Discuss Weber’s ideas from the Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Include specific quotations from the text to support your essay.
What will be an ideal response?
Weber argues that a religious belief system, intended to explain the path to a transcendent eternal salvation, paradoxically fueled the creation of a secular world in which “material goods have gained an increasing and finally an inexorable power over the lives of men as at no previous period in history”
Weber saw in religious beliefs a system of meaning aimed at explaining the existence of suffering and evil in the world. For Weber, such explanations have a profound impact on individuals’ actions, and consequently on the broader social order. The active engagement with the external, secular world called for by the Protestant belief system functioned as a potent impetus for social change. Weber maintained that the extraordinarily methodical attitude that characterized Protestant asceticism was integral to the rise and eventual dominance of Western capitalism. Thus, Weber sought to demonstrate that not only “material” factors, but also “ideal” factors can be instrumental in producing social change.
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What will be an ideal response?