Question

Explain the Weberian theory of class.

Answer 1

Maximilian Karl Emil Weber (/ˈveɪbər/;German: [ˈveːbɐ]; 21 April 1864 – 14 June 1920) was a German sociologist, philosopher, jurist, and political economist. His ideas profoundly influenced social theory and social research.[6] Weber is often cited, with Émile Durkheim and Karl Marx, as among the three founders of sociology.Weber was a key proponent of methodological anti-positivism, arguing for the study of social action through interpretive (rather than purely empiricist) means, based on understanding the purpose and meaning that individuals attach to their own actions. Unlike Durkheim, he did not believe in mono-causality and rather proposed that for any outcome there can be multiple causes.

Max Weber



Weber in 1894

Born

Maximilian Karl Emil Weber


21 April 1864

Erfurt, Province of Saxony, Prussia

Died14 June 1920(aged 56)

Munich, Bavaria, Germany

NationalityPrussia (1864–1871)
German Empire(1871–1918)
Weimar Republic(1918–1920)Alma materUniversity of Berlin
University of HeidelbergKnown for

Weberian bureaucracy

Disenchantment ·Ideal type

Iron cage · Life chances

Methodological individualism

Monopoly on violence

Protestant work ethic

Rationalisation ·Social action

Three-component stratification

Tripartite classification of authority

Verstehen

Instrumental and intrinsic value

Instrumental and value rationality

Scientific careerFields

Economics

sociology

history

law

politics

philosophy

Institutions

Universities of Berlin

Freiburg

Heidelberg

Vienna

Munich

Doctoral advisorLevin GoldschmidtInfluences

Hermann Baumgarten[ Immanuel Kant ·Niccolò Machiavelli ·Friedrich Nietzsche ·Wilhelm Dilthey ·Heinrich Rickert ·John Stuart Mill[ Georg Simmel ·Werner Sombart Ernst Troeltsch

Influenced

Karl Jaspers · Georg Simmel · Talcott Parsons · Ludwig von Mises · György Lukács · Theodor W. Adorno · Carl Schmitt · Jürgen Habermas · Joseph Schumpeter · C. Wright Mills ·Cornelius Castoriadis · Ludwig Lachmann · Karl Polanyi

Weber's main intellectual concern was understanding the processes of rationalisation, secularisation, and "disenchantment" that he associated with the rise of capitalism and modernity.[13] He saw these as the result of a new way of thinking about the world.[14] Weber is best known for his thesis combining economic sociology and the sociology of religion, elaborated in his book The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, in which he proposed that asceticProtestantism was one of the major "elective affinities" associated with the rise in the Western world of market-driven capitalism and the rational-legal nation-state. He argued that it was in the basic tenets of Protestantism to boost capitalism. Thus, it can be said that the spirit of capitalism is inherent to Protestant religious values.

Answer 2

This theory is also known as three component theory of stratification.

It explains the interplay among the power, prestige and wealth.

The power, status and class plays a major part in the society, they influence the group where an individual is present with all the three and so the group.

But it also influences the other groups also.

The wealth includes the properties and money, the prestige is the name and fame and power helps to achieve everything and a person with the three is considered as the powerful person.