Weber: a short introduction

Gianfranco Poggi. (2006). Cambridge, UK: Polity Press

Questions of Method (17-35)
One of the greatest contribution that Weber made to sociology and cultural science is his radical refusal to positivistic model that prevailed in natural science and its expansion to other fields. Thus researchers should rely on their intuition in interpreting social phenomena and persuasive communication about the given topics. The fundamental difference that divides him from the main stream seems to originate from his ontological POV: Weber sees that human beings act within the reality where they exist on the basis of the meanings [Poggi emphasized] they attribute to it. Human events are basically individual, consisting of actions and passions of individuals, and thus its scientific understanding should be based upon methodological individualism, the questions of which may include individuals' interpretation of their own circumstances and needs. His concept of ideal types plays a significant role in understanding the relation of sociology and history. While historians emphasize the uniqueness of certain facts, sociologists should provide them with ideal types, which are intrinsically at the state of fluidity, continuously corrected and replaced by others. [Ideal types does not mean optimal, rather frameworks that allows tools for interpretation of the reality, I think.] By constructing ideal types, sociology is characterized as handmaiden to history and history takes them as hypothses. Thus, Poggi puts an emphasis on Weber's perspective of contingency of social events--in that there are more than one ways of interpreting them--and necessity--in that there are not many though.

Webers' Conception of the Socio-Historical Process (36-58)
Poggi asserts that Weber would agree with Marx on the fundamental role of classes in the historical process, but he sees history as an arena where conflicts different from classes arise in the sphere of socio-cultural and political relations. One particularity in his perspectives lie in that he regards the individuals as the ultimate agents that cause conflicts and move the society. He refuses a society as an organic whole entity that sits on top of individuals. [I think this is his fundamental perspective that deduces his other ideas.]

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (59-74)
The most highly regarded Weber's essay, the Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, explores the genesis of modern capitalism. Not disregarding economic components of capitalism, Weber emphasized the availability of institutional and intellectual resources, such as rationalized arrangement for political and economical activities with a weighted focus on early capitalist entrepreneurship taken by a large number of individuals, who collectively experimented new and disruptive ways of producing wealth through enterprises motivated by a very distinctive capitalist spirit. Weber finds the Calvinism, the dogma of which is predestination--God decreed for each human being its destiny in the afterlife--as the core genesis of the spirit of capitalism: accumulation of wealth was morally justified first, then the elimination of strong religious impediments became necessary. Thus, capitalism played a significant role in advancing secularization. After this developmental stage, the capitalist spirit ceased to function in the capitalist system.

Other Essays in the Sociology of Religion (75-88)
Weber's interest in religion about its general roles, Poggi defines, originates from his phylosophical anthropology--'human being as an interpretative animal, positioning itself in the world by attaching significance to selected aspects of reality'--and historically interpretaion is done chiefly through religion that imparts meaning to the cosmos.

Political Power and Legitimacy (89-104)
Weber regard organized violence as the grounding form of political power, in particular, with regard to the state (Politics as a Vocation). Political power creates legitimacy to make its order more durable, secure and effective. Weber presents three topologies about legitimacy, traditional (relying on past validity and goodness)/charismatic (obedience to the forces leader embodies)/legal-rational. Among three, legal-rational legitimacy is peculiar to modern polities and a central component of state. Unlike the others, it is grounded in the notion of commands accorded to authorized norms and obedience as dutiful observance of a whole system of norms. If the legitimacy is questioned, charismatically legitimated order "repeatedly justify itself and acquire new resources by means of new initiatives and achievements, particularly of a military and economic nature, in order to renew the followers' trust in the extraordinary qualities of the reader" (p.99). This aspect is not specifically addressed by Weber. Weber's interest in a phenomenon common to all political orders regardless of its particular form turned his attention to administrative staff structured in polity. While insecure contingency characterizes the staff in charismatically legitimate polities, the staff in legal-rational legitimacy is recruited and organized in a bureaucratic model and this model constitutes the nature of the modern state, Weber asserts.

The State and Bureaucracy (105-126)
To Weber, state is the continuously reproduced result of the convergence of innumerable lines of individual activity, not a superior entity, thus state's activities are intrinsically contingent, in other words, the set of ends they pursue is open-ended. The nature of state, which is portrayed as an ensemble of practices, facilities, rules and personnel, etc. as one entity, is defined by Weber as follows: 1) political entity, which comprises the core of the institutional identity of the state, is based on organized violence, 2) legal-rational legitimacy is determined by law, 3)individuals become citizens and they constitute a new kind of political community, a nation, 4) administration to implement the policies is bureaucratic by nature. Poggi evaluates Weber, although he acknowledged the inhumanity of the capitalism and accorded to socialists' justification, remained as a class member of bourgeoisie by adhering to the (western) modernity.