Title: Methodological Individualism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Headings: Methodological Individualism
Methodological Individualism
1. Origins of the Doctrine
2. Austrian School and the Methodenstreit
3. The Search for “Rock Bottom” Explanations
4. The Rational Choice Revival
5. Other Uses of the Term
6. Criticism
6.1 Statistical analysis
6.2 Subintentional explanations
6.3 Microrealization-robustness
6.4 Fallacies
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Content: Action-theoretic explanation is central to social-scientific analysis, therefore, because without knowing why people do what they do, we do not really understand why any of the more large-scale phenomena with which they are embroiled occur. Thus methodological individualism is a slightly misleading term, since the goal is not to privilege the individual over the collective in social-scientific explanation, but rather to privilege the action-theoretic level of explanation. This privileging of the action-theoretic level is methodological because it is imposed by the structure of interpretive social science, where the goal is to provide an understanding of social phenomena. Actions can be understood in a way that other social phenomena cannot, precisely because they are motivated by intentional states. Yet only individuals possess intentional states, and so the methodological privileging of actions entails the methodological privileging of individuals. Thus the “individualism” in methodological individualism is more a byproduct of its central theoretical commitment than a motivating factor. This is what defenders to the doctrine have tried to communicate, with greater or lesser degrees of success, by claiming that it is politically or ideologically neutral. It is worth emphasizing the difference between methodological individualism, in Weber’s sense, and the older traditions of atomism  (or unqualified individualism) in the social sciences. Many writers claim to find the origins of methodological individualism amongst economists of the Austrian School (especially Carl Menger), and doctrines articulated during the Methodenstreit of the 1880s  (Udehn 2001). Others trace it back to Thomas Hobbes, and the “resolutive-compositive” method elaborated in the opening sections of the Leviathan (Lukes 1968, 119).