The reflexive imperative in late modernity This book completes Margaret Archers trilogy investigating the role of reflexivity in mediating between structure and agency. What do young people want from life Using analysis of family experiences and life histories her argument respects the properties and powers of both and presents the internal conversation as the site of their interplay. In unpacking what social conditioning means Archer demonstrates the usefulness of relational realism. She advances a new theory of relational socialization appropriate to the mixed messages conveyed in families that are rarely normatively consensual and thus cannot provide clear guidelines for action. Life histories are analysed to explain the making and breaking of different modes of reflexivity. Different modalities have been dominant from early societies to the present and the author argues that modernity is slowly ceding place to a morphogenetic society as meta reflexivity now begins to predominate at least amongst educated young people This book completes Margaret Archers trilogy investigating the role of reflexivity in mediating between structure and agency. What do young people want from life Using analysis of family experiences and life histories her argument respects the properties and powers of both structures and agents and presents the internal conversation as the site of their interplay. In unpacking what social conditioning means Archer demonstrates the usefulness of relational realism. She advances a new theory of relational socialisation appropriate to the mixed messages conveyed in families that are rarely normatively consensual and thus cannot provide clear guidelines for action. Life histories are analysed to explain the making and breaking of the various modes of reflexivity. Different modalities have been dominant from early societies to the present and the author argues that modernity is slowly ceding place to a morphogenetic society as meta reflexivity now begins to predominate at least amongst educated young people