© F. Enke Verlag Stuttgart Zeitschrift für Soziologie, Jg. 6, Heft 1, Januar 1977, S. 91118 Zur Lage der Soziologie Max Weber: A Bibliographical Essay* GuentherlRoth DepartmenYof Sociology, University of Washington, Seattle Max Weber: ein bibliographischer Bericht Inhalt: Der Beitrag gibt einen Überblick über die Rezeption der Soziologie MAX WEBERS in der seit 1960 erschie­ nenen Literatur. Angesichts der Breite und Spezialisierung dieser Literatur werden sechs Bereiche der WEBER-Rezep- tion unterschieden und nacheinander behandelt: (1) WEBERS vergleichende Studien und historische Typologien, (2) seine methodologischen und erkenntnistheoretischen Beiträge, (3) seine Stellung als Theoretiker des „bürokrati­ schen Zeitalters“, (4) seine allgemeinpolitischen und hochschulpolitischen Auffassungen, (5) die marxistische Aus­ einandersetzung mit WEBER sowie Vergleiche zwischen dem Weberschen und dem Marxschen Ansatz und schließlich (6 ) die Biographie MAX WEBERS im Kontext der zeitgenössischen Geistesgeschichte. Abstract: The article attempts an overview of the reception of MAX WEBERS’s sociology in the literature published since 1960. Considering the wide scope and specialization of this literature, six dimensions in the WEBER-reception are dis­ tinguished and taken up in turn: ( 1) WEBER’s comparative studies and historical typologies; (2) his basic methodolo­ gical and epistemological contributions; (3) his place among theorists of “the bureaucratic age” ; (4) his general and his academic politics; (5) the Marxist struggle against WEBER, but also scholarly comparisons of WEBER and MARX; and finally (6 ) WEBER’s biography in the context of the intellectual history of his and our time. Much scholarship and partisanship continue to the relations between ideologies and social revolve around the works and impact of MAX structures, and as a methodologist concerned WEBER and KARL MARX. In recent years the with the relations of methods, values and facts, level of DÜRKHEIM scholarship has improved, WEBER must remain controversial in the battles, and there is a steady stream of studies on indivi­ inside and outside the academy, about the pur­ dual writers and various isms in the history of pose and consequences of social knowledge for modern social thought. However, nothing compa­ polity and society — empirical study is never an res to the sheer magnitude of the concern with innocent or neutral undertaking. MARX and WEBER. This is not at all surprising in MARX’s case, since political ideologies linked In would like to distinguish three stages or phases with his name legitimate the governments of a in the American and English WEBER reception. large part of the globe and since in many other During the first stage The Protestant Ethic and countries variants of Marxism are kept alive by the Spirit o f Capitalism (1904/5), in TALCOTT radicalism — by the ineradicable revolutionary PARSONS’ translation of 1930 (WEBER 1958), sentiments of alienated intellectuals - in the face became widely assigned reading on American of persistent inequalities and inequities. WEBER campuses, but without reference to WEBER’s however, never created an ism in politics or scho­ comparative studies of the world religions. With larship, not even the political decisionism or the the growing interest in large-scale organization methodological individualism that have sometimes and stratification in the wake of the Second been attributed to him. What, then, maintains so World War WEBER’s notions of bureaucracy and much interest in WEBER’s work? Primarily its of class and status were widely diffused, but intrinsic scholarly superiority, as a comparative without their systematic location in his typolo­ approach to macrosociological investigation, over gies. GERTH and MILLS’ 1946 selections from reductionist Marxism and ahistorical structural WEBER (WEBER 1946), contrasting bureaucra­ functionalism. However, there are also political cy and charisma, became very influential in shap­ and epistemological reasons for WEBER’s conti­ ing an image of WEBER’s work, and PARSONS’ nued importance: As a researcher probing into translation of the difficult-to-read categories of Part I of Economy and Society (published under the misleading title The Theory o f Social and * Revised version of an introduction to a re-issue of R. BENDIX, Max Weber. Berkeley: University of Economic Organization in 1947) made available California Press, 1977. By permission. that segment in splended isolation from the main 92 Zeitschrift für Soziologie, Jg. 6, Heft 1, Januar 1977, S. 91 -1 1 8 body (WEBER 1947). Moreover, PARSONS’ distinction from WEBER’s acute sense for the “creative misinterpretation” of WEBER in The ambiguities and paradoxes of western rationa­ Structure o f Social Action (PARSONS 1937) and lism. subsequent writings as one of his forerunners and a systems theorist manque received much atten­ Both BENDIX and PARSONS shared prominent­ tion after 1950 with the ascendancy of his struc­ ly in the second stage of the WEBER reception, tural functionalism1. which was reached reciprocally with the revival of comparative studies in the fifties. Whereas In 1960 REINHARD BENDIX countered this many development studies followed a “Weberian- Parsonian interpretation by putting before the Parsonian” approach emphasizing the predomi­ reader the historical substance of WEBER’s com­ nance of values in social systems old and new, parative sociology of politics, law and religion BENDIX’s intellectual portrait showed the reader on the level of its own intentions (BENDIX the intricate ways in which WEBER related ideas I960)2. PARSONS had at first treated WEBER and material and ideal interests. Moreover, BEN­ as one predecessor among others of his own DIX facilitated the study of development issues theory of voluntarist social action and later by clearly relating The Protestant Ethic to WE­ juxtaposed to him his own social systems analy­ BER’s studies on the world religions, and by em­ sis, which provided a framework for studying the bedding bureaucracy and charisma in their pro­ relations of social actors irrespective of time and per typological matrix within the Sociology of place. From his systems perspective WEBER’s de­ Domination in Economy and Society. He also finitions of various kinds of social action and his edited, with a group of students, the first reader historical typologies appeared atomistic. Yet WE­ in comparative political sociology, State and So­ BER too presented, in the first chapter of Econo­ ciety (BENDIX et al. 1968), which was based on my and Society, a general, “ahistorical” sociolo­ a Weberian conception of historical sociology in gy of the social group, which moved logically contrast to the functionalist approach with its from individual social action through various evolutionary overtones3. forms of social relationships to the concerted actions in the organization ( Verband) with its le­ The third stage of dealing with WEBER began gitimate domination. For WEBER these definitions with the centenary commemoration of his birth provided the basis for an historical typology at the Heidelberg meetings of the German Socio­ within which the distinctive and historically uni­ logical Association in 19644. The event turned que course of western rationalism could be stu­ out to be the beginning of the great onslaught on died. By contrast, PARSONS came to relate his WEBER as arch representative of liberal or bour­ systems approach to a neo-evolutionism that per­ geois social science, an onslaught carried forth ceived the “progress” from tradition to moderni­ by a new political generation without any memo­ ty as a process of almost unilinear structural dif­ ries of the Second World War and hence without ferentiation and value transformation - in sharp any personal yardsticks for comparing the pre­ sent with the past. 1 On PARSONS’ WEBER interpretation, see also J. It is important to understand that the three COHEN, L. HAZELRIGG, W. POPE (1975a) , and stages are not exclusive sequences: The Prote­ the subsequent exchange: PARSONS (1975) and COHEN, HAZELRIGG, POPE (1975b). On the stant Ethic is still frequently interpreted in isola­ first stage of the WEBER reception, see ROTH and tion; the selections from the very popular GERTH BENDIX (1959). On the notion of “creative misin­ and MILLS edition are still widely used as the terpretation”, see my essay on “Value-Neutrality major reading assignment on WEBER; the defini­ in Germany and the United States”, in BENDIX and ROTH, 1971: 35, and on its effects in the con­ text of the gradual WEBER reception, see also H. STUART HUGHES, 1975: 31ff. 3 For the contrast between Weberian historical socio­ logy and structural functionalism in State and Society 2 For overviews and expositions of WEBER’s work see RANDALL COLLINS (1968). as a whole since 1960, see RAYMOND ARON (1967); LEWIS A. COSER (1971); JULIAN FREUND 4 See OTTO STAMMER (1971), especially HERBERT (1969) . There are two readers: DENNIS WRONG MARCUSE, “Industrialization and Capitalism”, pp. (1970) ; DIRK KÄSLER (1972). 133-151 in this volume. Zur Lage der Soziologie 93 tions from Part I of Economy and Society are scholarly citations still refer to the various frag­ still ritually quoted out of theoretical and histo­ mentary selections rather than to the complete rical context. However, the comparative approach edition.) My introduction to Economy and So­ is now well-established, although funding for for­ ciety (see WEBER 1968: xvii-civ) was written eign area studies has declined severely. Finally,