ABSTRACT
Social analysis based on concepts of stakeholders and ‘communities of interest’ helps identify the people, groups and institutions involved in a situation or proposed action. It explores the resources, influence, authority or power that individuals, groups and organizations can apply to a situation and how existing or proposed actions may affect their interests. Stakeholder analysis thus urges social thinking and inquiry that reflects particular contexts and is grounded in real settings. The focus is on specific social actors and what they can do to solve particular problems and achieve their goals using the power and resources they already have or seek to obtain. In its own pragmatic way, the analysis of ‘key actors’ questions much of the standard wisdom of stratification theory and political economy based on handy class definitions that can be applied to all situ - ations. It is also a social actor alternative to positivist methodologies that pay little attention to how actors ‘act’ on their own real-life conditions.
