Beyond Actor Network Theory to the Marriage of Moments

Abstract

In 2004, the Government of Jamaica and the Confederation of Trade Unions signed a social partnership agreement or Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), which maintained the size of the public sector and wage expenditure, in exchange for no redundancies. The implementation of the Agreement unearthed unanticipated implications for the practice of power within the partnership. The ontology of Actor Network Theory, conceptualizes the MoU as an actor which, through the mechanics of translation, creates its own actor network that it seeks to inscribe with its own discourse to attain a ‘black box' status. The inclusion of discourse as a moment and use of Critical Discourse Analysis provides for the penetration of the impenetrable black box of network interaction and analytical possibilities. The paper argues for the recognition of discourse as a moment in ANT which strengthens it and affords a mode of analysis to deconstruct or explore inner distributions of power.