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Agency: What Does It Mean to Be a Human Being?
Richard N Williams1, Edwin E Gantt2, Lane Fischer1
1Department of Counseling Psychology and Special Education, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT, United States.
Frontiers in Psychology
|October 7, 2021
Summary
This study examines the crisis of modernism and its impact on human agency in social science. It proposes an alternative view of agency that preserves meaning and purpose in human action.
Area of Science:
- Social Sciences
- Philosophy
- Modernism Studies
Background:
- The 19th and 20th centuries witnessed "the crisis of modernism" and the rise of postmodernism.
- This intellectual shift significantly impacted the concept of human agency within social science.
- Contemporary scholarship, influenced by neo-Hegelian and postmodern trends, often marginalizes human agency.
Purpose of the Study:
- To analyze the consequences of modernism's crisis on human agency.
- To critique how modern and postmodern social sciences diminish the role of human agency.
- To propose an alternative conception of human agency.
Main Methods:
- Conceptual analysis of modernist and postmodernist thought.
- Examination of social science theories and their treatment of human agency.
- Philosophical argumentation for an alternative model of agency.
Main Results:
- Modern and postmodern social sciences tend to obviate human agency.
- Neo-Hegelian and postmodern trends have minimized agency's role in understanding human action.
- A new conception of human agency is offered, distinct from libertarian free will.
Conclusions:
- The proposed view of agency upholds meaning and purpose in human action.
- This alternative counters social science paradigms that sacrifice agency for abstract theories.
- Reasserting human agency is crucial for a robust understanding of human existence.
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