Editing Talcott Parsons (section)

===Action theory===
Parsons' action theory can be characterized as an attempt to maintain the scientific rigour of positivism while acknowledging the necessity of the "subjective dimension" of human action incorporated in hermeneutic types of sociological theories. It is cardinal in Parsons' general theoretical and methodological view that human action must be understood in conjunction with the motivational component of the human act. Social science must consider the question of ends, purpose, and ideals in its analysis of human action. Parsons' strong reaction to behavioristic theory as well as to sheer materialistic approaches derives from the attempt of the theoretical positions to eliminate ends, purpose, and ideals as factors of analysis. Parsons, in his term papers at Amherst, was already criticizing attempts to reduce human life to psychological, biological, or materialist forces. What was essential in human life, Parsons maintained, was how the factor of culture was codified. Culture, however, was to Parsons an independent variable in that it could not be "deducted" from any other factor of the social system. That methodological intention is given the most elaborate presentation in ''The Structure of Social Action,'' which was Parsons' first basic discussion of the methodological foundation of the social sciences.

Some of the themes in ''The Structure of Social Action'' had been presented in a compelling essay two years earlier in "The Place of Ultimate Values in Sociological Theory".<ref>Talcott Parsons, "The Place of Ultimate Values in Sociological Theory." In Talcott Parsons, ''The Early Essays.'' Edited by Charles Camic. Chicago & London: The University of Chicago, 1991. (The essay was originally published in 1935.)</ref>

An intense [[Alfred Schütz#Intellectual life|correspondence and dialogue between Talcott Parsons and Alfred Schutz]] serves to highlight the meaning of central concepts in ''The Structure of Social Action.''