Social action

From Geography

Social action refers to an act orientated to an individual, agent, and, according to Max Weber, becomes social when the acting individual takes into account the action and reaction his behavior causes.

The concept of social action was primarily developed by Weber. It is an attempt to observe how human behavior relates to cause and effect in the social realm. Weber formulated a theory of man in which he distinguishes four types of human/social action goalrational (zweckrational), value-rational (wertrational), emotional action and traditionalist.

Goalrational: actions which are planned and taken after evaluating the goal in relation to other goals, and after thorough consideration of various means (and consequences) to achieve it.

Value-rational: actions which are planned and taken after evaluating the goal in relation to other goals, and after thorough consideration of various means (and consequences) to achieve it.

Emotional action: actions which are taken due to one's emotions, to express personal feelings.

Traditionalist: actions which are carried out due to tradition, because they are always carried out in a particular manner for certain situations

This page is in progress by Thijs Koolhof and Tobias Geerdink.