Anneke van Baalen, HIDDEN MASCULINITY, Max Weber's historical sociology of bureaucracy.
Amsterdam 1994. Chapter 2 The Weber's private, sex defined values.
49
According to her the oppression of woman is not the result of the institution of private
property, but the cause of it: appropriation of women is the first object of a 'property instinct'
84
- presumably a masculine one.
She further opposes the socialists by maintaining that private property of land and money
favors 'woman', since a woman's family can bargain a marriage settlement which keeps the
woman outside of the total power of the husband.
85
A second liberating effect of money and riches is their effect on law:
the woman who is active in commerce and crafts is always and everywhere an exception to
the rules of the exclusion of women from juridical personality and juridical competence in
marriage; if she lacks these, her husband cannot use her to earn money and legal security is
threatened.
86
By generalizing from 'rich women' or 'women from rich families' to 'woman', Weber-Schnitger
is able to construct an evolution of the position of women from 'primitive' to 'civilized', as a
result of the evolution of ethical ideas which benefit all women.
According to Weber-Schnitger 'primitive' society is a conglomeration of loose, temporary
relations, which she calls a 'horde' or 'tribe'.
87
Inside the horde, which possesses and
protects the area of food supply - hunting ground or fishing water - communally, the
individuals mostly live in 'pairing families' or 'loose families', temporary groups consisting of
father, mother and children, based on 'the need of protection of the woman for herself and
for her child and the endeavor of the man to better the food supply by her help.'
88
The
formation of those 'families' is not based on sexual drives, because these can be fulfilled in
many other ways; this kind of 'family' differs from the modern family in that woman and
children have no rights against the man, who indeed often leaves them; they are only based
on an exchange of food for 'protection'.
89
Weber-Schnitger generally rejects any socialist assertion that women in tribal associations
acquired power and prestige by fulfilling the most important economic roles. Even where a
'Mutterrecht' existed, in particular in agricultural societies
90
, women could be despised as
'working animals'.
91
In a matriarchal kinship organization women, according to Weber-
Schnitger, would fall under the authority of their brothers, and thus would not necessarily
have more freedom than they would have under patriarchy.
92
The only institution which liberates women from slavery is private property. Woman acquires
rights in marriage through a long development which has been begun by rich families who
want to protect their daughters against the slavery they will be subjected to. Private property
84
'This drive (Trieb) of human beings to have the exclusive command over something, seems to have been
directed first to woman.' EuM p. 7.
85
EuM p. 52.
86
EuM p. 238, 244, 379. The contrast between this important statement and Weber's silence on the subject of
the emancipation of women through the growth of the market when treating the comparable emancipation of the
sons of the household, is remarkable; see below, Ch. 7,10.
87
'The "tribe" only is an conglomeration of autonomous groups of people, which each serve their own interests.'
EuM p. 3.
88
EuM p. 3/4.
89
See the discussion of the construction of this 'sexual contract' by the 17th century contract theorists in
Pateman (1988).
90
EuM p. 24 f., 31.
91
EuM p. 86 (the original contempt for labor and therefore for women), 240, 271.
92
EuM p. 26 ff (28).
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