In contrast to agency, determinist explanations tend to see human behaviour as the result of external factors, such as the influence of the mass media; the effects of socialisation into a family structure; or the application of rigid caste or class systems, rather than as generated by internal motivation and intention.

A determinist stance is indeed supported by everyday observation. The gender, family, ethnic background, geographical location, social class, the stage of technological development into which someone is born is, or appears to be, a completely random occurrence, but once known we can with some degree of certainty predict a person’s educational attainment, the kind of career they will undertake, the health problems they will encounter and the age at which they will die. In a further twist we might also predict the likelihood of their rebelling against social expectations before going on to fulfil them.

Each of us has to a greater or less extent a life mapped out; in more traditional societies this is heavily proscribed by law and enforcing of customs but in open societies it is created by social expectation. In regard to the latter, Berger (1966: 13) wryly comments that on investigating the phenomenon of ‘falling in love’ one finds:

channels of interaction which are almost rigid to the point of ritual. The suspicion tends to draw on one that, most of the time, it is not so much the emotion that creates a certain type of relationship, but that carefully planned relationships eventually generate the desired emotion. In other words once certain conditions have been met or have been constructed one allows oneself ‘to fall in love’.

This is a telling example but there are problems in seeing social behaviour as ‘determined’. For example, nearly all of us have repeated experiences of seeing people acting in ways they are not expected to do: they marry the ‘wrong’ partner, they start from a humble beginning and have meteoric careers, they are brought up in stable and loving families and they ‘go off the rails’, they protest and develop militant attitudes. As human beings, we transgress as well as conform. We do not simply soak up what is around us, our lives are invested with personal meaning.

Second, and leading from the above, societies are not static. This is arguably much more the case in a post modern world in which customs and traditions weigh less heavy on us and we have a wider range of choice. If, for example, we take the idea of courtship and marriage proposed by Berger we find same sex partnership sits alongside arranged marriage in many western countries and that attitudes to cohabitation and divorce have undergone considerable changes in more traditional societies.

There is no satisfactory account of how our behaviour is determined though there has been many attempts to do so. Structural functionalism was influential in the fields of anthropology, politics and sociology particularly in the in the 1950’s and 1960’s and identified ways in which norms, customs, traditions and institutions held society together. While this provided a lens on social institutions it did not provide an explanation of internal motivation - the idea of latent functionalism was even introduced by some to describe how the real purpose of activity might be hidden from those taking part. Social constructivism in the 1960s provided another attempt but was as much concerned with the limits of agency as structural determination. Ethnomethodology, meanwhile, seemed to blame determinism on our limited imagination and marxism on a hegemonic culture that managed the consent of populations (see Sassoon 1987).

Today cultural studies and critical discourse analysis provide a new lens on power and identity but leave many questions unanswered. Where we stand on determinism versus human agency is, ironically, framed to some extent by our own experiences and background, but for many the idea of a determined life sits uneasily with an assumption as to what it means to be human. While conformity was for Berger (1966) the subject of gentle teasing, for others it is a matter of regret and condemnation. Indeed emancipatory pedagogy and participative approaches to research ask us to challenge what is taken for granted. Challenging conformity is underpinned by normative judgements and it can be asked why should people not choose to accept ‘the hand they have been dealt’ if they feel that the consequences of change might be worse (see game theory). Indeed by taking most aspects of the world for granted some are better able to expend time and energy in looking at arenas in which agency can flourish.

Undoubtedly most social researchers today accept, in the gendered language of the time, that ‘men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please;; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered. (Marx 1935: 244). Researchers tend to see ‘determination’ more as a question of probability (‘life chances’ are loaded one way or another); of habitus or disposition formed though experience (Bourdieu, 1977); and of varying degrees of access to ‘cultural’ and ‘social capital’ rather than the inevitable consequences of privilege or deprivation. Culture appears to be a major constraint on agency but following Giddens (1984) we are more ready to see how we ourselves contribute to, and maintain, cultures rather than seeing culture as reified and immovable.

Many researchers remain deeply interested in identifying factors which influence behaviour at a group level but are wary of extrapolating from this to claim insight into the decisions taken by particular individuals.

As with all perspectives on social research the focus on determinism has shifted over time. Social research today seems on balance to be ‘underdetermined’ in that many studies have a specific focus on the individual, the text or the case while neglecting the wider context. In contrast, some research appears ‘over determined’ and refuses to recognise that the outcomes being reported could have been very different if other choices had been made. To understand the nature of determinism researchers need to review data carefully and look as much for what is not said and is said. In interviewing the researcher should seek to develop lines of hypothetical questioning, for example ‘what would happen if you tried to change your behaviour?’, and to imagine what ‘could be’ for a group, an organization or a sect rather than simply describing ‘what is’. Researchers might try to view, and ask collaborators and respondents to view, the same event, first, as if it were a product of intentional social activity and second as determined by factors external to the participants. Which approach better fits the data as they have been represented?

References

Berger, P. (1966) Invitation to sociology, London: Penguin.

Bourdieu, P. (1977) Outline of a theory of practice, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Giddens, A. (1984) The Constitution of society, United States: The University of California Press. Marx, K. (2000) Selected writings, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Parsons, T. (1951) The social system, London: Routledge.

Sassoon, A. (1987) On Gramsci and other writings, London: Lawrence and Wishart.