Max Weber was born in 1864 in Prussia. As a sociologist, Weber devoted himself to the “interpretive understanding of social action […] with a causal explanation of its course & consequence” (Weber 1968: 4). Weber’s work focused on interpersonal relationships from the dyadic scale to the societal scale. Over the course of his life, he generated several key concepts in the field of sociology. Some of his groundbreaking base concepts were differentiating behaviors from actions, defining social actions, developing the verstehen approach, and creating a set of “ideal types” which aid in the analysis of actions. During Weber’s lifetime, society also experienced a fundamental shift to capitalism in the wake of the industrial revolution. The nature of interpersonal relations changed as well. Weber believed that a primary engine for this societal change was the ideological shift from traditionalism to rationality wrought by the growth and proliferation of Protestantism; while one of his major influences, Marx, believed that material reality always informed ideas, Weber believed that ideas influenced reality.
To understand how Weber interpreted the broader societal change he discussed in his seminal work The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, it is critical to understand the aforementioned base concepts. First was his differentiation of behavior and action. He determined that behaviors were things people do with no meaning attached such as breathing, while actions were behaviors people attach meaning to. Weber defined social actions as actions “which include both failure to act and passive acquiescence, [which] may be oriented to the past, present, or expected future behaviors of others” (Weber 1968: 22). The approach he created, which underlay his interpretation of social actions, is known as the verstehen approach; in this approach, the observer tries to assume the actors perspective in the analysis of an action. To categorize social actions, he developed “ideal types.” These are concepts that act as heuristic tools to understand and explain actions; they are “constructions of purely rational course[es] of action” and help sociologists better understand and interpret the actions. Weber created four primary ideal types. First was the “instrumentally rational,” which is essentially the lens through which economists view the world; based on their environmental conditions, actors make very calculated and rational choices to achieve what they believe is the most desirable outcome. Second is “value-rational;” in this type, an action is determined not by its “prospect of success,” but by a “conscious belief in the value [of the action]” according to the person’s ethical, religious, moral, or other value system (Weber 1968: 24-25). Third was “affectual,” which his especially emotional and determined by the actors “feeling states.” Fourth was traditional, which is determined by “ingrained habit.” Weber noted that actions executed out of habit are on the borderline of what can be referred to as “meaningfully oriented” action. Understanding these base terms and concepts is critical in gaining a deeper understanding of Weber’s thoughts on one of the most studied historical occurrences; the rise, proliferation, and dominance of capitalism.
Weber posits that the ideological shift to rationalism spurred by the rise of Protestantism was a major driver of the cultural and economic shift to capitalism. During the peak of Catholicism, society operated traditionally. They believed in natural order and that order (or tradition) was inherently good. According to Weber’s analysis, the shift away from traditionalism was likely inevitable. He stated that protestants showed “a special tendency to develop economic rationalism” (Weber 1905: 7). This is mainly due to the fact that protestants believed proof of salvation, which itself was believed to be predetermined, was represented in a person’s financial success. Labor came to be viewed as virtuous, and protestant society came to be centered around the efficient accumulation of wealth as people attempted to prove to others and themselves that they were predestined for salvation. As Protestantism flourished, so did the rationalist line of thought. Rationalist societies and economies have three distinctive features. First is rational calculation; production is standardized so that outputs are calculable. Second is book-keeping. Actors follow procedure and execute tasks in a systematic way. Third, these actors think reflexively; they examine procedures holistically and look for ways to improve them. For example, if a rationalist country was solely dedicated to the production of cookies, actors would standardize the amount of dough and other ingredients that went into making the cookies so that production could be simplified and output would be predictable. In addition, all workers would follow the procedure exactly, and people would reflect on how to improve the efficiency of the cookie production process. According to Weber, the highly organized nature of rationalist society laid the groundwork for the rise of bureaucracy.
Within a bureaucracy, everything is standardized. People are assigned specific roles based on skill or expertise, and they execute tasks according to the bureaucracy’s detailed guidelines and rules. One of the efficient aspects of bureaucracies is that leaders generally come into power based on rational legitimacy. The three types of legitimate domination are traditional (followed out of habit or personal loyalty), legal-rational (earned by following procedure to rise), and charismatic (followed because of extraordinary qualities) (Weber: 79/80). Bureaucracies, with their procedural nature, tend to favor rational legitimacy; people who have proven themselves in their role can advance through the hierarchy. This system ultimately came to permeate all aspects of society, from businesses to government. Ultimately, the rise of rationalist thought and the extremely efficient division of labor that came with bureaucracy (a system designed for harnessing labor power and executing work), influenced the growth of a social and economic dynamic perfect for the growth, proliferation, and ultimate dominance of capitalism.
While both Weber and Marx thoroughly researched capitalism and the circumstances around its growth, they had some points of disagreement. Marx argued that material reality informed ideas, while Weber argued the opposite. This dichotomy is clear in that Marx argued that material reality was the base of society and all ideas while religion and other ideas were part of the superstructure, while Weber argued that ideas, namely religion, play a major role in the creation of material reality, as one can see during his description of the connection between the protestant ethic and capitalistic society. They both agreed that society was stratified, but Marx’s model was almost purely economical, while Weber believed there were three elements: class (financial wealth), social status (prestige), and political parties (groups that seek power) (Weber 1946: 180-195). Two distinctive features of Weber’s analysis are that he took no hard negative stance on the existence of social stratification (despite noting issues), and that each individual element did not entirely determine the others; a person could have high prestige and low class, or high power without money or status, etc. Marx was an open critic of capitalism and social stratification, believed it was more binary and exploitative (bourgeoisie vs. proletariat), and believed society was cursed to a cycle of domination and oppression as these two classes struggled for control over the means of production. Though Weber did not share these ideas exactly, he did worry that rational society would eventually leave behind its meaningful foundational ideas and that it would devolve into a meaningless routine-that it would get locked in an “iron cage” (Weber 1946). While Marx and Weber impacted the field of sociology profoundly, it is clear that their approaches to examining the world were quite different; Weber’s holistic and interpretive approach resulted in more broad but inconclusive hypotheses, while Marx’s economy and exploitation-heavy materialist method led to harder, more debatable stances on the nature of society.
But Max Weber had a different one. The most important change wasn’t technical, or economic, or political. The biggest change, he said – the one that best distinguishes the modern world from the traditional one – was a difference in the way we think.