This interactionist spirit presents a profound challenge to social theory. At
its most radical it would disallow all second-order theoretical concepts and
categories. That is, it would prohibit all theoretical concepts of the kind that
go beyond the ways of thinking and acting that actors involved in real-world
vii
viii Series Foreword
practices and interactions themselves apply to their own thinking and act-
ing. In this most radical version, the only justifiable concepts would be those
employed by social actors in situ. These are concepts used by social actors in
their negotiations with empirical data as they themselves engage in the sense-
making activities of everyday life. In a less radical version of interactionism,
second-order theoretical concepts would be allowed. In this version, the more
abstract theoretical concepts would be acknowledged to be potentially illumi-
nating and useful. Here, concepts are allowed to go beyond the views of actors;
they are acknowledged to enable us to think usefully about such things as social
structure, interdependencies, power, time, space, conflict, language, and so on,
without always having to reference the perspectives of involved actors. How-
ever, when approaches influenced by the interactionist traditions do allow these
second-order categories, they never lose sight of the fact that these are indeed
‘external’ abstractions. They never forget that the forms of analysis lack refer-
ence to the inner-worlds of participating actors. Proponents of this less radical
version, too, thus remain constantly aware of the dangers of reification, of the
temptation to extend second-order concepts beyond their legitimate remit. As
soon as theorists or researchers want to make claims about the motivations,
desires, imagination, knowledge, reasoning, intentions, priorities and so on of
human actors then this strand of interactionism, too, insists that such claims
must be firmly grounded in the ideas and perspectives of those very same actors.
In other words, it is insisted that at a certain point researchers will have to com-
plement their second-order concepts with the first-order notions central to the
interpretivist, interactionist traditions.
Both radical and less radical versions of the interactionist spirit are repre-
sented within the pages of Gibson and vom Lehn’s rich and stimulating account.
It will be up to the reader to decide which of the two versions is dominant
within the volume, and which of them is the most persuasive. Certainly, both
versions throw down the gauntlet to overly abstract theory, and it would be
difficult to read this book carefully and still feel it was intellectually respectable
to simply ignore the implications of the interactionist spirit. In the core middle
chapters of Institutions, Interaction and Social Theory the authors bring their
arguments vividly to life through vibrant, illustrative case studies of interac-
tions in organizations within the varied fields of healthcare, education, markets,
and art. They do this by drawing on the micro theories, concepts, and research
methodologies introduced in Chapters 1 to 3, showing what these look like
when applied to a broad range of sub-worlds and settings.
At the same time, we should be clear that it is important never to dispense
too quickly or unquestioningly with the second-order constructs of theory.
These also have a major role to play in deepening our understanding of the
social world. They are almost always relevant and useful. Most of the books in
the Themes in Social Theory series combine, in different ways and to different
degrees, concerns with both first-order and second-order concepts. That is, they
Series Foreword ix
combine varying degrees of sensitivity to the perspectives of the actors involved
in the social worlds they examine with a parallel sensitivity to the larger scales
of social life. By the larger scales of social life I mean some of those concerns
mentioned above: concerns, for example, with social structures, with relations
of power and stratification, with the form and distribution of resources and
technology, and with dominant cultural norms. To a certain extent these forces
will be visible, as Gibson and vom Lehn quite rightly point out, within micro
interactions. There will also be certain aspects of these forces, however, which
are not visible within a particular set of interactions-in-focus, but which have
provided the causal conditions enabling the micro interactions to take place
and pushing them in certain directions. These are the prior conditions of exist-
ence that make the events of a particular setting possible, and which often also
make it more than likely that they will come about. The shape and content of
a particular set of interactions in a given setting will routinely be affected by
the relations of power and interdependence between the people in this setting
and people situated elsewhere in space (out of immediate vision). When the best
macro-oriented theorists talk about contextualizing events and interactions in
broader social structures, this is what they mean. Gibson and vom Lehn’s argu-
ment is at its most powerful when it warns such theorists of the abstract and
the large-scale against reifying the concepts they use to train their sights on both
events and interactions in the here and now and on the conditions of existence
of these, which exist in large part elsewhere. That is, their argument is at its
most impressive in holding theorists and researchers – whatever their object
of investigation – to much more stringent, interactionist standards than is rou-
tinely required by other approaches.
These issues go to the heart of the aims of this book series, which are to
deepen understandings of the role of social theory in the creation and validation
of the most valuable empirical research in the social sciences. The Themes in
Social Theory series rests upon a belief in the importance of seriously exploring
the vast terrain upon which theory and the empirical meet. It extends an invita-
tion to readers to share in this exploration. Each book takes on a specialized
substantive area of research, and the books published so far have covered the
fields of health, technology, international migration, human rights, the environ-
ment and nature, politics, crime, and now interactions within organizations and
institutions. The final books in the series, which are in preparation, will focus
on gender and work, and on issues of identity. The task that all the books set
themselves is to excavate the character of the interplay between social theory
and empirical evidence in relation to key themes within their specialized field.
The authors of the volumes in the series write clearly and accessibly even
when the material they are dealing with is intrinsically difficult. They have a
close knowledge of the relevant field and an enthusiasm for the kind of theoreti-
cally informed empirical research that has been produced within it, and possess
a flair for theoretical analysis. Within the general rubric of the series each author