Structure and Agency in Sociology

STRUCTURE AND AGENCY 1
Structure and agency
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STRUCTURE AND AGENCY 2
Introduction
Structure and agency are two main topics in sociology that brings a controversial debate among
many people. The term structures refer to the system of sociology which restricts and influence
the behaviors of individuals (Burkitt, 2016: p.330). On the other side, the agency in sociology
means the ability of people to come up with their personal decisions and perform them without
external interference (Dahl, 2018: p.180). In the debate of structure and agency, many people are
trying to check the extent to human behaviors are prescribed and the ability of human being to
act independently in various circumstances. In this assignment, it is going to elaborate on the
topic structure and agency and identify how the concepts are essential in making sense in the
society.
The relationship between structure and agency
The relationship between structure and agency have caused a hot debate between philosophers.
Generally, structure and agency need to go together to build a coherent society. Structure mainly
relates to both material and non- material things (Frankel, 2017: p.20), for example, social norms
and traditions. For instance, considering a football club that has some players and a set of
authority. Every player is free to behave according to his or her wish. However, the
administration should able to accommodate the behaviors according to the rules of that particular
sports team. A player cannot behave the way he or she wants but must conform to what the
authority says regarding how the players should act. The structure of the sports team shows that
the club has a set of rules that every member in that club needs to have to coexist freely with
authority. In this case, the rules have limited the behaviors of the members to some extent. The
concept contradict agency which allows everybody to make his or her own decision and be free
to implement it without intimidation