Philosophy
The Ontology of Social Institutions: Joint Intentions and Status Functions
Quick fact
Even a prisoner of war camp can have its own social institutions: a piece of chocolate might become currency, and a certain hut might be designated as the 'prison library'—all because the prisoners collectively accept these functions.
Why this is interesting
Have you ever wondered why a piece of paper is money, or why a certain person has the power to marry you? Their power and value exist, yet you can't see them—what makes them real?
Read the full explanation
Understanding The Ontology of Social Institutions: Joint Intentions and Status Functions
Consider a simple game like chess. The little plastic pieces have no intrinsic power—they only have the power to move in certain ways because everyone playing agrees to the rules. Similarly, in society, a person becomes a 'judge' or a 'professor' through collective recognition of a certain role. None of these things rely on physical properties alone; they exist because people collectively accept certain assignments. This is the core of the ontology of social institutions: they are built not from bricks, but from shared beliefs and intentions. When a group acts together, like forming a line or buying a coffee, they exhibit joint intentions—a sense of 'we' that guides individual actions. Status functions are the rules that attach special powers to certain objects, people, or actions: a piece of paper is a 'ticket' because we collectively bestow upon it the power to grant entry. So, social institutions are stable patterns of behavior governed by these collective agreements, and understanding this helps us see how our social world is both real and constructed.
A deeper explanation
The mechanism behind social institutions is collective intentionality: a group's shared mental state that cannot be reduced to individual intentions. When individuals form joint intentions (we-intentions), they coordinate their behavior to achieve a common goal, as when two people are dancing together or a team builds a house. Status functions are imposed through the formula: 'X counts as Y in context C.' For example, a certain sheet of paper (X) counts as 'money' (Y) within our economic system (C). This assignment does not rely on the physical features of X; it is created by collective acceptance. Once accepted, status functions confer deontic powers—rights, duties, permissions, and obligations—which regulate social life. Institutions arise when these status functions are connected to each other in systematic ways: a legal system is a hierarchy of such assignments. This theory, largely developed by John Searle, explains how institutional facts like 'the president has veto power' exist without adding anything to the physical world. The key is that the power is in the status function, not the object itself. Therefore, the ontology of social institutions is fundamentally mental and relational: it exists because we share intentions to treat certain things as having special functions, and this is what makes social reality both real and dependent on minds.