Max Weber Was a Class-Conscious Champion of the Bourgeoisie
During the Cold War, US sociologists lionized Max Weber as a superior alternative to Karl Marx. For all his brilliance, Weber’s social theory glosses over the violent, exploitative nature of capitalism and serves as a pessimistic defense of the status quo.
Sociologist Max Weber, photographed in 1918. (Wikimedia Commons)
Almost every student who studies sociology has heard of Max Weber. Few, however, are aware of how he came to occupy such a preeminent place in its canon.
After all, Weber’s influence was minimal in the immediate decades after his death. Between 1922 and 1947, his key book, Economy and Society, sold just two thousand copies in his native Germany.
Weber’s subsequent rise to a position of extraordinary importance did not merely stem from a belated recognition of his intellectual virtues. Opponents of Marxism in the social sciences seized upon Weber as an alternative to Marx in explaining how societies function and change.
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