7.3 The Ideal Type

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来自 University of Amsterdam 的课程

古典社会学理论

1020 个评分

University of Amsterdam

古典社会学理论

1020 个评分

This Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) will offer the participants an introduction into the most important classical sociological readings between the 18th and 20th century. Highly influential social science scholars, such as Karl Marx, Max Weber and Emile Durkheim, will be discussed during 8 sessions. Combined with small tests, based on the video’s and recommended readings, the participants will be encouraged to dive deeply into the complex texts and get familiar with classical sociological concepts that are still very relevant today.

从本节课中

Session 7: Max Weber (1864-1920)

This week shines a light on the work of Max Weber. From social action, verstehen, and ideal types to rationalisation and his famous work on the Protestant Ethic. Weber's theory of society tried to account for the manner in which various symbolic factors take part in establishing social status, stratification and inequality. His influence still runs throughout the realms of politics, religion and economics.

7.1 Value-Free Sociology6:51

7.2 Understanding Social Action7:15

7.3 The Ideal Type6:39

7.4 Methodological Individualism6:24

7.5 The Four Ideal Types of Social Action6:13

7.6 The Three Ideal Types of Authority5:44

7.7 Rationalisation5:48

7.8 The Protestant Ethic and The Spirit of Capitalism6:08

与讲师见面

Bart van Heerikhuizen
Dr.
Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences

I just said that Weber discerned four idealtypes of social action.

And again, I have to postpone the presentation of those four types

because I first must explain this word, idealtype,

that also became a household term in history and in sociology, and

in some other social sciences, thanks to Max Weber.

An idealtype is not an ideal thing in the sense that it is something admirable,

something worth striving for.

You might very well construct an idealtype of fascism and

that does not mean that you find fascism an attractive ideology.

Weber suggests that historians and sociologists try to get a grip

on the chaotic and stillborn reality that they are confronted with,

by constructing models in which they include some aspects

of the subject matter that they study as being characteristic.

And by omitting many other aspects that may be found in

the world out there but that they consider to be not essential.

I like to compare it with a caricature of a well known politician.

Everybody recognizes the image, not because it is a photorealistic portrait,

but because the artist has only stressed those facial traits that we

associate with this famous politician, and left out all the other aspects.

Now, Weber stresses time and time again, that the ideal typical

representation is not reality, itself.

The real world out there is more muddy, less transparent, more chaotic.

So in our idealtypes, we simplify, we streamline, reality.

And this, he says, is in fact what social scientists have always done in the past,

but they were not reflexively aware of their own methodological trick.

For example, although Squanto did not describe the theological stage in human

thought, he constructed his own idealtype of that theological stage.

Tocqueville wrote about an ideal typical democracy.

Karl Marx did not analyze the really existing capitalist system,

he analyzed his own ideal typical representation of capitalism.

And the error that he and many other social scientists made was that,

he believes that his model was actually empirical reality.

Which may explain by the way, why the capitalists system that he constructed in

this study room, had to ultimately fall to pieces, whereas the really

existing capitalism appeared to be more flexible and more robust.

Now, one of the gravest and most common errors in the social sciences is to

ignore that your ideal typical construction is not the real thing.

So then the question is, why should we do that?

Why build models of reality whose correspondence with what is

is actually going on out there is unclear?

And here, Weber gives an answer that may remind the philosophically

inclined students amongst you of the idealism of Kant.

Weber says there is just no other way.

If you want to come up with an interesting hypothesis about the relationship between

Protestantism and capitalism, then you must first start by creating your

own model of the Protestant ethic and your own model of the spirit of capitalism.

In choosing the defining characteristics, you try to approach a certain

degree of objectivity, but there always remains an element of coincidence.

And that is not a disaster as long as you realize that this is just your idealtype,

an instrument that you produce in your own study room, comparable to the ruler

that the carpenter has made in order to be able to measure his object.

Idealtypes, for example, help us when we use the comparative method.

You remember that method, that according to August Comte, is so

important in sociology.

If you want to compare, let's say,

the French Revolution with the Russian Revolution or with the Cuban Revolution,

the first thing to do is to construct an idealtype of the revolution.

All over his work, Weber presents classifications and concepts that are,

whether he explicitly stresses it or not, idealtypes.

Rational behavior, the bureaucratic organization, charismatic authority,

even value-free science, or the Protestant ethic of the spirit of capitalism,

those are all idealtypes.

And they have all been extremely helpful

in generating interesting hypothetical suggestions.

Weber says that an idealtype should make sense.

It must not be intrinsically inconsistent.

It has to be [FOREIGN], everything must fit.

You could compare it to what computer gamers tell us about virtual reality.

In a good computer game, they say the virtual world must feel like a real world,

a universe where you feel at ease.

A world that, in principle, could exist.

Now when you construct a virtual reality model of the spirit of capitalism and

a virtual reality model of the Protestant ethic, you can try to combine the two.

And then you may come up with an interesting idea about

how they are interrelated.

And that idea can then be operationalized in hypothetical statements.

Statements that can be tested in empirical,

known virtual reality in the social world out there.

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