Abstracts

Max Weber Studies Vol. 1 No. 2 (May 2001): 178-195

The Modern World as a Monolithic Iron Cage? Utilizing Max Weber to Define the Internal Dynamics of the American Political Culture Today

Stephen Kalberg

If derived from the overall thrust of his sociological writings rather than his political essays, Weber’s view of modernity is characterized by attention to the unique features of various advanced industrial societies rather than by a monolithic ‘iron cage’ vision. This study first demonstrates this point by briefly discussing central differences in the political cultures of Germany and the United States, and then by reconstructing, following Weber, the classic dualism in the American political culture: a ‘world mastery’ and self-reliant individualism stands opposed to—though also intertwined with—a public sphere penetrated by civic ideals. Although Weber’s expectations regarding the fate of this classical dualism in the twentieth century can be seen today to be largely incorrect, the utilization of an axiom central to his comparative-historical sociology yields a powerful conceptualization of the present-day American political culture: pendulum movements across a ‘tripolar constellation’ are identified. This application of Weber’s sociology reveals its analytic power even today.