Muslim Work Ethics: Relationships with Religious Orientations and the “Perfect Man” (Ensān-e Kāmel) in Managers and Staff in Iran

Nima Ghorbani,P.J Watson,Maryam Karimpour,Zhuo Chen

doi:10.3390/rel8080138

Nima Ghorbani, P.J Watson + Show 2 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/rel8080138

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Abstract

Weber’s association of a work ethic with Protestantism has been extended to religions, including Islam, more generally. Managers and staff in a bank and department store in Tehran responded to Muslim religiousness measures along with the multidimensional work ethics profile (MWEP). The MWEP is a 7-factor instrument that records Weber’s interpretation of work ethics. Intrinsic, extrinsic personal, and extrinsic cultural religious orientations predicted a higher work ethic. Two extrinsic cultural religious orientation factors exhibited especially strong connections with MWEP factors. The morality/ethics MWEP factor most consistently predicted Muslim commitments. Integrative self-knowledge and self-control served as empirical markers of an Iranian Muslim spiritual ideal called ensān-e kāmel or the “perfect man.” Both correlated positively with morality/ethics and with three of the four extrinsic cultural religious orientations. Managers scored higher than staff on morality/ethics, on the two characteristics of the “perfect man”, and on the three of four extrinsic cultural religious orientation factors. These data supported the existence of a Muslim work ethic.

Highlights

Intellectual efforts to link religion with a work ethic most famously appeared in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (Weber [1920] 1996)
Data obtained from Iranian bank and department store employees further supported the claim that Islam is among those religious traditions. (Feess et al 2014; Ghalavandi et al 2013)
Integrative self-knowledge and self-control served as empirical markers of an Iranian Muslim spiritual ideal called the “perfect man” (Ghorbani et al 2011), and their strong linkages with all but one of the extrinsic cultural factors confirmed their importance within Iranian religious commitments

Summary

Introduction

Intellectual efforts to link religion with a work ethic most famously appeared in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (Weber [1920] 1996). Weber found historical origins for a Protestant work ethic in especially Calvinist perspectives involving predestination, economic success as a sign of salvation by God, and work as a calling. For Calvinists, salvation was the gift of a gracious God and could not be earned through hard work. Such influences, Weber argued, gave capitalism a modern “spirit” that made it progressively more rationalized and productive. A work ethic of rationalized productivity became a nonreligious intrinsic good as processes of secularization increasingly disconnected this work ethic from its Protestant roots

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