Structure, Meaning, and Network Causality

Ethnographic methods are well suited to examining and understanding the nature of the relations that inhere in particular, documentable social ties. Actors' “lived experiences” and perceptions of the social relationships in which they participate are necessarily related to the manner in which those relationships shape social, political, and economic behavior. As political scientists increasingly use social network analysis to make causal arguments, focusing on network structures to the exclusion of the meanings those social ties have for the members of the networks presents a risk of misidentifying causal mechanisms