Transcript 17 Weber (10/31)

Max Weber
Sociology 100
Time is money
The Spirit of Capitalism
• “What we understand by the ‘spirit’ of capitalism in terms
of what we deem ‘essential’ from our point of view, is by no
means the only possible way of understanding it. This is in
the nature of ‘historical concept-formation,’ which for its
methodological purposes does not seek to embody
historical reality in abstract generic concepts but endeavors
to integrate them into concrete configurations which are
always and inevitably individual in character.”
– Not a “conceptual ‘definition’ but only a provisional illustration
of what is here meant by the ‘spirit’ of capitalism.” (9)
• Ideal types & ideal typical analysis
– Not a philosophical definition, but an emphasis of certain characteristics
common to most incidences of a thing or event
– “ideal” = ‘referring to ideas,’ ≠ ‘perfect’
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The Spirit of Capitalism
• Ben Franklin
– “‘Remember, that time is money. He that can earn ten
shillings a day by his labor, and goes abroad, or sits
idle, one half of that day, though his spends but
sixpence during his diversion or idleness, ought not to
reckon that the only expense; he has really spent, or
rather thrown away, five shillings besides.’” (9)
• “The essence of this ‘philosophy of avarice’ is the idea of the
duty of the individual to work toward the increase of his
wealth.”
– This “has for Franklin the character of an ethically slanted maxim
for the conduct of life. This has the specific sense in which we
propose to use the concept of the ‘spirit of capitalism.’” (11)
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The Spirit of Capitalism
• An unusual strength of character is required of
the capitalist entrepreneur “if he is not to lose his
sober self-control and face moral or economic
shipwreck. As well as energy and clarity of vision,
he will need certain outstanding ‘ethical’ qualities
to win the absolutely indispensable confidence of
his clients and of the workers when introducing
these innovations and to maintain the vigor
necessary to overcome the innumerable
obstacles he will meet.” (22)
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The Spirit of Capitalism
• “All Franklin’s moral precepts, however, have a
utilitarian slant. Honesty is useful because it
brings credit. So are punctuality, hard work,
moderation, etc., and they are only virtues for
this reason—from which it would follow that the
appearance of honesty serves the same purpose,
then this would suffice, and any unnecessary
surplus of this virtue would inevitably seem, in
Franklin’s eyes, like unproductive and
reprehensible profligacy.”(11)
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The Spirit of Capitalism
• “The ‘summum bonum’ of thus ‘ethic’ is the making of
money and yet more money, coupled with a strict
avoidance of all uninhibited enjoyment. Indeed, it is so
completely devoid of all eudaimonstic, let alone
hedonist, motives, so much purely thought of as an
end in itself that it appears as something wholly
transcendent and irrational, beyond the ‘happiness’ or
the ‘benefit’ of mankind.” (12)
– The ethic of capitalism does not require religious belief,
and they may in modern times even be negatively
correlated (23)
• If not a hostility to religious belief, an indifference toward it
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The Spirit of Capitalism
• “If one were to ask [capitalists] what is the purpose of
their restless chase and why they are never satisfied
with what they have acquired (something which must
seem inexplicable to those who are entirely oriented to
this world), they would answer, if they had an answer
at all, ‘to provide for children and grandchildren. More
frequently, however, [...] they would answer, with
greater justification, that business, with its ceaseless
work, had quite simply become ‘indispensable to their
life.’ That is in fact their only true motivation, and it
expresses at the same time the irrational element of
this way of conducting one’s life, whereby a man exists
for his business, not vice versa.” (23)
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The Spirit of Capitalism
• This ‘spirit’ was needed only to initiate capitalism, not to
maintain it
– Modern capitalism does not require an ethic: “Today’s capitalist
economic order is a monstrous cosmos, into which the
individual is born and which in practice is, for him, at least as an
individual, simply a given, an immutable shell in which he is
obliged to live.” (13)
• If he doesn’t, he is selected out by economic forces (22)
• But it is not the product of economic forces: “In order that this
conduct of life and attitude toward one’s ‘profession’, ‘adapted’ as it is
to the peculiar requirements of capitalism, could be ‘selected’ and
emerge victorious over others, it obviously had to first come into
being, and not just in individuals, but as an attitude held in common
by groups of people. The origin of this attitude is therefore what
needs to be explained.” (13)
– Ideas cause social change (vs. Marx)
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Origins of the Spirit of Capitalism
• “We are merely asking which of certain characteristic elements of
[modern capitalist] culture might be attributable to the influence of
the Reformation as historical cause.”
– It is not possible that it was a “historically necessary development” as
“innumerable historical constellations, especially purely political
processes, which do not fit into any kind of economic ‘law,’ but fit into
no economic scheme of any kind, had to come together in order for
the newly created churches to continue to exist at all.” (36)
– Nor could capitalism only have sprung from Protestant belief. The
question is only “to establish whether and to what extent religious
influences have in fact been partially responsible for the qualitative
shaping and quantitative expansion” of the spirit of capitalism. (36)
• Contingency & complexity of history
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Traditionalism
• “Backward” attitude toward work (14-17)
– Not an absence of greed
• Work not thought of as having ethical value
– When pay is raised, traditionalist laborers work less
• Example: if $10/day of labor is raised to $20/day of labor,
traditionalist workers go home after half a day
– Traditionalist: Commodity  Money  Commodity
– Capitalist: Money  Commodity  Money
– In the spirit of capitalism, by contrast, work is conceived of
“as though it were an absolute end in itself—a ‘calling.’”
• Bankers in 15th C. Florence view their work & wealth amoral or
even immoral, but Puritans of 18th C. Pennsylvania, in a fragile,
poor economy, work is regarded as a moral good (26)
– Cannot be caused by purely material conditions
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Calling
• “Now it is unmistakable that the German word
‘Beruf,’ and even more clearly the English word
‘calling,’ carry at least some religious
connotations—namely, those of a task set by
God—and the more strongly we emphasize the
word in a particular case, the more strongly felt
these connotations become.” (28)
– Latin, Catholic Europe, as well as Greece and Rome,
have no equivalent word referring to one’s work
– “By contrast, all Protestant peoples have such an
expression.”
• Vocation
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Calling
• “What was definitely new was the estimation of
fulfillment of duty within secular callings as being of
the absolutely highest level possible for moral activity.
It was this that led, inevitably, to the idea of the
religious significance of secular everyday labor and
gave rise to the concept of the calling.” (29)
– According to Weber’s reading of Luther, “the fulfillment of
innerworldly duties is absolutely the only way to please
God, that this and only this is God’s will, and that therefore
every legitimate occupation [Beruf] is quite simply of equal
value.” (29)
• The stonemason is esteemed as much as the priest, and more than
the monk, who is selfish & lazy
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Calling
• Luther had no intention of promoting the
“capitalist spirit”
– Attack on usury & taking interest
– Biblical authority in faith
• Bible tends to support traditionalist labor, not capitalist, with
labor either accepted or irrelevant (30-31)
• “The objective historical order into which the individual had
been placed by God became for him more and more the
direct outflow of the divine will”, & the individual should
thus accept his or her station in life.
• The calling was for Luther “bound to tradition. The calling
was something which man had to accept as a divine decree;
it was something to which he had to ‘submit’” (31-32)
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Calling
• The idea of a calling is not from Lutheranism,
but from Calvinism
• A different ethical system from either
Catholicism or Lutheranism, “valuing life as a
task to be accomplished.” (34)
– Life & work as a mission from God
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Calling
• But Reformers are not “founders of societies of ‘ethical
culture’ or representatives of social reform or of
cultural ideals. The salvation of souls and this alone is
at the heart of their life and work. Their ethical goals
and the practical effects of their teaching are all
anchored firmly here and are the consequences of
purely religious motives.” (35)
– These consequences may be “unforeseen and indeed
unwished for”
• The history and evolution of ideas, engaged with material forces
but not determined by them
• Ideas have their own force
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