ABSTRACT

This chapter introduces Anthony Giddens's main concepts and perspectives. Giddens's theories are attempts to go beyond the fundamental sociological traditions and the dichotomies objectivism/subjectivism and structure/agency. The focus on the relations between micro and macro levels could be an argument for calling Giddens a social psychologist, since he interprets individual behavior and reflexivity as dialectic in relation to macro-societal changes. Giddens is renowned for two theoretical systems of ideas: the structuration theory and the theory of late modernity and reflexivity. Social systems range from dyads to global formations. Structuration processes is based on the condition that the development of these systems are open-ended. Giddens points towards three interdependent sources of the modernity dynamic: the separation of time and space, the development of disembedding mechanisms, the reflexive appropriation of knowledge. Giddens's theories may in other words be used as a "third way public relations perspective": between managerial, functionalistic and prescriptive traditions and critical and interpretative approaches.