What is a (social) structural explanation?

Philosophical Studies 173 (1):113-130 (2016)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

A philosophically useful account of social structure must accommodate the fact that social structures play an important role in structural explanation. But what is a structural explanation? How do structural explanations function in the social sciences? This paper offers a way of thinking about structural explanation and sketches an account of social structure that connects social structures with structural explanation

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 84,108

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Structural realism and the social sciences.Harold Kincaid - 2008 - Philosophy of Science 75 (5):720-731.
Structural explanation in social theory.Frank Jackson & Philip Pettit - 1992 - In K. Lennon & D. Charles (eds.), Reduction, Explanation, and Realism. Oxford University Press. pp. 97--131.
Explanation and laws.Alexander Bird - 1999 - Synthese 120 (1):1--18.
Contextualism, explanation and the social sciences.Harold Kincaid - 2004 - Philosophical Explorations 7 (3):201 – 218.
Functions and Mechanisms in Structural-Modelling Explanations.Guillaume Wunsch, Michel Mouchart & Federica Russo - 2014 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 45 (1):187-208.
Epistemic Context and Structural Explanation of Belief.Olivier Ouzilou - 2014 - Philosophy of the Social Sciences 44 (5):630-645.
The Concept of Structural Power.Joanna Szalacha - 2008 - Proceedings of the Xxii World Congress of Philosophy 50:781-788.
Causes and Explanations: A Structural-Model Approach. Part II: Explanations.Joseph Y. Halpern & Judea Pearl - 2005 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 56 (4):889-911.

Analytics

Added to PP
2015-01-09

Downloads
819 (#12,577)

6 months
71 (#25,139)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Sally Haslanger
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Citations of this work

Real Talk on the Metaphysics of Gender.Robin Dembroff - 2018 - Philosophical Topics 46 (2):21-50.
Oppressive Things.Shen-yi Liao & Bryce Huebner - 2020 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 103 (1):92-113.
White psychodrama.Liam Kofi Bright - 2023 - Journal of Political Philosophy 31 (2):198-221.
Beyond Binary: Genderqueer as Critical Gender Kind.Robin Dembroff - 2020 - Philosophers' Imprint 20 (9):1-23.
Social Structures and the Ontology of Social Groups.Katherine Ritchie - 2018 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 100 (2):402-424.

View all 117 citations / Add more citations