The Network Inside Out

Riles, Annelise

doi:10.3998/mpub.15517

Cited by 683 publications

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“…For one, we often find ourselves confronted with notions that seem incompatible, or even incommensurable, with STS modes of understanding (Walford 2013). Ironically, however, problems also arise if the concepts and interpretations of our interlocutors seem "too similar" to our own (Riles 2000).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lateral Concepts

Gad¹,

Jensen²

2016

Engaging STS

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This essay discusses the complex relation between the knowledges and practices of the researcher and his/her informants in terms of lateral concepts. The starting point is that it is not the prerogative of the (STS) scholar to conceptualize the world; all our "informants" do it too. This creates the possibility of enriching our own conceptual repertoires by letting them be inflected by the concepts of those we study. In a broad sense, the lateral means that there is a many-to-many relation between domains of knowledge and practice. However, each specific case of the lateral is necessarily immanent to a particular empirical setting and form of inquiry. In this sense lateral concepts are radically empirical since it locates concepts within the field. To clarify the meaning and stakes of lateral concepts, we first make a contrast between lateral anthropology and Latour's notion of infra-reflexivity. We end with a brief illustration and discussion of how lateral conceptualization can re-orient STS modes of inquiry, and why this matters.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lateral Concepts

Gad¹,

Jensen²

2016

Engaging STS

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“…Riles 2000). It is at this point that the conversation among activists, bureaucrats and academics becomes relevant from activists' point of view.…”

Section: Human Rights As Projectmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One theme emerging from this work concerns the articulation, appropriation, and circulation of academic or artistic knowledge in commercial, bureaucratic and professional contexts (e.g. Brenneis 1999;Born 1995;Marcus & Myers 1995;Latour 1990;Rabinow 1989;Dezalay and Garth 1996;Radway 1997;Riles 2000). In this essay, I am interested in extending this project to an understanding of the work of what I call legal knowledge professionals-academics, bureaucrats, activists self-consciously acting in a transnational and legal domain (Riles, manuscript).…”

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confidence: 99%

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The Virtual Sociality of Rights: The Case of "Women's Rights are Human Rights"

Riles¹

2000

SSRN Journal

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“…By linking production and consumption processes across geographic boundaries, global economic forces have led what were once highly varied communities to adopt similar forms of association and action. And the network form has thus been uniquely associated with globalization, since it adapts the modern formal bureaucratic organization to the demands placed on it by complex, rapidly changing, and highly uncertain environments (Castells 1996;Knoke 1990;Riles 2001). Thus, when scholars consider the mobilizing structures from which social change efforts are likely to emerge, they increasingly find themselves speaking in terms of "networks" of associations (Diani and McAdam 2003;Keck and Sikkink 1998;Khagram et al 2002).…”

Section: Network and Globalizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Structural Approaches in the Sociology of Social Movements

Fetner

2009

Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research

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Sociological research emphasizes how social institutions, such as the family, religion, corporations, and governments influence people's choices about how they live.While acknowledging that individuals have some freedom to pursue different paths, sociologists argue that this freedom is limited in important ways by forces outside the control of individuals. Sociology, therefore, asks how these broader forces operate to affect the actions and beliefs of individuals and groups. As the editors have noted, sociological research on social movements can be classified as adopting either a structural or cultural emphasis. While the former focuses on the distribution of material resources and the organizations and institutions that govern such distribution, the latter approach emphasizes questions about how individuals and groups perceive and interpret these material conditions.In practice, distinguishing between actual material conditions and popular understandings of these can be difficult. For instance, categories of individuals such as gender, class, or ethnicity are structurally defined, but their sociological relevance grows not simply from their existence bur rather from the cultural work of individuals who help define group identities according to these structural categories. As Buechler observes, "[c]ollective identity and political consciousness are thus decisive factors mediating 2 structures of power and collective action " (2000:123). In other words, a group must somehow come to perceive itself as both distinct and subject to unjust material or social conditions. Such "collective identities" are far from automatic, because the "interlocking systems of domination" embedded in broader political and economic structures affect possibilities for social groups to articulate and mobilize around social movement identities. Thus, any attempt to understand social change requires attention to questions about how the resources and power needed to define and defend group interests are distributed within a society. Structural approaches recognize that inequalities are closely linked to macro-level factors such as a country's position in the world economy or to meso-level ones, such as class, race, and gender. Thus, any attempt to reduce inequalities in society must be mindful of how these broad structures are shaping broader power relations.A key starting point for much sociological work is the observation that virtually all societies experience inequality. The benefits and risks of society are nowhere near equally distributed, and therefore we would expect that particular clusterings of people would be more likely candidates for participation in social movements. In particular, more aggrieved groups might be expected to be engaged in protests against the status quo. Important debates have taken place among social movement scholars regarding the role of grievances in the generation of social movements. Early research in social movements saw political protest as emerging from groups that were relatively disadvantaged by the...

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The Network Inside Out

Cited by 683 publications

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Lateral Concepts

Lateral Concepts

The Virtual Sociality of Rights: The Case of "Women's Rights are Human Rights"

Structural Approaches in the Sociology of Social Movements

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