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The Protestant ethic — a moral code stressing hard work, rigorous self-discipline, and the organization of one's life in the service of God — was made famous by sociologist and political economist Max Weber. In this brilliant study (his best-known and most controversial), he opposes the Marxist concept of dialectical materialism and its view that change takes place through "the struggle of opposites." Instead, he relates the rise of a capitalist economy to the Puritan determination to work out anxiety over (...) salvation or damnation by performing good deeds — an effort that ultimately discouraged belief in predestination and encouraged capitalism. Weber's classic study has long been required reading in college and advanced high school social studies classrooms. (shrink)

What is Sociology? presents in concise and provocative form the major ideas of a seminal thinker whose work--spanning more than four decades--is only now gaining the recognition here it has long had in Germany and France. Unlike other post-war sociologists, Norbert Elias has always held the concept of historical development among his central concerns; his dynamic theories of the evolution of modern man have remedied the historical and epistemological shortcomings of structualism and ethno-methodology. What is Sociology? refines the arguments that (...) were first found in Elias' massive work on the civilizing process, in which he formulated his major assertions about the interdependence of the making of modern man and modern society. It is Elias' contention that changes in personality structure--embodied in phenomena ranging from table manners and hygiene habits to rites of punishment and courtly love--inevitably reflect and mould patterns of control generated by new political and social instututions. Elias' rejection of a dichotomy between individual and society, and his use of psychoanalysis, political theory, and social history, help restore a fullness of resource to sociology. (shrink)

A reflection on everyday existence in the 'sphere of consumption of late Capitalism', this work is Adorno's literary and philosophical masterpiece.

Die Aufgabe dieser Arbeit bildet eine vergleichende Diskussion der Arbeiten von Norbert Elias und Max Weber unter dem Gesichtspunkt einer Theorie dessen, was Elias den "Prozeß der Zivilisation" und Weber "die zunehmende Intellektualisierung und Rationalisierung" (GA WL: 594) genannt' hat. In diesen Vergleich habe ich auch die Theorie Max Horkheimers und Theodor W. Adornos über die "Dialektik der Aufklärung" einbezogen - unter anderem deswegen, weil manche Thesen und Probleme der beiden anderen Autoren schärfer ins Licht treten, wenn man sie dieser (...) gegenüberstellt. Während im Mittelpunkt meiner Darstellung die beiden Theorien stehen, auf die der Titel mit den Stichworten "Zivilisation" und "Rationalisierung" verweist, hat mir die Zivilisationskritik der älteren Frankfurter Schule vor allem als Kontrastfolie und als eine wichtige Quelle von hilfreichen Intuitionen gedient. Die Problematik einer Theorie der "Zivilisation" im Sinne Elias' und in der verwandten Bedeutung, die dieser Begriff bei Horkheimer und Adorno erhalten hat, oder der "Rationalisierung" umfaßt, je nachdem, welcher der genannten Autoren zu deren Eingrenzung herangezogen wird, vor allem die folgenden Gegenstandsbereiche : eine Theorie der Entwicklung soziogener Persönlichkeitsstrukturen im Zusammenhang mit dem Wandel der gesellschaftlichen Beziehungen und ihrer Organisationsformen; eine Theorie der Entwicklung der gesellschaftlichen 'Institutionen', der sozialen Zusammenhänge von Handlungen und Menschen, die sich in der Geschichte der sogenannten "Hochkulturen" verfestigt und bestimmte "typi sche" Züge angenommen haben, von denen einige heute nahezu über die ganze Menschheit verbreitet sind (dazu gehört zum Beispiel die Monopoli sierung der "legitimen" Gewaltanwendung als Kennzeichen des modernen Staatsapparats und im übrigen auch die herausragende Rolle von Parteien in. (shrink)