《新教伦理与资本主义精神》方法论？韦伯的3个立场与5步法

Ekström,Mats. 1992. ‘Causal Explanation of Social Action: The Contribution of Max Weberand of Critical Realism to a Generative View of Causal Explanation in Social Science’. ActaSociologica[北欧社会学的旗舰刊物] 35 (2):107–22.

 【此为专辑：古典社会学家+施米特的当代重读，第3篇】

附：张旺山老师讲韦伯的社会科学哲学的youtube视频

1. 韋伯(Max Weber)-人的科學 張旺山教授 2017-04-22 （https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjw40EqTYiA）

2. 【民視台灣學堂】哲學談，淺淺地:韋伯的治學精神與社會科學哲學 2017.11.3—沈清楷、葉浩、吳豐維 \ 來賓:張旺山

（https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seETAmchZFg&t=91s）

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1. 韦伯的基本立场

1.1理解与解释是要整合的

Weber did not regard understanding and causal explanation as distinctor opposed activities, but as two essential and integrated parts of one and the same methodology. The formulation of a Verstehende Soziologi involved the conviction that all meaningful human actions can be causally explained

因果解释是以意义理解为前提。

The integrated perspective involves interpretive understanding as a crucial prerequisite for causal explanation

有时候，韦伯会有将解释与理解为同义词。

A furtherexpression of the integrated perspective ist he fact that Weber in certaincases treats the concepts of understanding andexplanation as virtually synonymous.

总的说，韦伯会认为意义为原因

Theway I understand it, the important part of Weber's contribution is that he (aswe shall see) looks upon meanings as causes

1.2基本立场之二：反对休谟式因果性

Weber认为数量的关联只是起点，下一步是要分析process

AsManicas (1987: 130) points out: 'For Weber the scientific investigation beginsonly after these correlations have been established.' Quantified correlationscan be a starting-point for a causal analysisin the sense that they bring into focus the processes that are then to be investi gated.

1.3 基本立场之三：超越直觉主义/心理学主义的狄尔泰

but transcends atthe same time the intuitionist and psychologizing understanding represented by Dilthey

2. 主要内容：从行动到互动，从意义到脉络，问why问how问which

Weber'schief interest, both as a historian and as a sociologist, is persons who act and whogive reality content and meaning by setting themselves into relation with other persons andwith specific social and cultural contexts. Insuch a science it is principally by interpreting the intentions behind

actions,and by relating actions to various complexes of meaning, that we can identify the causal mechanisms that produce actions

3. 案例：新教伦理与资本主义精神

（1）第一步：看到职业与宗教、经济与新教精神之间有“量”上的关联，

In The Protestant Ethic Weber takes as his starting-point certain general patterns - correlationsbetween occupation and religion, and between high economic development and the breakthrough of Protestantism.

（2）第二步：从量的关联，看到“背后”的过程是什么

These quantitative correlations are not used for givingexplanations but for formulating the problem on which the study is then tofocus, namely what ….- lie behind the correlations(Weber 1976:35, 68).

（3）第三步：找脉络的诠释、理想类型的建构，连接动机与意义

. Instead heperforms a contextual interpretive analysis, andconstructs abstract ideal types for the purpose of reconstructingcertain complexes of meanings and motives.

（4）第四步：动机会形成行动，行动会形成的模式

Protestantism acted as a causal force in that it influenced the context of meanings affecting the motives of workers, businessmen and entrepreneurs - motives which in turn gaverise to patterns of action, a life-style. fostering the rise of capitalism

——例如：新教伦理 - 商人动机 - 商人行为模式/资本主义

——也就是说，资本主义精神是“grow up out of”

The Protestant Ethic focus on substantial internal relations. It is not relations between distinct and independent objects that are studied, but how one

phenomenon comes out of another, how certain motives, certainideas concerning work and wealth, grow up out of acertain socio-cultural context

（6）第五步：识别在生成的过程中，还有哪些其它作用力（如法律系统）交互作用/抵消作用，以避免决定论

Whilst it is truethat Weber lays the main emphasis on identifying the causal properties of the Protestantethic, at the same time he asserts the important roleplayed by the legal system, the accumulation of capital, the division oflabour, etc., in the development of the specific form of capitalism -and of the economic rationality - that appears in Western society. A reasonableinterpretation is that Weber. on the basis of his ontological view, saw various conditions (cultural, social, political, material andpsychological) as effective tendencies that reinforced or neutralized oneanother in a complex interplay。  

（Sociological理论大缸第159期）

链接：

第157期 作为政治社会学家的施米特：从纯粹的决断论到制度主义决断论

第158期 反驳蒂利：亦是历史社会学家的涂尔干（Emirbayer,1996）