Max Weber's 'Central Question

Max Weber's 'Central Question

Datos Bibliográficos

ID2160237
AutoresWilhelm Hennis (autor de correspondencia)
Año1983
Volumen12
Número2
Páginas135-180
Fecha de publicación1983-05-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaEconomy and Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0308-5147 • E-ISSN: 1469-5766
EditorialTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/03085148300000012
OpenAlexW1520304377
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas55
Referencias citadas26

Virtually all interpretation of the work of Max Weber rests on the identification of a ‘central interest’ which runs through his works and in terms of which they must be read. In recent years the most frequently-named candidate has been ‘the development of western rationalism’. Like all other candidates however, this notion depends for its credibility on the introduction of an outside hypothesis and the manipulation of well-known passages as evidential support. Here it is accepted that such a ‘central interest’ exists, but it is argued that we must begin by ascertaining what Weber conceived it to be. Primarily through an analysis of the two versions of the Protestant Ethicand Weber's responses to criticism of the original essays, it is demonstrated that this ‘central interest’ is an anthropological one, the ‘development of mankind’, which informs his ‘methodological writings’ as much as his empirical sociology

Credibility · Criticism · Economics · Epistemology · Identification (biology · Interpretation (philosophy · Linguistics · Political science · Positive economics · Rationalism · Sociology · Law · Philosophy · Political Theory and Influence · Religion and Society Interactions · Weber, Simmel, Sociological Theory