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Definition: Weber, Max from Chambers Biographical Dictionary

1864-1920

German sociologist

Born in Erfurt, he was educated at the universities of Heidelberg, Berlin and Göttingen and taught law at Berlin from 1892, political economy at Freiburg from 1894 and economics at Heidelberg from 1897. He accepted a chair of sociology in Vienna in 1918, and in 1919 he took over the chair of sociology at Munich. Regarded as one of the founders of sociology, Weber is best known for his work Die protestantische Ethik und der Geist des Kapitalismus (1904, Eng trans The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, 1930).

  • Mitzman, Arthur, The Iron Cage (1970).

Weber, Max

From Encyclopedia of Politics and Religion
German jurist, political economist, preeminent figure in sociology, and profound theorist of religion, capitalism, and democracy. Max Weber (1864–1920) has exerted wide influence on social thought. Empirical and theoretical claims he made have passed into the debates and conceptual vocabularies of diverse fields—economic history, law, politics, comparative religion, philosophy of social science, several specialized geographical area studies, and even applied policy studies of entrepreneurship, development, and modernization. Through widespread use, his originally technical concepts of “charisma” and “the Protestant ethic” have passed into everyday English. In Weber’s theory of politics, charisma refers not only to the mere magnetism of a public personality but also to actual power. If, as he famously said, “the decisive means for politics is violence,” the stable footing of political order nevertheless was not a material but a subjective one: the moral claim to uncoerced obedience—that…
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Full text Article Weber, Max

From The Penguin Dictionary of Sociology
Weber is often regarded as the founder of modern sociology, because: he provided a systematic statement of the conceptual framework of the sociological perspective; he developed a coherent philosophy of social science, which recognized the essential problems of explanation of social action; in a…
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Full text Article Weber, Max (1864 - 1920)

From World of Sociology, Gale
Max Weber (Archive Photos, Inc.)
The German social scientist Max Weber initiated modern sociological thought and his historical and comparative studies are a landmark in the history of sociology . Weber was interested in charting the varying paths taken by universal cultural history as reflected in the development of the great…
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Full text Article Weber, Max

From Philip's Encyclopedia
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Full text Article Weber, Max (1864–1920)

From The Oxford Companion to International Relations
Although Max Weber is regarded as one of the founders of twentieth-century sociology, his university appointments were all in political economy (at Freiburg in 1894, Heidelberg in 1896, and Munich in 1919), and it was the mutual interaction between economic systems and law, culture, and politics…
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Full text Article Weber, Max (1864-1920)

From Encyclopedia of Ethics
Born in the German city of Erfurt, Weber grew up in Berlin. At the gymnasium there, he read widely in history and philosophy, studied the classics, and received an excellent training in languages. Weber began his university studies as a student of law at Heidelberg in 1882, transferring later to…
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Full text Article Weber, Max (1864-1920)

From Cambridge Dictionary of Sociology
Max Weber is widely regarded as the greatest figure in the history of the social sciences , and as one of the founders of sociology as a discipline. His most influential works include The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1905 [trans. 2002]) and Economy and Society (1922 [trans. 1968]). …
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Full text Article Weber, Max (1864–1920),

From Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy
German social theorist and sociologist. Born in Berlin in a liberal and intellectual household, he taught economics in Heidelberg, where his circle included leading sociologists and philosophers such as Simmel and Lukács. Although Weber gave up his professorship after a nervous breakdown in 1889, he…
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German sociologist and economist. In Baxter’s view, the care of external goods should only lie on the shoulders of the ‘saint like a light cloak, which can be thrown aside at any moment.’ But fate decreed that the cloak should become an iron cage. 1904-5 The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of…
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Full text Article Weber, Max (1864–1920)

From The AMA Dictionary of Business and Management
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Full text Article Max Weber 1864–1920

From The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations
German sociologist The protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism. Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft u. Sozialpolitik vol. 20 (1904–5) (title of article) In Baxter's view the care for external goods should only lie on the shoulders of the saint like ‘a light cloak, which can be thrown aside at any…
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