Times Higher Education Supplement
"Max Weber is the one undisputed canonical figure in contemporary sociology."
Book Description
Max Weber's best-known and most controversial work, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, first published in 1904, remains to this day a powerful and fascinating read. Weber's highly accessible style is just one of many reasons for his continuing popularity. The book contends that the Protestant ethic made possible and encouraged the development of capitalism in the West.
Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: German
The publisher, Prentice-Hall Humanities/Social Science
A brilliant book which studies the psychological conditions which made possible the development of capitalist civilization. The book analyzes the connection between the spread of Calvinism and a new attitude toward the pursuit of wealth in post-Reformation Europe and England, and attitude which permitted, encouraged--even sanctified--the human quest for prosperity.
About the Author
Max Weber (1864-1920). One of the founding fathers of modern sociology.
Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism FROM THE PUBLISHER
This brilliant study--the author's best-known and most controversial work--opposes the Marxist concept of dialectical materialism and its view that change takes place through the conflict of opposites. Instead, Weber relates the rise of a capitalist economy to the Puritan determination to work out anxiety over salvation or damnation by performing good deeds--an effort that ultimately discouraged belief in predestination and encouraged capitalism. Weber's classic has long been required reading in college and advanced high school social studies classrooms.
SYNOPSIS
In what is arguably one of the most famous and influential works of sociology and is certainly Weber's most famous, he argued that Calvinist asceticism helped sow the seeds of capitalism by promoting selfless labor and restricting material consumption. This edition is an unabridged republication of the 1958 English translation published by Charles Scribner's Sons. Cited in Books for College Libraries, 3rd ed. Annotation ©2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
FROM THE CRITICS
Times Higher Education Supplement
Max Weber is the one undisputed canonical figure in contemporary sociology.
Booknews
Arguing that classic works should be translated every generation, and that the essay here was last translated into English some 70 years ago, Kalberg (sociology, Boston U.) strives to make the text accessible to undergraduates and general readers and to retain the integrity of the work with a close-to-the-text translation. In addition to the essay itself, which was published in a two parts in a social science journal in 1904-05, he has included two related documents by Weber (1864-1920). Cited in . Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
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