Max Weber’s Distinction Between Means-End Rationality and Value-Rationality — Rationale, Scope, Difficulties

Abstract

The classical foundation-laying of sociology from the point of view of a ‘theory of action’ is widely held by the social-science community to be that enunciated by Max Weber. In itself this could be considered somewhat surprising, in view of the well-known fact that Weber himself never spoke of a sociological ‘theory of action’, preferring instead to label his approach more modestly and at the same time more misleadingly ‘Verstehen-oriented sociology’. That more is involved here than a mere matter of terminology is shown by the multiplicity of misunderstandings and unnecessary controversies which can be traced back to various interpretations of Verstehen-oriented sociology as identical with action theory. Even when examined more closely the prominent position and role played by Weber in the action-oriented theoretical tradition inside sociology remains quite remarkable: all that Weber had to offer by way of explicit analysis is confined to the relatively scanty reflections contained in the 1913 paper ‘On several Categories of Verstehen-oriented Sociology’ (Uber einige Kategorien der verstehenden Soziologie), and to the even more concise (or, as Weber himself put it, ‘simplified’) conceptual delineations and expositions prefaced to Economy and Society. Weber himself never submitted an analysis of his conception of action at all adequate in scope or differentiation, nor did he undertake to show how the whole body of his work in its conceptual-theoretical as well as its empirical-historical aspects is sustained and informed by fundamental insight, a ‘Grundanschauung’, that in its turn is conditioned by such a conception of action.