Editing Structuration theory (section)

===Structure and society===
Structures are the "rules and resources" embedded in agents' memory traces. Agents call upon their memory traces of which they are "knowledgeable" to perform social actions. "Knowledgeability" refers to "what agents know about what they do, and why they do it."<ref name="The constitution of society" /> Giddens divides memory traces (''structures-within-knowledgeability''<ref name="Structuration theory" />) into three types:
* Domination (power): Giddens also uses "resources" to refer to this type. "Authoritative resources" allow agents to control persons, whereas "allocative resources" allow agents to control material objects.
* Signification (meaning): Giddens suggests that meaning is inferred through structures. Agents use existing experience to infer meaning. For example, the meaning of living with mental illness comes from contextualized experiences.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Zanin|first1=Alaina C.|last2=Piercy|first2=Cameron W.|date=2018-07-19|title=The Structuration of Community-Based Mental Health Care: A Duality Analysis of a Volunteer Group's Local Agency|journal=Qualitative Health Research|volume=29|issue=2|pages=184–197|language=en|doi=10.1177/1049732318786945|pmid=30024315|url=https://kuscholarworks.ku.edu/bitstream/1808/27631/1/Zanin_2018.pdf|hdl=1808/27631|s2cid=51700414 |hdl-access=free}}</ref> 
* [[Legitimation]] (norms): Giddens sometimes uses "rules" to refer to either signification or legitimation. An agent draws upon these ''stocks of knowledge'' via memory to inform him or herself about the external context, conditions, and potential results of an action.

When an agent uses these structures for social interactions, they are called ''modalities'' and present themselves in the forms of facility (domination), interpretive scheme/communication (signification) and norms/sanctions (legitimation).

Thus, he distinguishes between overall "structures-within-knowledgeability" and the more limited and task-specific "modalities" on which these agents subsequently draw when they interact.

The duality of structures means that structures enter "simultaneously into the constitution of the agent and social practices, and 'exists' in the generating moments of this constitution."<ref name="Central problems" />{{rp|5}} "Structures exist paradigmatically, as an absent set of differences, temporally "present" only in their instantiation, in the constituting moments of social systems."<ref name="Central problems" />{{rp|64}} Giddens draws upon [[structuralism]] and [[post-structuralism]] in theorizing that structures and their meaning are understood by their differences.