Identity and Control: A Structural Theory of Social Action

by Harrison Colyar White

In proposing a comprehensive network theory that cuts across the range of social sciences, Harrison White rejects conventional hierarchical models and focuses instead on efforts of control in a social structure described as a tangle of locked-in practices. He argues that the widely held conceptions of person and goal grounded in traditional political economy do not provide a basis for social theory that is either coherent or consistent with current developments in psychology and anthropology. White replaces person with identity, which, in a distinctively human sense, emerges from frictions and social noise across different levels and disciplines in networks. Likewise he reshapes the notion of goals, maintaining that they merely inhabit sets of stories used to explain agency, and that action itself comes through selective strategies to break through formal organization. As his main empirical basis, White uses case studies covering a wide range of topics, including tribal religions, changing rhetorics of industrial administration and the premodern Church, practices of State-building, and change of style in popular music. His analyses draw from English social anthropology, natural science, French rhetorics, mathematics, German industrial history, control engineering, and American pragmatism.

Genres: Sociology, Psychology, Nonfiction, Social Science

423 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1992

Reviews

[Regina]

This book is brilliant but often incomprehensible. I highly recommend Azarian's interpretation, especially to a network theory nubie! White has developed an entirely original theoretical language for thinking about networks and culture, although he never uses the word culture, instead he talks about "netdoms", "identities" and "contexts". I still have trouble working out what he means, I can't imagine anybody knew what he was talking about in 1992! Don't even think about reading this book if you are not committed to braving the background reading required. I am hoping that his 2nd edition will clear things up a bit...

[Ashley Wu · Rating 3 out of 5]

Needed to read and analyze this for my research job— while there are some really brilliant insights (particularly on social networks and ties), the book drained me of a ton of brainpower. Perhaps this is likely due to the fact that I don’t read the most academic literature on abstract concepts, but this was a HARD read.

[Victoria · Rating 5 out of 5]

My professor of organizational sociology described this as the “Ulysses” of network analysis. I loved the book in all its thorny detail and am on my third read through. Wonderfully sensitive and diverse formalism applied to identities and their behavior in various network morphologies.