Sewell (1996b) identified three temporalities that underlie many social scientific accounts. This article identifies a fourth: transitional temporality. This approach is inspired by Polanyi’s ([1944] 2001) comparative analysis of the rate of change of economic transformation surrounding the commodification of land and labor. Following Polanyi, transitional temporality focuses not on the endpoints of social transformation (as in teleological approaches) nor on moments of transformation (as in eventful approaches) but on the potentially lengthy transitions between structures. Whereas eventful temporality equates agency with the choices made by individuals during relatively rare events, transitional temporality identifies the capacity for agents to alter the rate of change and, in so doing, to prevent or bring about events. This approach recovers Polanyi’s oft-ignored analysis of the state’s role in modulating the rate of change and foregrounds the social costs of disruption and dislocation resulting from abrupt transitions.

Sewell（1996b）指出了许多社会科学依据的三个时态。本文确定了第四点：过渡时间性。这种方法的灵感来自波兰尼（[1944] 2001）对围绕土地和劳动力商品化的经济转型变化率的比较分析。在波兰尼之后，过渡时间性既不关注社会转型的终点（如目的论方法），也不关注转型时刻（如事件方法），而是关注结构之间可能漫长的过渡。偶然的时间性将代理与个人在相对罕见的事件中所做的选择等同起来，而过渡的时间性则确定了代理商改变变化率并以此预防或引发事件的能力。