ABSTRACT
In the framework of actor-centered institutionalism, actors are characterized by their orientations and by their capabilities. Corporate actors may achieve identities, purposes, and capabilities that are autonomous from the interests and preferences of the populations they affect and are supposed to serve. On the positive side, this allows a degree of effectiveness and efficiency that collective actors depending immediately on membership preferences could not achieve. Composite actors that must resolve internal conflict through negotiated agreement have a lower capacity for conflict resolution than actors that are able to resort to majority votes or to hierarchical decisions in the face of continuing disagreement. In the cognitive dimension, composite actors depend on interpersonal information processing and communication. The major difficulty with actor-centered approaches is that they must, at bottom, rely on intentional explanations that are inevitably based on subjectivities. The "self-interest" component is meant to describe the basic preference of actors for self-preservation, autonomy, and growth.
