Acting and Passing in Organizational Communication: Agency as Making a Difference

• In Event: On the Various Ways of Studying Agency in Organizational Communication: A Roundtable Discussion

Abstract

Usually associated with the idea of intentionality, the notion of agency tends to be mobilized to mark the room for maneuver that human actors have with regard to the social structures that enable and constrain their actions and interactions (see Giddens, 1984). In contrast with this view, I will show that we are better served by using this construct to refer to “the capacity to make a difference,” a capacity that can be ascribed to human beings, but also to a myriad of things that can alter how a situation unfolds. Methodologically speaking, this means that we must be on the lookout for everything that appears to be active in a situation. It also means that human beings should be analyzed in terms of what leads them to do and say what they do and say, which allows us to recognize how acts are always forms of passing.

Author

• Francois Cooren, U de Montreal