Social relation

Sociology

Social science

Epistemology

Philosophy

Social group

Psychology

Metaphysics

Ontology

Normative

Social ontology

Social philosophy

Social psychology

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research

Social groups—like teams, committees, gender groups, and racial groups—play a central role in our lives and in philosophical inquiry. Here I develop and motivate a structuralist ontology of social groups centered on social structures (i.e., networks of relations that are constitutively dependent on social factors). The view delivers a picture that encompasses a diverse range of social groups, while maintaining important metaphysical and normative distinctions between groups of different kinds. It also meets the constraint that not every arbitrary collection of people is a social group. In addition, the framework provides resources for developing a broader structuralist view in social ontology.

Social Structures and the Ontology of Social Groups