Description
Macro-histories tend to adopt sweeping views of politics that emphasise structures and institutions while downplaying individuals and individual agency. However, a genuine sensitivity to macro-historical change also tells us that the balance between agency and structure is not constant across different time periods. In some eras structures and institutions matter more, and in other periods agents play a greater role. To put it another way, there are periods where structural trends themselves tend to select for hyper-agents whose biographies do matter greatly even for macro-historical narratives. I illustrate this argument with examples from late antiquity, the early modern period and the present.
