Agency

Agency in political science is the capacity of individuals to act independently and make their own free choices.

This is as opposed to structure, which is the recurrent patterned arrangements that influence or limit the choices and opportunities available to people. The debate in social science is between whether socialization (structure) or autonomy (agency) determines whether an individual acts in a manner dictated by social structure or as a free agent.

Karl Marx, for instance, suggested that people in society are socialised and embedded into social structures and institution from which they cannot escape, for instance the bourgeoisie, who own the means of the production, and the proletariat, who sell their labour to the owners. Decisions taken by people are therefore influenced mostly by their place in this structure.

Many economists, such as Kenneth Arrow, argue instead that peoples’ behaviour is influenced by their own rational choices, based, for instance, on prices and incomes. This focus on the motivations and actions of individuals is called methodological individualism.