Platform and Agency - 9781032895970

Taylor & Francis Ltd

Platform and AgencyBecoming Who We Are\nAuthor(s): Mark Carrigan\nFormat: Hardback\nPublisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd, United Kingdom\nImprint: Routledge\nISBN-13: 9781032895970, 978-1032895970\nSynopsis\nagency and reflexivity in contemporary social life. Drawing on Margaret Archers social realist framework, it moves beyond treating platforms merely as tools or environments to conceptualise them as distinct sociotechnical structures with emergent properties and powers that shape human action without determining it.\n\nThe book develops the concept of platform and agency to explore the temporal dimensions of sociotechnical change, tracing how platforms condition personal and collective reflexivity through mechanisms of distraction, cultural abundance and multiplying communication channels. While affirming the analytical distinction between structure, culture and agency, it demonstrates how platforms constitute a fourth dimension necessary for understanding contemporary social morph.