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Agency without Agents

In: Belief and Organization

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  • John Roberts

Abstract

In this chapter I want to use the Buddhist notion of agency without agents to explore the relationship between identity and ethical conduct. At one level the notion of agency without agents seems simply nonsensical; the two terms require and imply each other such that there could not be agency without an agent. Arguably what makes humans capable of ethical conduct – capable of agency rather than mere behaviour – is precisely our awareness of the self as agent and the choice that this makes possible. Ethical agency needs a self-conscious agent. In what follows, however, I want to explore the ways in which self-identity can prove an obstacle to ethics; where my own preoccupation with my self and defending my identity effectively forecloses the possibility of ethics. Here belief in the self – in my substance as an agent – seems to blind me to the reality of my agency and its consequences. Two examples may serve to illustrate some of the ways identity and ethics can easily come to work against each other

Suggested Citation

  • John Roberts, 2012. "Agency without Agents," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Peter Case & Heather Höpfl & Hugo Letiche (ed.), Belief and Organization, chapter 9, pages 144-162, Palgrave Macmillan.
    • Handle: RePEc:pal:palchp:978-1-137-26310-0_9
    DOI: 10.1057/9781137263100_9
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    Cited by:

    1. Roberts, John, 2014. "Testing the limits of structuration theory in accounting research," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 25(2), pages 135-141.

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