Marx And Weber Essays - Marxian Economics, Social Philosophy

Marx And Weber Essays - Marxian Economics, Social Philosophy Marx And Weber Both Carl Marx and Max Weber wrote extensively on capitalism, its origins, and its future. Although, they agreed on a few very small points, for the main part, they strongly disagreed. Only through the analysis of their main differences in the two ideologies can a stronger and broader understanding of capitalism be reached. Marx believed strongly in what he called dialectical materialism, that is, that everything is material and that change takes place through the struggle between classes. He believed that men make their own history and transform their natural habitat to fit their changing needs. Men begin to distinguish themselves from animals as soon as they begin to produce their means of subsistence. . . In producing their means of subsistence men indirectly produce their actually material life. Throughout history men transform nature to make it better serve their own purposes. According to Marx, all societies go through five stages of history and capitalism is simply a necessary stage between feudalism and the final step of communism. The way in which men create their social organization is based on modes of production. Changes within these societies occur because as the mode of production changes, it no longer fits the present social organization (p. 157). Therefore, a new class and hence a new form of society emerges. During Feudalism merchants were inferior. Nevertheless, as cities grew the number of merchants grew as well. With their increase in number came an increase in economic power. When the state was unwilling to change to their needs, they formed a revolution resulting in capitalism. Weber has a different perspective on why and how capitalism came about. Rather than just focusing on how capitalism came about, he focuses on finding an answer to the question of why capitalism happened where and when it did. When he looked for differences in the capitalist cultures and non-capitalist cultures at the time he found that capitalism occurred at the same time as the Protestant reformation. The obvious next question for Weber was why was it the Protestant culture that led to capitalism. He found a large explanation within the difference between Protestants and Catholics. For Catholics, priests had the power to forgive you of your sins. Therefore, all that was necessary for you to do to get absolution was to confess your sins. For Protestants this was much more difficult. Because Protestant priests were only teachers, they did not have the luxury of simply confessing their sins. Protestants also believed that their souls were predestined to go to either heaven or hell. Nonetheless, Protestants felt that they could determine the status of their souls through their calling. As Weber describes on page 80, The only way of living acceptably to God was. . . solely though the fulfillment of the obligations imposed on the individual by his position in the world. This was his calling. As Protestants worked in their callings, their God given field of study in which to work, the amount of success that they achieved was a sign from God as to the predestination of their souls (p. 162). For this reason, Protestants developed a wonderful work ethic. However, they were not allowed to spend the money that they earned. Instead they saved and invested it. Weber found this to be strong evidence that, Ones duty in a calling is what is most characteristic of the social ethic of capitalistic culture, and is in a sense the fundamental basis of it (p. 54). Weber also found that this work ethic was strong throughout all economic classes no matter what their individual callings were (p. 40). He found the division of labor that came naturally through capitalism to be a good thing. It did not lead to the separating of society into two very different and conflicting classes. Instead, it formed a number of different classes that were related to each mans life style and calling. Each mans God given calling was different from that of his fellow man because God intended it to be so. The division of labor led to the specialization of occupations and increased development of skills, which in turn caused an improvement in production. The division of labor therefore serves the common good (p. 161). Marx