ABSTRACT
ANT has much to offer to sociological analysis, although it has thus far been little used by criminologists and can appear impenetrable (this is certainly not the case!). ANT3 is a method to investigate situations by tracing connections between actors, rather than a theoretical framework which imposes interpretation on a situation (Pollack et al., 2013; Latour, 2005). It provides an intellectual toolkit, or set of sensibilities, aiming to sensitise researchers to complex and multiple realities that might otherwise have remained obscure (Nimmo, 2011: 109; Law, 2004: 157). It offers a framework to investigate power and organisation, by mapping the range of heterogeneous actors4 involved in creating these effects (Pollack et al., 2013; Latour, 1999). The ANT approach is to trace connections and ‘learn from the actors without imposing on them an a priori definition of their world building capabilities’5 (Latour, 1999: 20; see also Latour, 2005). But ANT is not a ‘singular whole’ and exists in various forms (Alcadipani and Hassard, 2010: 429), perhaps because it is not a programmatic theory but rather a general attitude and attempt to be sensitive to the multiple circulating forces that affect both each other and ourselves (Nimmo, 2011: 109; Hitchings, 2003: 100; Latour, 1999: 20). ANT was developed in the field of Science and Technology Studies, and principally propagated by the work of John Law, Bruno Latour and Michael Callon (Law and Hassard, 1999). It has been applied to a range of case studies within multiple social science fields, principally to explain interactions between human and non-human actors (Alcadipani and Hassard, 2010: 419). Case studies include scallops and fishermen (Callon, 1986), the Portuguese spice trade to India (Law, 1986) and seatbelts (Latour, 1992). More recently, ANT has been used in a limited number of criminological studies (Martel, 2004; Carrabine, 2000). It gives as much attention to the agency of micro actors (e.g. a prisoner, local action group or scallop), as it does to the power of macro actors (e.g. the MoJ, the state), and considers the interactions between the two (Herbert-Cheshire, 2003: 459). Although macro actors do appear more powerful than micro actors (Law, 1992: 320), ANT holds that ‘the difference between them is brought about by power relations and the construction of networks that will elude analysis if we presume a priori that macro actors are bigger than or superior to micro actors’ (Callon and Latour, 1981: 280).
