The Analytical Micro–Macro Relationship in Social Science and Its Implications for the Individualism

This article argues that the tradition within the individualism-holism debate of importing arguments from the micro–macro discussion in other disciplines (e.g., philosophy of mind and philosophy of biology) significantly has hampered our understanding of the “individual-social” relationship. While, for example, the “neural-mental” and “atomic-molecular” links represent empirical “gives rise to” relationships, in the social sciences the micro–macro link is a purely analytical “qualifies as” type of relationship. This disanalogy is important, since it has significant implications for the individualism-holism debate: (a) it implies a phenomenally monist social ontology and (b) it disqualifies the notion of social macro causation