Anneke van Baalen, HIDDEN MASCULINITY, Max Weber's historical sociology of bureaucracy. 1994
Chapter 7 The city: new fraternities of patriarchs
113
Because Weber chooses the aspect of the - temporary - break with patriarchal domination
as the decisive characteristic of occidental cities, his essay on 'the city' is a chapter in his
'theory of revolutions': how were cities established and why did they develop only in the
West ? The revolutionary process in the cities is presented 'from above', from the point of
view of the lords: it is regarded as a rejection of their legitimate domination. The city
founders thus appear as bands of revolutionaries. The continuity of patriarchy remains
secondary to this analysis.
2. Revolutionary charisma and democratic dictatorship
According to the table of contents Weber drew up, 'domination' in the city exists, although it
is not legitimate. An absence of legitimacy can only mean that this domination is unstable,
impermanent and to a substantial degree based on violence; even so the city rulers needed
a military and administrative staff and therefore had to have a relation to it which, in Weber's
own view, had to be structured by some claim to legitimacy.
5
Although he does not use the
term in his essay of the city, in his conceptual exposition of domination he characterizes the
revolutionary city domination as charismatic. In his treatment of a last form of transformation
of charisma, the 'herrschaftsfremde Umdeutung des Charisma' - the 'transformation of
charisma in a democratic direction', as the American translation not quite accurately labels it
- Weber discusses 'revolutionary charisma' and 'democratic legitimacy'.
6
By these terms he
means a form of domination which respects the formal freedom of its subjects and therefore
can develop into the formal mass-democracy which would become the political structure of
modern Western societies.
According to Weber this 'revolutionary charisma' is an anti-authoritarian transformation of
'charisma', since it formally derives its legitimacy from the consensus of the followers, and
not from the magical quality of the leader. In this sense 'revolutionary charisma' is the
opposite of the original 'charisma', which has nothing to do with a consensus of the
followers, since a proper charismatic leader does not regard 'his quality as dependent on the
attitudes of the masses toward him.'
7
Yet in Weber's view it is possible to extend the
meaning of the concept to this anti-authoritarian form of legitimation, since the validity of all
charismatic authority rests entirely on recognition by the ruled, on '"proof" before their eyes.'
Recognition by the group in this case becomes an 'election'.
8
5
ES p. 214, WG p. 123, see Ch. 1,5.
6
ES p. 266 ff., WG p. 155 ff., 'The *anti-authoritarian transformation of charisma', see also ES p. 1123 ff., WG p.
663 ff. where Weber explains that the problem of succession 'inescapably channels charisma into the direction of
legal regulation and tradition.'
7
ES p. 242, WG p. 140.
8
'To be sure, this recognition of a charismatically qualified, and hence legitimate, person is treated as a duty. But
when the charismatic organization undergoes progressive rationalization, it is readily possible that, instead of
recognition being treated as a consequence of legitimacy, it is treated as the basis of legitimacy: democratic
legitimacy. Then designation of a successor by an administrative staff becomes "preselection", whereas
recognition by the group becomes an "election". The personally legitimated charismatic leader becomes leader
by the grace of those who follow him since the latter are formally free to elect and even to depose him - just as
the loss of charisma and its efficacy had involved the loss of genuine legitimacy. Now he is the freely elected
leader.' ES p. 266/7, WG p. 156.
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