restricted relativisms
In accepting social constructionists’ relativism, one might conclude that there is a potentially
infinite number of reasons why people do things. After all, is not every social theory just another
way that people might construct reality amongst themselves? Instead of resigning themselves to
the futility of universalistic theorizing, a small number of social theorists have derived a different
theoretical challenge from the impasse that relativism apparently implies: Given the variety of
human motivations, what social conditions might sustain distinct types of motivation over time
within the same situation, society, or individual? Each theorist in this section presumes that
“tensions” form within or among individuals such that they stimulate behavioral patterns in
themselves or in each other. At issue is no longer the content but the form of people’s
motivations.