Ratism By Weber And Weber's Theory Of Rationalism

Rationality is this idea by Weber that it is potentially what created capitalism. Formal rationality is the set of pre-determined criteria that we use to make decisions and conduct activities. He basically says that as humans, we set goals for ourselves and we take whatever steps necessary to reach those goals. These steps though, have to be rational i.e. they are based off of our past experiences, logic or even science. Weber best describes this through the Protestant Ethic, in which he speaks of traditional capitalism, and rational capitalism.

Unlike Marx who didn’t believe that culture influenced capitalism, Weber focused primarily on that and ideas. Weber says that traditional capitalism was when the elite kept their traditional values and status in the society, they didn’t have to take any actions to keep living as they normally had. Where as in rational capitalism, the spirit of capitalism shows that the culture has duties they need to keep up with instead of just keeping the norms that have already been in place. They have to work for what they get. Through rational capitalism, according to Weber, Life is to be lived with a specific goal in mind, which is making money. As humans, if we are organized, honest and overall good we believe that making more, and more money will come to us.

One it has increased the exchanges in relationships due to the fact that it can cover greater distances and can last longer than it normally would. An example of this would be with amazon, due to the money we are able to buy from anyone all over the world, and therefore creating more social ties. However though on the opposite side of the spectrum, we aren’t creating more emotional ties, and we aren’t having real deep relationships. We are having more diverse relationships, but now due to money it’s not about the deep relationships but instead is about the more social ties you have with the most