This paper addresses three conceptual challenges concerning actors and agency
that arise when taking interest in market practice: i) how agency is awarded in
practical situations, ii) how actors are preconfigured, and iii) how actors are
represented. These issues are explored in three empirical scenes taken from a
case study of the introduction of an e-procurement system at an international
transport and logistics company. First, we suggest that practical interaction
can be fruitfully regarded as a process of interdefinition involving
prescriptions and subscriptions between acting entities, or actants .
Second, we employ the term inscription to address efforts to affect in advance
the configuration of such actants. Third, we suggest that actors are
entities to which actions are ascribed, ex post. Through this secondary
process a number of actants may be subsumed under a common actor label, thus
offering a way of accounting for agency as part of a practice perspective. We
conclude by discussing implications of the proposed vocabulary for multiplicity,
reflexivity and market agency.
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