Anneke van Baalen, HIDDEN MASCULINITY, Max Weber's historical sociology of bureaucracy. 1994
Chapter 9 Connections between formal rationality and charismatic domination over and through free
men: the continuing role of magic in the construction of impersonal patriarchal fraternities; from
Ständestaat to revolution
167
In this way Weber connects 'asceticism' with 'rationality' and 'legality', making the 'inner-worldly
ascetic' a force of modernization; he does fail to explain, however, the origin of this rationality
and legality, other than by emphasizing that irrational motives are proscribed. Weber's theory
of rationalization therefore is presented in all its nakedness: 'rationality' is what remains when
irrationality is eradicated; it is a natural characteristic of human beings (or perhaps of men
only, who even in prehistory were intellectually superior), which is hidden behind the irrational
forms of tradition and charisma.
Weber's theory of 'the puritan ethic' is connected with his sociology of domination and
legitimation only by his concept of 'charisma', since he does not establish any direct
connection between puritan bourgeoisie and 'patriarchy in a technical sense'. I constructed
such a connection when I postulated that the medieval 'homo economicus', the member of a
plutocratic fraternity, had to affiliate himself with patrimonial power in order to support the
legitimation of his own patriarchal power over his household dependents against the
emancipating effects of the money economy.
Between 'puritan ethic' and 'patriarchy in a technical sense' a further connection can be
constructed. The protestant bourgeois does not prove his manhood by living a knightly lifestyle
and by conspicuous consumption, or by the pomp and circumstance of the medieval burgher
fraternities, but by asceticism. His obsession with the 'Jenseits' is a characteristic of Weber's
negative status groups.
47
Insofar as the Puritans in England were industrial entrepreneurs all
this can be explained: they were 'new men' who still had to prove themselves. Their financial
success was invisible in their style of life, since it had to be invested in the mass production of
goods; they had neither time nor money for a knightly lifestyle; but by bringing his 'methodical
way of life' to ascetic extremes they created capitalist industries and proved their manhood as
well. The sects in which rigid selection criteria, standards and conscience examinations have
been established are the new patriarchal-capitalist confraternizations.
48
The anxiety theory of The Protestant Ethic does not play an important role in the argument in
ES. In ES Weber, after having analyzed different kinds of predestination doctrines, only
dedicates one paragraph to a rather weakened version of his old theory; he states that when
the dour bleakness of predestination had become intolerable, 'the idea of the methodical
demonstration of vocation in one's economic *conduct' became a lasting contribution to 'the
rational capitalistic temperament'.
49
Here, as so often in ES, Weber's interest lies more in the
47
See Ch. 4,6. Van Vucht Tijssen (1985) wants to explain the rise of protestantism by using the concept of
'resentment', reproaching Weber with his lack of account of emotions (p. 177 nt 148); in her treatment on p. 157
ff. of Weber's criticism of Nietzsche's concept, however, she does not discuss Weber's concept 'negative status
honor' in which these 'emotions' are accounted for in a different way.
48
In Die protestantischen Sekten und der Geist des Kapitalismus, in GAzR, I. Teil, p. 210, Weber deals with the
role of these sects, especially in the USA, in the development of capitalism: because of their rigid selection
procedures, members are eminently credit-worthy for all outsiders. Weber apparently sees this as an 'unintended
consequence' of their beliefs.
49
'Predestination too is a belief of virtuosi, who alone can accept the thought of the everlasting "double decree".
But as this doctrine continued to flow into the routine of everyday living and into the religion of the masses, its
dour bleakness became more and more intolerable. Finally, all that remained of in occidental ascetic
Protestantism was a vestige, a caput mortuum: the contribution which this doctrine of grace made to the rational
capitalistic temperament, the idea of the methodical demonstration of vocation in one's economic behavior.' ES p.
575, WG p. 348. Cf. the famous passages at the end of TPE, which have a more emotional, even a prophetic
character: 'The Puritan wanted to work in a calling; we are forced to do so. For when asceticism was carried out
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