Weber, Interpretive Sociology
and Modern Capitalism:
Understanding Human Action
What Is Interpretive Sociology?
• Weber says:
• Human behavior, “external” or “internal”, exhibits both relational contexts and
regularities in its course, as do all occurrences. Unique to human behavior, however (at
least in the fullest sense), are relationships and regularities whose course can be
intelligibly interpreted. An “understanding” of human behavior achieved through
interpretation contains, in varying degrees, a specific qualitative “self evidence” (1981—
Sociological Quarterly).
• Behavior or human conduct has “regularities” or patterns that can be
observed by the social scientist.
• However, if these regularities are the product of human minds, what does
that tell us?
• First, that these behaviors can be understood by other humans; and,
second, that these interpretations are a type of self-evidence. In other
words, we create the meaning of history, social structure and culture
through our own understandings—we make the world.
• Interpretive sociology involves the practice of ‘putting ourselves in
someone else’s shoes.’
• Verstehen.
Sociology and Social Action
• Weber believes that the central aspect of study for the new science
of sociology is social action. He says:
• Sociology (in the sense in which this highly ambiguous word is used here) is a
science concerning itself with the interpretive understanding of social action
and thereby with a causal explanation of its course and consequences. We
shall speak of “action” insofar as the acting individual attaches a subjective
meaning to his behavior—be it overt or covert, omission or acquiescence.
Action is “social” insofar as its subjective meaning takes account of the
behavior of others and is thereby oriented in its course (Economy and Society:
4).
• Social action is, quite simply, human action with a motive, meaning
and direction. Weber simply asks: Why do humans do what they
do?
• Weber believes that all human behavior requires the simultaneous
creation of human meaning.
• Therefore, the task of sociology is to ‘study human actions’ as they
pertain to specific forms of meaning creation.
What Is Meaning?
• 1. Meaning in the Concrete case versus meaning in the hypothetical
or “pure case.”
• 2. Meaningful behavior versus Reactive behavior (which is often
difficult to distinguish).
• 3. “Sympathetic participation” and “sympathetic self-analysis.”
• 4. Examination of meaning through “stimuli, results, favoring or
hindering circumstances” (E & S: 7). Example: age.
• 5. Direct observation versus Explanatory understanding.
• 6. Meaning is always present in contexts.
• 7. Subjective adequation or subjective testing.
• 8. A type of social psychology is involved in which we examine what
might be called the ‘mental representation’: “the object of
cognition is the subjective meaning-complex of action” (E & S:13).
The Hypothetical Case: Ideal Types
• The “Ideal type” is a tool of meaning creation and
understanding used by Weber.
• The ideal type is:
• 1. Based on real world conditions and research.
• 2. It looks for essential similarities between real world phenomenon.
• 3. From these two premises, it builds a hypothetical model or heuristic
device.
• The ‘ideal type’ is a hypothetical construct—it is both of the
real world but not an exact copy of anything in existence.
• Example: Bureaucracy, the Puritan, etc.
• In reality, no human being or human institution ever
matches up with a pure or ideal example.
The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of
Capitalism
• What is capitalism and how did it emerge?
• In criticism of Marx, Weber argues that capitalism could not have emerged
simply and purely in and through economic or material causes.
• Capitalism, Weber argues, is a product of human meaning and must be
understood in such a way.
• Profit-making is not the essential feature of capitalism because this has
always existed.
• What distinguishes capitalism, from just simple profit-mongering, is its
modern, rational nature.
• A subjective state of meaning must be present in capitalist behavior.
• Example: Catholic workers versus Protestant workers.
• Worldly asceticism.
• Predestination.
• Puritanism and the idea of a vocation
Rationality and Disenchantment
• Weber strongly believed that one of the key features of the modern world
is its greater reliance on rationality as a way to organize human action and
society.
• This has often been called the “rationalization thesis.”
• Disenchantment: this is the belief that our modern world is inexorably
moving towards greater secularization. This also means that human
existence is becoming less magical and/or mystical and more logical and
organized.
• Weber’s fear: The Iron Cage:
• The Puritan wanted to work in a calling; we are forced to do so. For when asceticism was
carried out of monastic cells into everyday life, and began to dominate worldly morality,
it did its part in building the tremendous cosmos of the modern economic order. This
order is now bound the technical and economic conditions of machine production which
today determine the lives of all the individuals who are born into this mechanism, not
only those directly concerned with economic acquisition, with irresistible force. Perhaps
it will so determine them until the last ton of fossilized coal is burnt. In Baxter’s view the
care for external goods should only lie on the shoulders of the “saint like a light cloak,
which can be thrown aside at any moment.” But fate decreed that the cloak should
become like an iron cage (The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, 181).
The Essential Features of Bureaucracy:
An Ideal Type
• One essential feature of the modern world is its greater reliance on
bureaucracy. Bureaucracy seeks to rationalize human action and
organizations.
• The Ideal Type:
• 1. It has a fixed division of labor.
• 2. There is a hierarchy of offices.
• 3. It is based on a rational-legal authority.
• 4. There is a creation of rules in order to govern performances.
• 5. There is a separation of personal from official property and
rights. Further, the office exists outside and/or beyond the
individual.
• 6. Selection is based on qualifications.
Types of Authority
• 1. Charismatic Authority. This “rests on devotion
the exceptional sanctity, heroism or exemplary
character of an individual person.”
• 2. Traditional Authority: This “rests on an
established belief in the sanctity of immemorial
traditions and the legitimacy of those exercising
authority under them.”
• 3. Rationality Authority: This “rests on a belief in
the legality of enacted rules and the right of the
those elevated to authority under such rules to
issue commands legal authority.”
Influence
• Weber is one of the most influential thinkers
of the 20th century.
• Influence on: Frankfurt school, modern
sociology (symbolic interactionism, etc.),
phenomenology.
• Science as a Vocation.
• What is the role of the lecturer, academic or
intellectual?
Weber and Capitalist Society
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1. Capitalism (and liberalism) brings with a diversity of values. This means that political and social
formations, as well as values and morals, are premised on different ‘value spheres’ (i.e., science,
religion, etc.).
2. Capitalism is combined with a rationalization process. This process is both about forms of action
as well as being about the spread of bureaucratization. Examples of this include: the rationalization
of book-keeping and the use of technology and science.
3. Capitalism brings with it a ‘disenchantment of the world.’ This means that society is not focused
on central values that organize and unite people’s lives. Modern society is characterized by a
growing ‘nihilism’ that is tied to the decline of religion.
4. Capitalism is structured along lines of class (as Marx argued); however, he also thinks that status,
race and ethnicity, gender, etc., are also important groupings in modern society.
5. Weber was both critical of capitalism but also resigned to its inevitability. He described himself as
a ‘reluctant liberal.’
6. Modern society and the ‘iron cage.’
7. Weber saw dangers with socialism and potential communism. A planned economy was unable to
take account of all possible decisions—the market, in other words, has an important function.
8. Capitalism emerges in and through a series of factors that are made up of both forms of action as
well as technology and organizational changes. Capitalism is fundamentally a form of action and a
way of seeing the world.