ABSTRACT
We humans live in social reality that we ourselves have constructed. From marriage and money to nationstates, the European Union, and the United Nations, we live in the reality that has been constructed by humans in the past and is being maintained by us in the ongoing activities of our everyday lives. In fact, social scientists of the past and present took it for granted that humans construct social reality. For example, the classical sociology of Durkheim (1901/1982) and a more recent rendition of it by Giddens (1976/1993) both took the analysis of social institutions as a central question of sociology (and social sciences). The difference between them mainly lies in their assumption about the extent to which social reality is given (Durkheim) or reproduced in social activities (Giddens). Regardless of the way in which a group of individuals constructs social reality, once constructed, it becomes part of what they take for granted, and thus constrains and enables what they can and may do in the future. Arguably, the main point of the social sciences is to examine the working of social reality from a variety of perspectives.
