Sociology in His Discourse, the Protestant Ethic

Sociology

In his discourse, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, Max Weber discussed the importance of religion in dealing with capitalism, which he considered the most important economic revolution in humankind's history. Weber asserts that in capitalism, "which has come to dominate economic life, educates and selects the economic subjects which it needs through a process of economic survival of the fittest," there must be a new "manner of life" where people can adapt to the "peculiarities of capitalism" (Weber, 1958:47-8). This new manner of life, which he calls the Spirit of Capitalism, interweaves rationalism (giving birth to capitalism) and spiritualism (through religion). Weber proposes the Spirit of Capitalism in order to solve the problems of human greed, which stems from people's motivation to increase their material wealth. Thus, greed, human suffering, and inequality are the result of capitalism without its "spirit." Weber reminds that capitalism (and thus, rationalism) stemmed from religion, but because of the wealth-making nature of capitalism, religion was 'eroded' or eventually disregarded. In effect, Weber's discourse states that because of modernism and rationalism, religion has become gradually "rationalized" as well. Remembering that capitalism evolved from religion (in the early times) will help reconcile between the moral and rational differences between religion and capitalism as an economic revolution. Thus, religion in the modern, rational society has a significant role in bringing back humanity's passion, feeling, and ethics that capitalism took away: "It will be our task to find out whose intellectual child the particular concrete form of rational thought was, from which the idea of a calling and the devotion to labour in the calling has grown... We are here particularly interested in the origin of precisely the irrational element which lies in this, as in every conception of a calling" (Weber, 1958:47-8 and Coser, 1977:233-4).