In Max Weber’s book “The Protestant
Ethic and the Spirit of
Capitalism,” he presents the
argument that religion in
certain forms and ways had a critical influence in creating and shaping modern
capitalist economy and society. He
supports his
argument by examining the relationship between the ethics of
ascetic Protestantism and the beginnings of modern
capitalism.
To begin his argument, Weber uses the first three
chapters to present the problem of linking religion to the spirit of
capitalism. In these chapters he
explains different religions and how they will play into his study. Weber begins by comparing the differences between
Catholics and Protestants. He observes
that in many countries, business leaders and owners and higher skilled laborers
and personnel are overwhelmingly Protestant.
Although Weber admits that through history some of the richer areas
tended to convert to Protestantism and that Protestants generally had a greater
inherited wealth, this does not entirely explain the greater participation in
capitalism shown by the Protestants. He
believes that environment has a great effect on determining choice of
occupation, but that Protestants have also shown a strong tendency to develop
economic rationalism more so than Catholics.
One explanation Weber provides for this is that Catholics tend to be
more “otherworldly” than Protestants and therefore do not put as much
importance on material gains. He bases
this argument on his observations in Germany and elsewhere, and this is why he
focuses his argument on the Protestants.
Next Weber moves explaining why Lutheranism, a branch of Protestantism
is of limited importance to his study.
He says that because Martin Luther was a traditionalist and so believed
in obedience to God’s will and acceptances of the way things are, that
Lutheranism did not have great significance in the development of the
capitalistic spirit. Thus Weber decides
to study Calvinism, a branch of Protestantism with a clearer connection to
capitalism, along with the other ascetic forms of Protestantism, the Pietism,
Methodism, and Baptist sects. He
continues by explaining some of the values involved with these other sects
although its clear that Calvinism will be the most important to his
argument. Pietism is closely connected
with Calvinism, however according to Weber it has an uncertain basis for
asceticism and is therefore less consistent than Calvinism. Methodism has a similar uncertain foundation
similar to Pietism and is also has some key differences from Calvinism’s
doctrinal basis. And finally the
Baptist sects had quite a different foundation than Calvinism.