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Max Weber's Liberalism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 December 2008

Fritz Ringer
Fritz Ringer
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
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Extract

There are a variety of possible approaches to Weber's political thought. One can emphasize his class-conscious attack upon the new East Elbian agrarian capitalists, or his commitment to a politics of responsibility, in which the probable consequences of political proposals are explicitly assessed and announced. Wolfgang Mommsen has focused upon Weber's nationalism, almost to the exclusion of other aspects of his work. Jürgen Habermas has suggested that Weber tended to reduce ultimate value choices to essentially gratuitous, purely personal decisions. The emphasis in the present essay, however, is upon Weber's liberal pluralism, which anticipated a principled value pluralism, and which was a profound and persistent theme in his political commentaries.

Type
Reflections on Max Weber
Information
Central European History , Volume 35 , Issue 3 , September 2002 , pp. 379 - 395
Copyright
Copyright © Conference Group for Central European History of the American Historical Association 2002

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References

1. See Mommsen, Wolfgang, Max Weber and German Politics, 1890–1920 (Chicago, 1984)Google Scholar; Habermas, Jürgen, The Theory of Communicative Action, trans. McCarthy, T. (Boston, 1985)Google Scholar. The present essay summarizes parts of a forthcoming book on Weber. In what follows, MWG refers to Max Weber Gesamtausgabe.

2. Weber, Max, Briefe 1906–1908 (MWG II/5); 1909–1910 (MWG II/6); 1911–1912 (MWG II/7), the indeces for this and what follows.Google Scholar

3. Weber, , “Die sogenannte ‘Lehrfreiheit’ an den deutschen Universitäten,” Frankfurter Zeitung, 53, no. 262 (20 09 1908), p. 1Google Scholar; Weber, , “Die Lehrfreiheit der Universitäten,” Hochschul-Nachrichten 19, no. 4 (01 1909): 89–91.Google Scholar

4. Weber, , Briefe 1906–1908, 467–73, 482–83, 492–96.Google Scholar

5. Weber, , Briefe 1906–1908, 568–71, 585–86, and esp. 644Google Scholar; Briefe 1911–1912, 542Google Scholar; Honigsheim, Paul, “Max Weber in Heidelberg,” in Max Weber zum Gedächtnis, ed. König, R. & Winckelmann, J. (Cologne, 1963), 167–241, esp. 172.Google Scholar

6. Mommsen, W. & Schwentker, W., eds. Max Weber und seine Zeitgenossen (Göttingen, 1985)Google Scholar, esp. the articles by Mommsen, Aldenhoff, Theiner, Dahlmann, and Karadi. On Lukacs, see also Weber, , Briefe 1911–1912, 625.Google Scholar

7. Jellinek, Georg, Die Erklärung der Menschen- und Bürgerrechte: Ein Beitrag zur modernen Verfasungsgeschichte, 2nd ed. (Leipzig, 1904), 1–64Google Scholar; Weber, , “Zur Lage der bürgerlichen Demokratie in Russland,” MWG I/10, 86–163 for what follows.Google Scholar

8. Ibid., 164–267, esp. p. 164.

9. Ibid., 269–71; my italics.

10. Ibid., 268–69, 272–73.

11. Weber, , “Die Arbeitsverhältnisse in den privaten Riesenbetrieben,” MWG I/8, 251, 254–57, 259.Google Scholar

12. Ibid., 269–71.

13. Weber, , “Die wirtschaftlichen Unternehmungen der Gemeinden,” MWG I/8, 360–61, 363–66.Google Scholar

14. Ibid., 362–63.

15. Weber, , “Das preussische Wahlrecht,” MWG I/15, 224–35Google Scholar; “Wahlrecht und Demokratie in Deutschland,” MWG I/15, 432–633Google Scholar; “Parlament und Regierung im neugeordneten Deutschland,” MWG I/15, 432–633, esp. 432–36.Google Scholar

16. Ibid., 437–50; “Wahlrecht und Demokratie,” 347–48.Google Scholar

17. Weber, , “Parlament und Regierung,” 450–54.Google Scholar

18. Ibid., 451–55, 457–61.

19. Ibid., 467–72.

20. Ibid., 476–77, 481–82, 484, 486–87, esp. 482.

21. Ibid., 473–76, 500–1, 503–5.

22. Ibid., 423, 488–91.

23. Ibid., 535–37, 539–40.

24. Ibid., 547, 549–51.

25. Ibid., 532.

26. Weber, , “Das preussische Wahlrecht,” 332–34Google Scholar; Weber, , “Wahlrecht und Demokatie,” 355–58, 368–72Google Scholar; Weber, , “Parlament und Regierung,” 456–57.Google Scholar

27. Weber, , “Das preussische Wahlrecht,” 229–31Google Scholar; and esp. Weber, , “Wahlrecht und Demokratie,” 350–51.Google Scholar

28. Weber, , “Parlament und Regierung,” 591–95.Google Scholar

29. Ibid., 461–64, esp. 462, 464.

30. Ibid., 465–66.

31. I am relying upon the editor's introduction to MWG I/ 16, 1–37, which is by Wolfgang Mommsen.Google Scholar

32. Weber, , “Deutschlands künftige Staatsform,” MWG I/16, 110–12, 116–22, 125–30, 138–40Google Scholar; Weber's offhand remark that the fundamental right to property might have to be modified was almost certainly tactical only.

33. Ibid., 99–109, 112–16, 145–46, esp. 103, 105–09, 116.