Handlungszuschreibung und Situationsdefinition

Action as meaningful behavior and action as an attributional category are usually understood to represent competing concepts of action. In contrast, the present paper argues that the sociological theory of action should include both views. One main reason is that the concept of social action does not only rely on the social actor’s own meaningful behavior but requires him or her to interpret the behavior of the other(s) as action and thus implies the attribution of action. Attributed actions are not just imagined actions. Rather, when attributed actions become the social actor’s reference point for his own actions, they gain a reality of their own. Especially when the attribution of action takes place within the frame of reference of intersubjective definitions of the situation, attributed actions tend to gain such a reality of their own. This effect is connected with two different forms of intersubjective definitions of the situations: those who are commonly shared and those who are effectively enforceable. Additionally, the paper distinguishes between two modes of attributing actions: attribution of reasons and attribution of causation. Using these both distinctions, the paper analyses different ways of how attributed actions come into effect within social action.