Weber, Neo-Weberians, Cultural Anthropologists
Main ideas: Culture-as-system; Cultural Relativism versus Cultural Developmentalism
Max Weber and Religious Values
Max Weber, the early German social thinker, studied everything
Part of his work was his religious sociology, his studies of Calvinism, Islam, ancient Judaism etc.
His aim was Verstehen, sympathetic understanding
Two important ideas of his, for our purposes:
Wertrational – value-rationality
Zweckrational – purposive rationality
Salvation – being saved, living the right kind of life
every religion, and every culture, provides ideas about salvation, about how to live
Theodicy – the question of God’s role in a world of evil, suffering, and injustice
in every religion, intellectuals obsess over the problem of theodicy
different religions solve this tension differently
Culture and Capitalism
The most influential and historically significant book on the interrelations of culture, religion, and capitalism is Max Weber’s The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.
Weber’s essay is often seen as a response to the growing influence of historical materialism or Marxism in the Germany of his day, with the growth of a large Social Democratic Party.
Historical materialism … Base/Superstructure
persists in varying forms: e.g. environmental or natural resource determinism
The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism was published as a two-part study in 1904-5. It not only pointed the way to Weber’s future work but also became the center of a long-running controversy. Distinguished by passionate writing and bold theorization, the argument has attracted attention far outside the boundaries of sociology. Those who invoke the notion of a ‘Protestant work ethic’ may not have read Weber but they are not wrong to echo his belief that the ‘rationalization of labor’ was a decisive feature of modernity.
Weber’s work was prompted by his concern that the German Empire was still socially backward compared with the United States and Britain, and had failed to develop a sufficiently assertive and public spirited bourgeoisie and middle class during the long rule of Bismarck during the 19th century. He believed that the Anglo-Saxon commitment to economic and social freedom was a source of strength and that it was rooted in secularised impulses stemming from the sectarian versions of Protestantism which had been so influential in their history since the seventeenth century.
Weber stressed that contrary to the materialist reductionism of some Marxists, ideas, beliefs, and psychological states could have a large influence on the course of history. Specifically he argued that sectarian Protestantism promoted a ‘worldly asceticism’ and notion of a ‘calling’ or secular vocation which was conducive to the rationalization of labor.
If early twentieth century Germans recognized this they could improve and strengthen the institutions of the German Empire.
While Weber had different political objectives from Marxists, his understanding of the material practices of capitalism owed a lot to Marx. Like Marx he writes of a distinctive ‘rational capitalist organization of (formally) free labor’; the capitalist enterprise calculates wages and prices in order to make a surplus and is defined by this not the simple lust for profit.
Furthermore the opening pages of the Protestant Ethic spell out a whole sequence of material practices seen as crucial to capitalist development in early modern Europe. These include:
1) the rise of autonomous towns
2)the separation of enterprise and
household
3) double entry book-keeping
But Weber does insist that there must have been social-psychological presuppositions for the emergence of capitalist institutions and that in the European case a rationalizing approach to labor had been the unintended consequence of the Reformation
The core of Weber’s argument is that with Luther’s notion of the ‘calling’ the monk’s ideal of an ascetic life became incumbent on all believers. It was taken out of the monasteries and required all to single-mindedly and methodically dedicate themselves to their work, to shun idleness and luxury regardless of their station in life. Protestant teaching, especially that of Calvin, imbued the individual with a sense of original sin; a sober and industrious life would be the sign or proof of salvation.
Theodicy: Calvinism removes God from reality entirely, and “inhuman” idea
In the ‘Protestant Ethic’ Weber argues that the Calvinist belief in predestination furnished a constant inner guarantee of consistent conduct; in a later text on the Protestant sects he urges that each believer takes care to pursue a restrained, godly life because of concern for the opinion of fellow-believers.
There has been much debate over Weber’s specific interpretation of Protestant theology. There is evidence that Calvinism was sometimes associated with collectivism and restraints on merchants, e.g. in New England. But the core of Weber’s argument is that some strands in Protestantism help to give rise to collective psychological conditions that underpinned early capitalist rationalization and accumulation. Weber himself illustrates his case by quotes from Benjamin Franklin, who was a man of affairs rather than a theologian. Weber does not insist that Protestantism is the only route to preparing mentalities that will help to sustain and reproduce capitalist social relations - simply
that in early modern Europe they did play this role. (of course we should think about the development of Asian capitalism as a comparison case or set of cases)
Islam and Capitalism
Bryan Turner Islam, Capitalism and the Weber Theses
Weber’s treatment of Islam is not nearly as famous as his discussion of Calvinism and capitalism
The usual contrast is between Asian mysticism and Puritan asceticism
Turner argues that Weber was wrong to try to explain the absence of rational capitalism in Islam
instead, the real issue is Islam’s transition from a monetary economy >> agricultural-military regime
Muhammad, after all was a merchant
Weber’s theses on Islam, according to Turner
PE (Protestant Ethic) theses:
1. idealistic theory of values
Calvinist beliefs >> modern capitalism (causal)
2. necessary condition for the emergence of capitalism
no, but Protestant asceticism is necessary for rational capitalism
3. “elective affinity” of ideas and socio-economic contexts
4. Continuity between Marx and Weber: beliefs are shaped by socio-economic contexts
Turner’s analysis of Weber’s analysis of Islam
Meccan Islam was monotheistic and rejected magic
but Islam did not develop into a “salvation religion” because of 1) warrior groups who carried Islam
2) Sufi mystical brotherhoods
individual salvation was reinterpreted through jihad (holy war), suitable for warrior groups on quests for land: Islam becomes a ‘national Arabic warrior religion’
Islamic asceticism became the rigor of the military caste
Sufism provided a salvation path, but it was mystical and other-worldly
together militarism and mysticism produced the “characteristics of a feudal spirit...unquestioned acceptance of slavery, serfdom, and polygamy...simplicity of religious requirements...and ethical requirements”
Islam could thus not lift the Middle East out of feudalism and stagnation, it could not produce capitalism
Islam and Shari’a did not produce a systematic formal law tradition (only fatwa, which are ad hoc judgments)
not because of the content of the early religion, but because of the socio-economic context in which it emerged
Turner argues, however, that Islam was originally urban, commercial, and literate: Mecca
was a trading center
However, Islam provided a culture capable of uniting desert tribesmen (Bedouins) who often attacked caravan routes, with urban merchants. Islam was thus a “triumph of town over desert”
Finally, Weber blames Sultanism for the stagnation of the Middle East, because of the socio-economic conditions it produced
this is because of the “legal insecurity of the taxpaying population” in the presence of foreign troops
the arbitrariness of the tax powers of foreign troops (Selcuks and Mamelukes) could paralyze commerce
towns were merely army camps for patrimonial troops, rather than centers of commerce
patrimonial interference discouraged investments in trade and craft industry, and discouraged a bourgeois lifestyle and bourgeois-commercial utilitarianism, seeing this as sordid greediness
“Neo-Weberians”
Samuel Huntington, Cultures Count and Lawrence Harrison, “Why Culture Matters”
Huntington: author of the “Clash of Civilizations”
Culture changes much more slowly than the economy, technology
Economic and tech’l modernization can occur without modern, liberal, Western cultural values
The contemporary scholars most directly influenced by Weber’s book insist that culture, usually national cultures, i.e. “culture as system,” continues to affect the economic growth of modern nations.
To get their point, imagine, if you will, that we are living in the 1950s or early 1960s. Countries across the world are becoming independent, that is they’re rejecting colonialism. Optimism abounded, and serious scholars believed that economic growth would be more or less uniform in most developing countries in Asia, Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East.
N. Africa was predicted by many to grow most quickly, because of its proximity to Europe and its pool of cheap labor.
JFK and other American leaders were openly concerned about Brazil’s economic development, its ability to compete with the US
50 years later, what happened?
There have been some notable economic successes: Germany and Japan rebuilt their shattered economies into world powers, and Spain, Portugal, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, and Hong Kong have entered the “first world,” more or less. But what about the rest of the world, especially Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East?
For the most part, low economic growth and its social correlates:
severe economic stratification
Illiteracy, especially among women
Poverty
High birth rates, population growth rates
Corruption is near-universal
Why? Some explanations:
Colonialism had deleterious effects of all sorts, e.g. drawing arbitrary borders around “nations” (as in Africa)
“Neo-colonialism” Post-colonial theory
continuing dependency: countries on the global economic periphery, e.g. Latin American countries, are beholden to core countries such as the U.S., and provide us with raw materials only
Systemic Racism: economic development disproportionately benefits white men; the global economic system is inherently racist and oppressive to minorities and women
These explanations are unsatisfying to lots of people, certainly to H&H. So Neo-Weberians look to cultural values, including
equality
civility
individualism
time orientation
religious outlook
optimism versus pessimism
“trust” and social capital
“rationality”
Later in their book, Harrison and Huntington explore the idea that cultures should be reprogrammed and modernized, that this would be better than simply giving financial aid to poor countries. And they find support among generally western-educated scholars and NGO workers from Africa, Asia and elsewhere.
Cultural Anthropology
Like Weber (at times), cultural anthropologist view culture as a system.
Their analyze “cultures” in synchronic, not diachronic, terms. This is part of what makes cultural anthropology unique.
Their approach and methods are interpretive; they see cultures as texts that are open to interpretation, and contain recurring themes and symbolism
Cultural anthropology can tend to be functionalist in its thinking.
Everything in a culture serves a function
Everything in a culture is part of an integrated whole
Society is a system of mutual interdependence that must be kept in equilibrium
Cultures are necessary for human life, serve concrete needs:
For rearing and socializing children
For creating social solidarity and harmony
An implication of these functionalist views is that indigenous cultures should be protected or preserved
i.e. if Westerners tamper with one part of an indigenous culture, they may destroy the whole thing
This view was crucial for anthropology during its early years in the 20th century, when Western powers still operated systems of colonial control in “3rd world” countries.
Ruth Benedict, “The Diversity of Cultures” (Spillman)
From her undergraduate work, she had a background in literature, and in the various ways of studying a text to grasp its various levels of meaning.
She did not concern herself as much with history as did her peers. Rather, she was looking for repeated themes, for the importance given various values and beliefs, and for how all of this fit together (or didn’t).
Benedict's Patterns of Culture (
1934) was translated into fourteen languages and was published in many editions as standard reading for anthropology courses in American universities for years.
Culture-and-personality:
The essential idea in Patterns of Culture is “her view of human cultures as “personality writ large.’”
Each culture, Benedict explains, chooses from "the great arc of human potentialities" only a few characteristics which become the leading personality traits of the persons living in that culture. These traits comprise an interdependent constellation of aesthetics and values in each culture which together add up to a unique gestalt. For example she described the emphasis on restraint in
Pueblo cultures of the American southwest, and the emphasis on abandon in the
Native American cultures of the
Great Plains. She used the
Nietzschean opposites of
"Apollonian" and "Dionysian" as the stimulus for her thought about these Native American cultures. She describes how in ancient Greece, the worshipers of
Apollo emphasized order and calm in their celebrations. In contrast, the worshipers of
Dionysus, the god of wine, emphasized wildness, abandon, letting go. And so it was among Native Americans. She described in detail the contrasts between rituals, beliefs, personal preferences amongst people of diverse cultures to show how each culture had a "personality" that was encouraged in each individual.
Other anthropologists of the culture and personality school also developed these ideas—notably Margaret Mead in her Coming of Age in Samoa (published before "Patterns of Culture") and Sex and Temperament in Three Primitive Societies (published just after Benedict's book came out).
“modal personality”—cluster of traits most common to a traditional culture/social group
In Patterns of Culture she expresses her belief in
cultural relativism. She desired to show that each culture has its own moral imperatives that can be understood only if one studies that culture as a whole.
Morality, she argued, was relative to the values of the culture in which one operated.
Critics have objected to the degree of abstraction and generalization inherent in the “culture and personality” approach.
The Chrysanthemum and the Sword
This book is an instance of Anthropology at a Distance. Study of a culture through its literature, through newspaper clippings, through films and recordings, etc., was necessary when anthropologists aided the United States and its
allies in World War II. Unable to visit
Nazi Germany or Japan under
Hirohito, anthropologists made use of the cultural materials produced studies at a distance. They were attempting to understand the cultural patterns that might be driving their aggression, and hoped to find possible weaknesses, or means of persuasion that had been missed.
Benedict's war work included a major study, largely completed in
1944, aimed at understanding
Japanese culture. Americans found themselves unable to comprehend matters in Japanese culture. For instance,
Americans considered it quite natural for American
prisoner of wars to want their families to know they were alive, and to keep quiet when asked for information about troop movements, etc., while Japanese POWs, apparently, gave information freely and did not try to contact their families.
In more recent years however, Benedict's "national character" approach has been criticized as being subjective, and at times even demeaning -- she characterized Dobu people, for example, as mean-spirited and paranoid.
Anthropologists were now eager to get away from imposing their own culturally created value judgments on other societies. And Benedict appeared to have gotten caught up the mentality of her era, a mentality that wanted to see people of different nationalities in stereotyped ways. Additionally, her approach has always been criticized for not putting greater emphasis on class differences.
Clifford Geertz
Thick Description: Toward an Interpretive Theory of Culture (Spillman)
In the 1970s, Geertz becomes the public “ambassador” of anthropology, much as Ruth Benedict and Margaret Mead had been before him. However, while Benedict was read by the educated public, Geertz is read mostly by graduate students and academics.
Like Benedict, Geertz conceptualizes culture as a text that can be read and interpreted in terms of recurring themes and symbolism. This is in stark contrast to Marxist and neo-Marxist (materialist) approaches.
Like Neo-Weberians, Geertz takes on the mantle of Max Weber. Geertz is one of the most famous and influential anthropologists ever, and as we will see, Richard Shweder, another anthropologist and a critic of the neo-Weberians Huntington and Harrison, takes on the mantle of Geertz.
Geertz’s famous phrase, quoting Weber: “Man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun. I take culture to be those webs…”
The analysis of culture is therefore not an experimental science in search of law, but an interpretive one in search of meaning.
Studying culture for Geertz thus involves doing ethnography, living with people in their communities, interviewing them, taking notes, and doing “thick description”
Thick description involves thinking about culture, that is thinking about what things mean in a social setting
Thin description, by contrast, involves simple physical description of what is happening
Interpretive understanding is as important as causal understanding
Geertz’s most famous study is of cockfighting on the Indonesian island of Bali
He argues that the system of betting reflects the status hierarchy and macho culture of the Balinese men.
The cultural practice of cockfighting “reflects” deeper truths about Balinese society.
Balinese men wager irrationally high stakes because of the social meaning of the cockfight and its outcome. People don’t remember the money they won or lost, so much as the status order of the winners and losers.
“The culture of a people is an ensemble of texts, themselves ensembles, which the anthropologist strains to read over the shoulders of those to whom they properly belong”
Richard Shweder, Moral Maps, "First World" Conceits, and the New Evangelists
Shweder writes in the tradition of Clifford Geertz, and so also of Max Weber, but his position is quite different from that of the neo-Weberians we discussed above.
He is, to put it bluntly, a strong relativist and he refutes notions of cultural superiority, certainly of western cultural superiority, or as he puts it the culture of northwestern Europe.
Nonwestern cultures are not something to be denigrated or reprogrammed, rather westerners have much to learn from nonwestern cultures and societies.
Harrison and Huntington are wrong because theories of “national culture” have long been discredited, because different cultures place different relative importance on different values, and because people from nonwestern societies who want to change their own cultures’ values do not reflect their own cultures, but rather certain western values.
We can all learn from all different kinds of cultures, from experiencing life in different cultures, so we ought to respect and preserve different cultures, which have lasted for thousands of years.
For example, Shweder applauds the rejection of the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights by the American Anthropological Association in the 1940s. They argued that it was an ethnocentric document.
