Here the action is meaningful from the viewpoint of the individual, but also takes account of the actions of others. While different actors may not interpret the action in the same manner, at least there is some interpretation on each side. The result could be disagreement or agreement, depending on the mutual interpretations. The third part of social action is that social relationships are ordinarily stable. If each social action met completely unexpected results, maintenance of social relationships over any period of time would be difficult.
Some social relationships are very short term, but others have considerable permanence.
The meaningful content which remains relatively constant in a social relationship is capable of formulation in terms of maxims which the parties concerned expect to be adhered to by their partners on the average and approximately. The more rational in relation to values or to given ends the action is, the more likely this is to be the case. That is, social action considers the response of others, and others generally respond in the general way that is expected. So long as actions and responses fall into these expected and usual patterns, this makes it possible for ordinary social relationships to continue. Further, these continued patterns make it possible for larger scale institutions to develop.