Max Weber and the Contemporary Political Crisis

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

E-ISSN: 1748-6858|4|1|61-76

ISSN: 0034-6705

Source: Review of Politics, Vol.4, Iss.1, 1942-01, pp. : 61-76

Disclaimer: Any content in publications that violate the sovereignty, the constitution or regulations of the PRC is not accepted or approved by CNPIEC.

Previous Menu Next

Abstract

We are living in a time when men most urgently feel the need of intellectual clarification of the social and political situation in which they stand. By no means all the great masters of social thought who have made important potential contributions to such clarification are sufficiently well known, even among social and political scientists. One of these is Max Weber who, in the English-speaking world, is known more as a sociologist of religion and a methodologist of social science than as an interpreter of the political scene. Weber's scope of interest in institutional problems, with specific reference to the modern Western world, was, however, exceedingly broad, and a substantial part of his work was centered o nthe field of political institutions, particularly in their relations to the economic order and to other aspects of the social structure.