Infrastructures of Aesthetic Agency

Abstract

The main argument for the network theory of aesthetic value is that it better explains the facts about aesthetic activity than does its rival, aesthetic hedonism. According to the network theory, an aesthetic value figures in a fact that lends weight to the proposition that it would be an aesthetic achievement for an agent to act. An aesthetic achievement is an act that succeeds out of aesthetic competence, so an agent has aesthetic reason to act just when they have reason to achieve by so acting. Agents with aesthetic reasons to act have reasons to act in coordination with one another when their coordination raises their chances of achieving. In acting, they rely upon and give rise to social formations. Aesthetic agency is scaffolded by aesthetic practices, which are social practices. A contrast is drawn with structuralist social theory.