Max Weber and International Relations (review)

Abstract

Book Reviews 297© Max Weber Studies 2018. to Hegel only once in all of Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft (MWG I-22-3, 603). That Cochrane misunderstands Weber’s notion of ‘ideal type’ is also revealed by his assertion that it ‘looks like a complicated way of describing a case study’ and that ‘students of organization’ should have ‘interrogated it’ (154-55). Then there are some claims that misrepresent Weber’s views, such as, ‘Weber regarded compulsion as being essential’, ‘Weber linked bureaucracy with secrecy’, he was ‘critical of classical humanistic expertise’, he believed ‘the ends justified the means’, and his ‘big-canvas analytic approach was not joined-up with worm-eye’s tools’ (17, 43, 78-79, 98, 118). Then there is the matter of Cochrane’s inconsistent manner of citation , his numerous mistakes in pagination, and his incorrect attributions . Sometimes Cochrane provides a citation to the work and no page numbers; at other times he gives the page numbers but they are wrong. For example, ‘Politics as Vocation’ is listed as pages 1-27 in Gerth and Mills, From Max Weber, but that is the introduction, ‘A Biographical View’ (17 n. 48, 65 n. 1, 129 n. 26, 130 n. 27, 131 n. 30, 140-41 nn. 2-3 and 5, 148 n. 18). ‘From Max Weber: An Intellectual Portrait , edited by Reinhard Bendix’s (129) is likely a mistaken combination of Gerth and Mill’s book and Bendix’s Max Weber: An Intellectual Portrait. There are references to The Theory of Economic and Social Organization on pages 1149, 1155 and 1393, but that book is only 450 pages in length (12 n. 37, 41 n. 41). All things considered, however, Cochrane’s larger and more important mistake is his failure to comprehend Weber’s conception of bureaucracy. Christopher Adair-Toteff University of South Florida Richard Ned Lebow (ed.), Max Weber and International Relations (Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2017), vii + 203pp. (hbk). ISBN 978-1108416382. $99.99. This useful collection of essays, covering a wide range of topics relating to Max Weber, brings together major voices in the field of academic international relations (IR). Aiming to launch an overdue conversation between ‘IR’ and Weber scholarship, the volume, at its best, succeeds in doing just that. Unfortunately, it also tries to cover what many versed in Weber and his theoretical legacy, though perhaps not most IR specialists in political science, will likely consider familiar territory. 298 Max Weber Studies© Max Weber Studies 2018. The collection’s somewhat nondescript title veils both its strengths and its weaknesses. Its most illuminating discussions concern Weber’s ideas and their direct—or sometimes indirect—relevance to the study of international politics: Max Weber on (or for) International Relations might have better described that part of the book. Its less successful sections, unfortunately, might have instead been entitled International Relations Specialists on Max Weber. Some parts of the volume consist of general discussions of Weber and his ideas written by (and probably for) IR scholars, discussions likely to be of limited interest to Weber specialists or others with serious interests in German political and social theory. These less successful sections cover many aspects of his biography, political theory, and methodology, but do not always break new ground. The volume’s core enterprise nonetheless remains praiseworthy. Both IR specialists and Weber aficionados have something to gain by considering his relevance to the systematic analysis of international politics. As a number of contributors rightly remind us, Weber’s presence has occasionally loomed large in the academic field of IR, particularly as it emerged in Anglophone universities in the immediate aftermath of World War II. In part surely because of Weber’s 1895 Antrittsrede (‘The Nation State and Economic Policy’) and other short pieces where he addressed matters of war and peace,2 he exerted significant influence on an early generation of ‘realist’ IR scholars. In particular—as Richard Ned Lebow and David Bohmer Lebow highlight in an insightful discussion—Weber’s political and intellectual legacy proved crucial to the refugee scholar Hans Morgenthau , one of the major figures in postwar IR during the 1950s and 1960s (186-94). He and a number of influential postwar realist IR thinkers...