Max Weber and the Idea of the Occident

2019 ◽  
pp. 518-533
Author(s):  
Joshua Derman
Keyword(s):  
Max Weber ◽  
Developmental Trajectories ◽  
Cultural Institutions ◽  
Ideal Types ◽  
Methodological Difficulty ◽  
Modern Capitalism ◽  
The World ◽  
Cultural World ◽  
Typical Method ◽  
The Ideal

Max Weber believed that the Occident had produced a set of unique institutions whose distinctiveness could be characterized using ideal types that accentuated their type and degree of “rationalism.” The rise of modern capitalism, one element within this set, had been enabled by the presence of other elements, he famously argued, none of which had indigenously arisen anywhere else in the world. This chapter reconstructs Weber’s idea of the Occident and examines how he understood the place of his own “modern European cultural world” within the development of occidental rationalism. It also considers the ways in which Weber’s comparative project might have been contaminated by various forms of “Eurocentric” biases, such as cultural prejudices, misapprehensions of Western uniqueness, and inept applications of the ideal-typical method. The most serious methodological difficulty with Weber’s comparative project is not his assertion of occidental difference, this chapter suggests, but rather his assumption that many paradigmatic cultural institutions were shared by societies whose developmental trajectories ultimately diverged. By attempting to understand non-Western institutions in terms of ideal types that were derived from European experiences, Weber often failed to appreciate the distinctive norms that structured the dynamism of non-Western societies.

Melancholy

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julius Rubin
Keyword(s):  
Religious Experience ◽  
Max Weber ◽  
Ideal Type ◽  
Religious Ethics ◽  
Lived Religion ◽  
Ideal Types ◽  
Experience Emotion ◽  
The Ideal

Max Weber's concept of religious ethos proves important to the study of religion and emotion. Through the concept of religious ethos, Weber developed a structural phenomenology of religious experience, emotion, personality, and life-order. In the spirit of Max Weber, this article investigates a variety of religious ethics and their affinity with melancholy. These ethics include inner-worldly asceticism (Protestant evangelical pietism), other-worldly asceticism (Christian monasticism), and inner-worldly mysticism (apophaticism and quietism among Christian mystics, in Hasidism, and in Sufism). The discussion proceeds using Weber's concept of the ideal type, where each religious ethos is articulated with clarity and precision, in a logically consistent form that accentuates or exaggerates certain aspects of religious experience and expression. In this manner, ideal types create “logical utopias” that are not intended realistically to describe or to depict, photographically, the lived religion of peoples in concrete settings.

scholarly journals Classical music in the new millennium: Return of philantropy

2014 ◽  
pp. 323-336
Author(s):  
Smiljka Isakovic
Keyword(s):  
Human Resources ◽  
Financial Support ◽  
Classical Music ◽  
Future Generations ◽  
Economic Base ◽  
Cultural Institutions ◽  
Non Profit ◽  
Turbulent Times ◽  
The World ◽  
The Ideal

Artists need economic base and financial support, either by individuals, corporations, non-profit organizations or government institutions. Investing in culture implies the provision of natural and human resources for artists and cultural institutions, in order to achieve, in return, certain counter services - generally improving the image. Those who want to influence the world must offer to the society something healing and positive, such as culture and art. These contribute to the vitality and mental health of society in finding the sense of identity and the meaning of life in turbulent times. Thus the benefactor eternalizes his name for future generations while artists sometimes become a living advertisement of their patrons or sponsors. In 2011, Ministry of Serbian Culture established the "Golden Wreath" award for the contribution to the development of Serbian culture through sponsorship and donations. This is the ideal form of support for the existence and development of arts and classical music in Serbia.

The Tyranny of the Ideal

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald Gaus
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Moral Life ◽  
Moral Inquiry ◽  
Open Society ◽  
The Past ◽  
Theories Of Justice ◽  
The World ◽  
Diverse Society ◽  
Just Society ◽  
The Ideal

This book lays out a vision for how we should theorize about justice in a diverse society. It shows how free and equal people, faced with intractable struggles and irreconcilable conflicts, might share a common moral life shaped by a just framework. The book argues that if we are to take diversity seriously and if moral inquiry is sincere about shaping the world, then the pursuit of idealized and perfect theories of justice—essentially, the entire production of theories of justice that has dominated political philosophy for the past forty years—needs to change. Drawing on recent work in social science and philosophy, the book points to an important paradox: only those in a heterogeneous society—with its various religious, moral, and political perspectives—have a reasonable hope of understanding what an ideally just society would be like. However, due to its very nature, this world could never be collectively devoted to any single ideal. The book defends the moral constitution of this pluralistic, open society, where the very clash and disagreement of ideals spurs all to better understand what their personal ideals of justice happen to be. Presenting an original framework for how we should think about morality, this book rigorously analyzes a theory of ideal justice more suitable for contemporary times.

Pengaruh Inflasi, BI Rate, NPF, dan BOPO terhadap Profitabilitas Bank Umum Syariah di Indonesia

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 133-153
Author(s):  
Toufan Aldian Syah
Keyword(s):  
Banking Industry ◽  
External Factors ◽  
Coefficient Of Determination ◽  
Muslim Country ◽  
Internal Factors ◽  
Slowing Down ◽  
The World ◽  
Negative Effect ◽  
Test Correlation ◽  
The Ideal

Banking industry has a very important role in economic development in a country. Indonesia, which is the largest Muslim country in the world, certainly has the prospect of the development of Sharia Banking Industry is very good in the future. However, the development of Sharia Bank has been slowing down in recent years and the profitability of sharia comercial banking is still below the ideal value. This study aims to determine the internal factors and external factors that affect the profitability of Sharia Bank in the year of January 2012 until August 2017. The variables used in this study are ROA, Inflation, NPF, and BOPO. The data used is aggregate data of all Sharia Commercial Banks recorded at Bank Indonesia. Measurement of Statistic Description, F-Test, T-Test, Correlation Coefficient, Coefficient of Determination and Multiple Linear Regression using IBM SPSS 21 software. The results showed that significant negative effect of BI rate, NPF and BOPO was found, while Inflation variable showed negative but not significant. Overall, the above variables affect the ROA of 87.7%, while 12.3% is likely to be influenced by other factors.

The World Underfoot

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hallie M. Franks
Keyword(s):  
The Political ◽  
Classical Period ◽  
Social Fabric ◽  
Physiological Reaction ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Foreign Land ◽  
Social Gathering ◽  
Set Up ◽  
The Ideal

In the Greek Classical period, the symposium—the social gathering at which male citizens gathered to drink wine and engage in conversation—was held in a room called the andron. From couches set up around the perimeter of the andron, symposiasts looked inward to the room’s center, which often was decorated with a pebble mosaic floor. These mosaics provided visual treats for the guests, presenting them with images of mythological scenes, exotic flora, dangerous beasts, hunting parties, or the specter of Dionysos, the god of wine, riding in his chariot or on the back of a panther. This book takes as its subject these mosaics and the context of their viewing. Relying on discourses in the sociology and anthropology of space, it argues that the andron’s mosaic imagery actively contributed to a complex, metaphorical experience of the symposium. In combination with the ritualized circling of the wine cup from couch to couch around the room and the physiological reaction to wine, the images of mosaic floors called to mind other images, spaces, or experiences, and, in doing so, prompted drinkers to reimagine the symposium as another kind of event—a nautical voyage, a journey to a foreign land, the circling heavens or a choral dance, or the luxury of an abundant past. Such spatial metaphors helped to forge the intimate bonds of friendship that are the ideal result of the symposium and that make up the political and social fabric of the Greek polis.

Conclusion

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul D. Webb ◽  
Thomas Poguntke ◽  
Susan E. Scarrow
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Research ◽  
Ideal Type ◽  
Representative Democracy ◽  
Party Organization ◽  
Ideal Types ◽  
Practical Guide ◽  
Organizational Patterns ◽  
Key Dimensions ◽  
Analytical Frameworks ◽  
The Ideal

This chapter briefly recaps the findings of this volume, then addresses more general questions concerning the types of organizational patterns that researchers should expect to find, and the most fruitful approaches to understanding the origins and implications of those patterns. The authors review the PPDB data in order to assess the empirical applicability of various well-known ideal-types of parties. They find that only a minority of the cases in the dataset fit into one of these ideal-type categories—even when the bar is set low for such classification. It is argued that the ideal-type approach, while it has its merits, is less useful as a practical guide for empirical research than analytical frameworks based on the key dimensions of party organization—resources, structures, and representational strategies. The chapter closes by emphasizing the very real consequences that the organizational choices made by parties can have for representative democracy.

The Oxford Handbook of Max Weber

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Economic Policy ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Max Weber ◽  
Modern Capitalism ◽  
Point Of Departure

Max Weber is one of the most important modern social theorists. Using his work as a point of departure, The Oxford Handbook of Max Weber investigates the Weberian legacy today, identifying the enduring problems and themes associated with his thought that have contemporary significance: the nature of modern capitalism, neoliberal global economic policy, nationalism, religion and secularization, threats to legality, the culture of modernity, bureaucratic rule and leadership, politics and ethics, the value of science, and power and inequality. These problems are global in scope, and the Weberian approach has been used to address them in very different societies. Thus, the handbook also features chapters on Europe, Turkey, Islam, Judaism, China, India, and international politics. The handbook emphasizes the use and application of Weber’s ideas. It offers a journey through the intellectual terrain that scholars continue to explore using the tools and perspectives of Weberian analysis.

scholarly journals Older workers imagining retirement: the collapse of agency, or freedom at last?

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Anne Skevik Grødem ◽  
Ragni Hege Kitterød
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Old Age ◽  
Older Workers ◽  
Qualitative Interviews ◽  
Social Meaning ◽  
Active Engagement ◽  
Work Patterns ◽  
Ideal Types ◽  
Retirement Decisions ◽  
The Ideal

Abstract Images of what retirement is and ought to be are changing. Older workers are being encouraged to work for longer, at the same time, older adults increasingly voice expectations of a ‘third age’ of active engagement and new life prospects. In this article, we draw on the literature on older workers’ work patterns and retirement transitions (noting push/pull/stay/stuck/jump factors), and on scholarship on the changing social meaning of old age, most importantly the notions of a ‘third’ and ‘fourth’ age. The analysis is based on qualitative interviews with 28 employees in the private sector in Norway, aged between 55 and 66 years. Based on the interviews, we propose three ideal-typical approaches to the work–retirement transition: ‘the logic of deadline’, ‘the logic of negotiation’ and ‘the logic of averting retirement’. The ideal-types are defined by the degree to which informants assume agency in the workplace, their orientation towards work versus retirement and the degree to which they expect to exercise agency in retirement. We emphasise how retirement decisions are informed by notions of the meaning of ageing, while also embedded in relationships with employers and partners.

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