Social Mechanisms and the Logic of Possibility Trees

Abstract

Mechanisms are usually understood as sequences of events that allow us to explain regular observed behaviors. This mode of thought presupposes an ontology of stable causal factors. In the present paper a critique to this conception in the field of social sciences will be carried out. In particular, it will be argued that social phenomena should be understood under the logic of “possibility trees” or “open-ended results”. Finally, on the basis of Bunge’s distinction between conceptual and concrete systems, a distinction between two kinds of mechanisms will be made: theoretical and material mechanisms.