Paper short abstract:

ANT introduces an asymmetry in the way it treats actors as references. This poses a challenge to ANT as a theory of differentiated societies. I argue that it might be beneficial to radicalize ANT’s semiotic approach, conceptualizing humans also as references to situations of socialization.

Paper long abstract:

Actor-Network Theory claims a symmetry between human and non-human actors. ANT as the study of how technology is society made durable was a ground-breaking approach at the time, as it highlighted the involvement of non-human actors in the construction of social collectives. In this perspective, technology acts as a semiotic reference to the situations and contexts of its making and allows to trace processes of societal stabilization. However, this focus also creates an asymmetry, as human actors are not theorized the same way. While the design, enactment, and inscription processes of technology are described in many case studies, the aspect of human socialization is not as present. This especially poses a challenge to the transformation of ANT into a theory of differentiated societies, as it is laid down in Modes of Existence (Latour, 2013). I will illustrate these challenges in the discussion of Latour’s understanding of law. Latour provides an interesting description of the Conseil d’Etat. Yet, the approach of following the references in the enactment of law paradoxically hides important moments in the making and doing of law. This includes e.g. the training of legal scholars, where a collective understanding of law is constructed. Based on this example I argue that in order to reconstruct the complex organization of social collectives in their different modes of existence, it might be more productive to radicalize the semiotic approach in Latours theory, conceptualizing humans also as references to situations of socialization.