ABSTRACT

This chapter illustrates the meaning and use of the notions of structure and structuralism as referred, in particular, to sociology. In sociology, structural analysis, at a micro-analytical level, is focused on the choice between alternatives that are institutionalized, and hence, imposed on individuals. At a macro-analytical level, structural analysis is focused on the unequal, and historically contingent, social distribution of power, authority, influence and prestige. The chapter focuses on the social and individual consequences of this distributive inequality. As from the 1970s, the sociologist Peter M. Blau, who had distinguished himself for his contribution to exchange theory, aimed at formulating an exclusively macro-sociological theory of the social structure. Blau's theory intends to deductively explain social relation models only by availing itself of concepts pertaining to the social structure, rather than explain individual behaviors by means of psychological or cultural categories.