ABSTRACT
Durkheim's challenge that social phenomena should be understood as objective facts' has incited many social theorists to analytically ground this insight. For Durkheim, social phenomena are understood as encompassing a whole collective action, thus existing beyond individual activity. He argues that social life is more than the aggregate of individuals' activities. Structuralist models have been questioned since their very inception. Notably by authors emphasize interactive micro-dynamics among individuals as central to the emergence of the social. Judith Butler's prominent post-structuralist model, based on a combination of Foucauldian and performative stances. Constitutive nature of the performative force of individuals' activity is more clearly developed by Barnes' performative theory of social institutions. Using the conceptual tools of these two positions, the author argues that, as Durkheim suggests, the social' must be conceived as a reality outside a single individual's activities. Social facts are collective accomplishments beyond single individuals that exert coercive force upon them.
