Rationalities and rationalization

Abstract

Max Weber is famous as the sociologist of rationality par excellence but his deepest insights have been obscured by overconcentration on one aspect of his thought about it. The aspect in question is the rationalization of the modern world. The outcome is a distorted caricature of Weber’s theory of rationality. A clue to the way back to understanding him is his comment that Hindu asceticism is the most rationalized in world history. For Weber, the whole character of instrumental rationality is coloured by the value rationality which generates it. His concept of value rationality not only fits religious belief systems but also, no less so, the belief in equality, individual freedom, and human rights. Value systems are rational through internal coherence. Thus, the sequence of questions sociologist or historian should ask the following: No 1, is there a value system behind this? No 2, can what I find be explained as the instrumental rationalization of that system? No 3, if, and only if not, can I find an explanation in terms of irrationality (which can include functionalist explanation)? It should be added that an extra layer of confusion has been added to Weber exegesis by the identification of formal rationality with instrumental rationality. In fact, the ‘formal/substantive’ rationality axis does not mirror the ‘value/instrumental’ axis. They cut across each other at right angles. This chapter aims to scrape away the layers of misinterpretation and shows Weber’s theory of rationality in its true colours.