The main types of social action according to Weber. Social action by M

Sociology is a science that studies society, the features of its development and social systems, as well as social institutions, relationships and communities. It reveals the internal mechanisms of the structure of society and the development of its structures, the patterns of social actions and mass behavior of people and, of course, the features of the interaction between society and man.

Max Weber

One of the most prominent specialists in the field of sociology, as well as one of its founders (along with Karl Marx and Emil Durkheim) is a German sociologist, political economist, historian and philosopher named Max Weber. His ideas had a strong influence on the development of sociological science, as well as a number of other social disciplines. He adhered to the methods of anti-positivism and argued that the study of social action should not be purely empirical, but more interpretive and explanatory approach. The very concept of "social action" was also introduced by Max Weber. But, among other things, this person is also the founder of understanding sociology, where not only any social actions are considered, but their meaning and purpose are recognized from the position of the people involved in what is happening.

Understanding sociology

According to the ideas of Max Weber, sociology should be precisely an "understanding" science, since human behavior is meaningful. However, this understanding cannot be called psychological, because meaning does not belong to the field of the mental, which means that it cannot be considered a subject of study. This meaning is part of social action - behavior that is related to the behavior of others, oriented, corrected and regulated by it. The basis of the discipline created by Weber is the idea that the laws of nature and society are opposite to each other, which means that there are two basic types of scientific knowledge - natural science (natural sciences) and humanitarian knowledge (cultural sciences). Sociology, in turn, is a frontier science, which should combine the best of them. It turns out that the methodology of understanding and correlation with values is taken from humanitarian knowledge, and the cause-and-effect interpretation of the surrounding reality and adherence to accurate data are taken from natural knowledge. The essence of an understanding sociology should be the sociologist's understanding and explanation of the following:

Through what meaningful actions do people strive to realize their aspirations, to what extent and thanks to what can they succeed or fail?
What are the consequences of the aspirations of some people for the behavior of others?

But, if Karl Marx and Emile Durkheim considered social phenomena from the position of objectivism, and society was the main subject of analysis for them, then Max Weber proceeded from the fact that the nature of the social should be considered subjectively, and the emphasis should be placed on the behavior of an individual. In other words, the subject of sociology should be the behavior of the individual, his picture of the world, beliefs, opinions, ideas, etc. After all, it is the individual with his ideas, motives, goals, etc. makes it possible to understand what causes social interactions. And, based on the premise that the main feature of the social is an accessible and understandable subjective meaning, the sociology of Max Weber was called understanding.

social action

According to Weber, social action can be of several types, based on four types of motivation:

Purposeful rational social action- is based on the expectation of specific behavior of other people and objects of the external world, as well as on the application of this expectation as a "means" or "conditions" for goals that are rationally directed and regulated (for example, success);
Value-rational social action - is based on a conscious belief in the religious, aesthetic, ethical or any other unconditional value of any behavior taken as a basis, regardless of its success and effectiveness;
Affective social action it is mainly an emotional action, which is due to affects or intense emotional states of a person;
Traditional social action based on habitual human behavior.

ideal type

To identify cause-and-effect relationships and comprehend human behavior, Max Weber introduced the term "ideal type". This ideal type is an artificially logically constructed term that makes it possible to single out the main features of the social phenomenon under study. The ideal type is formed not by abstract theoretical constructions, but is based on manifestations that take place in real life. Moreover, the concept itself is dynamic - because society and the area of interest of its researchers may change, it is necessary to form new typologies that will correspond to these changes.

Social institutions

Weber also singled out social institutions, such as the state, church, family, and others, and social associations, such as societies and groups. The scientist paid special attention to the analysis of social institutions. At the center of them is always the state, which Weber himself defined as a special organization of public power with a monopoly on legitimate violence. Religion is the most vivid representative of the meaning-forming principles in people's behavior. Interestingly, Weber was interested not so much in the essence of religion as in how a person perceives and understands it, based on his subjective experiences. Thus, in the course of his research, Max Weber even revealed the relationship between people's religious beliefs and their economic behavior.

Bureaucracy Study

The works of Max Weber also explore such phenomena as bureaucracy and the bureaucratization of society. It should be said that the attitude of sociological science to bureaucracy is neutral. Weber considered it through the prism of rationality, which, in his understanding, is bureaucracy. In understanding sociology, the effectiveness of bureaucracy is its fundamental characteristic, as a result of which this term itself acquires a positive meaning. However, Weber also noted that bureaucracy poses a potential threat to democracy and liberal-bourgeois freedoms, but despite this, no society can fully exist without a bureaucratic machine.

Influence of understanding sociology

The emergence of the understanding sociology of Max Weber and its development most seriously influenced the Western sociology of the middle and second half of the 20th century. Even at present, it is the subject of heated debate in the field of theoretical and methodological problems of sociological knowledge in general. The initial assumptions formulated by Max Weber were subsequently developed by such famous sociologists as Edward Shiels, Florian Witold Znanensky, George Herbert Mead and many others. And thanks to the activity of the American sociologist Talcott Parsons in generalizing the concepts of understanding sociology, the theory of social action served as a fundamental starting point for all behavioral science of our time.

findings

If we argue from the position of Max Weber, then sociology is the science of social behavior, striving for its understanding and interpretation. And social behavior reflects the subjective attitude of a person, his externally or internally manifested position, which is focused on committing an act or refusing it. This attitude can be considered behavior when in the mind of a person it is associated with a certain meaning. And behavior is considered social when, in this sense, it correlates with the behavior of other people. The main task of understanding sociology is to determine the motives that move people in certain situations.

If you are interested in the ideas of Max Weber, you can refer to the study of one (or all) of his main works - "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism", "Economy and Society", "Basic Sociological Concepts", as well as works devoted to issues of religion - "Ancient Judaism", "Religions of India: The Sociology of Hinduism and Buddhism", and "The Religion of China: Confucianism and Taoism".

Max Weber , essays: “Economic ethics of world religions”, “Protestant ethics and the spirit of capitalism”, etc.

The criterion for highlighting the main thing in the individual, according to Weber, is “reference to value”. Values can be - theoretical (truth), political (justice), moral (goodness), aesthetic (beauty). These values are significant for all existing subjects, have absolute significance within a certain historical era.

The need to understand the subject of one's research, according to Weber, distinguishes sociology from the natural sciences. It considers the behavior of a person only insofar as the person associates a certain meaning with his actions. action human behavior is called if and insofar as the acting individual or individuals associate a subjective meaning with it. Sociology, according to Weber, must be understanding, since the action of the individual is meaningful.

Listing the possible types of social action, he identifies 4: purposeful; value-rational; affective; traditional .

Purposeful rational can be defined through the expectation of a certain behavior of objects of the external world and other people, and using this expectation as "conditions" or "means" for rationally directed and regulated goals. The criterion of rationality is success.

Value-rational - through a conscious belief in the ethical, aesthetic, religious or otherwise understood unconditional own value (intrinsic value) of a certain behavior, taken as such and regardless of success.

affective - affectively or especially emotionally through feelings.

Traditional - through habit.

The basis of M. Weber's political sociology is domination. It means a chance to meet obedience to a certain order. There are three types of dominance.

16. Comrade Parsons' General Theory of Action.

Talcott Parsons. According to Parsons, reality, despite its immensity, is organized logically, rationally and has a systematic order. The general model of action singled out by him, called a single act, implies a generalized model of any human action, taken in its essential features. This model includes:

1. one person (current face ), endowed with the ability and desire to act, having definite goals and able to describe ways to achieve them;

2. situational environment - variable and immutable factors in relation to which the action is directed and on which it depends.

Situational environment - changeable and immutable factors in relation to which the action is directed and on which it depends.

The concept of a system is taken by Parsons from general systems theory.

Action systems are open , therefore, in order to continue their existence (maintain order), they must satisfy human system needs or functionally necessary conditions: 1) adaptation; 2) goal setting; 3) integration; 4) latency.

Latency- maintaining a certain pattern. Thus, each system can be represented by four subsystems, formed by satisfying the system needs necessary for the continued existence of the system as such:

1. each system must adapt to its environment (adaptation);

2. Each system must have the means to determine the order in which goals are achieved and to mobilize resources in the order in which they are achieved. This is called goal setting;

3. each system must maintain its unity, i.e. internal coordination of its parts and prevent possible deviations. This is called integration;

4. Each system must strive for an appropriate balance. This is latency.

Parsons identified the following levels of hierarchy, starting with the living system, including organisms. The living system includes 4 subsystems:

1. Physico-chemical consists of physical and chemical processes. Uses the functions of adapting to the inorganic environment.

2. An organic system performs the functions of goal-setting for a living system.

3. Transcendental, including the conditions for the existence of a living system and performing the function of maintaining order and relieving tension within a living system.

4. System of action (single act) - these are actions controlled by decisions made under the influence of the situation and performing the functions of integration, a living system.

For the action system (4), 4 more subsystems are distinguished: a) biological system; b) the personality system formed in the process of socialization; c) social system - a set of role statuses controlled by norms and values; d) cultural system - a set of ideas, various ideals.

Further, Parsons substantiated the thesis that any system is controlled by a subsystem that has a large information potential, but consumes the least amount of energy. Among the systems of action, the biological system has the greatest energy potential. It creates a condition for the course of action, but at the same time has the least control effect. The system with the lowest energy potential is the cultural one and it has the highest controlling status.

concept "social action" first introduced M. Weber. It was this researcher who defined the new sociological term and formulated its main features. Weber understood by this term the actions of a person, which, according to the assumption of the actor, the meaning correlates with the actions of other people or is guided by them. Thus, according to Weber, the most important features of social action are the following:

1) the subjective meaning of social action, i.e., personal understanding of possible behaviors;

2) an important role in the action of the individual is played by a conscious orientation to the response of others, the expectation of this reaction.

Weber identified four types of social action. This typology was made by analogy with his doctrine of ideal types:

1) purposeful action- the behavior of the individual is formed exclusively at the level of the mind;

2) value-rational- the behavior of the individual is determined by faith, the adoption of a certain system of values;

3) affective- the behavior of the individual is determined by feelings and emotions;

4) traditional activities Behavior is based on habit, pattern of behavior.

Significant contribution to the theory of social action was made by T. Parsons . In the concept of Parsons, social action is considered in two manifestations: as a single phenomenon and as a system. He identified the following characteristics:

1) normativity - dependence on generally accepted values and norms;

2) voluntarism - dependence on the will of the subject;

3) the presence of sign mechanisms of regulation.

Social action, according to Parsons, performs certain functions in a person's life that ensure his existence as a biosocial being. Among these functions, four can be distinguished depending on the subsystems of the individual's life in which they are carried out:

1) at the biological level, the adaptive function of social action is performed;

2) in the subsystem of the assimilation of values and norms, social action performs a personal function;

3) the totality of social roles and statuses is provided by the social function;

4) at the level of assimilation of goals and ideals, a cultural function is carried out.

Thus, social action can be characterized as any behavior of an individual or a group that is significant for other individuals and groups in a social community or society as a whole. Moreover, the action expresses the nature and content of relations between people and social groups, which, being constant carriers of qualitatively different types of activities, differ in social positions (statuses) and roles.

An important part of the sociological theory of social action is the creation of a theoretical model of behavior. One of the main elements of this model is the structure of social action. This structure includes:

1) the acting person (subject) - the carrier of active action, having the will;

2) object - the goal towards which the action is directed;

3) the need for active behavior, which can be considered as a special state of the subject, generated by the need for means of subsistence, objects necessary for his life and development, and thus acting as a source of the subject's activity;

4) method of action - a set of means that is used by an individual to achieve a goal;

5) result - a new state of the elements that have developed in the course of the action, the synthesis of the goal, the properties of the object and the efforts of the subject.

Any social action has its own mechanism of accomplishment. It is never instant. To start the mechanism of social action, a person must have a certain need for this behavior, which is called motivation. The main factors of activity are interest and orientation.

Interest- this is the attitude of the subject to the necessary means and conditions for satisfying his inherent needs. Orientation- this is a way of distinguishing social phenomena according to the degree of their significance for the subject. In the sociological literature, there are various approaches to the analysis of the motivation of social action. So, within one of them, all motives are divided into three large groups:

1) socio-economic. This group includes, first of all, material motives that are associated with the achievement of certain material and social benefits (recognition, honor, respect);

2) implementation of prescribed and learned norms. This group includes motives that are of social significance;

3) life cycle optimization. This group includes motives associated and conditioned by a certain life situation.

After the motivation of the subject arises, the stage of goal formation begins. At this stage, rational choice is the central mechanism.

Rational Choice is an analysis of several goals in terms of their availability and suitability and their gradation in accordance with the data of this analysis. The emergence of the goal can be carried out in two different ways: on the one hand, the goal can be formed as a kind of life plan that has a potential character; on the other hand, the goal can be formulated as an imperative, i.e., have the character of obligation and obligation.

The goal connects the subject with the objects of the external world and acts as a program for their mutual change. Through a system of needs and interests, situational conditions, the outside world takes possession of the subject, and this is reflected in the content of the goals. But through a system of values and motives, in a selective attitude to the world, in the means of goal-fulfillment, the subject seeks to establish himself in the world and change it, that is, to master the world himself.

Social actions act as links in the chain of interactions.

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The theory of social action M. Weber.

Performed:

Introduction…………………………………………………………………………..3

1. Biography of M. Weber…………………………………………………………..4

2. The main provisions of the theory of social action………………………7

2.1 Social action……………………………………………………..7

3. Theory of social action…………………………………………........ 17

3.1 Purposeful rational behavior……………………………………………………………………………….

3.2 Value-rational behavior…………………………………..22

3.3 Affective behavior………………………………………………..23

3.4 Traditional behavior……………………………………………….24

Conclusion……………………………………………………………………….28

References…………………………………………………………........29

Introduction

Relevance of the topic. The theory of social action is the "core" of M. Weber's sociology, management, political science, sociology of management and other sciences, and therefore its importance for professional training is very great, because. he created one of the most fundamental concepts of sociological science throughout its existence - the theory of social action as a tool for explaining the behavior of various types of people.

The interaction of a person as a person with the world around him is carried out in a system of objective relations that develop between people in their social life and, above all, in production activities. Objective relations and connections (relations of dependence, subordination, cooperation, mutual assistance, etc.) inevitably and naturally arise in any real group. Interaction and relationships are formed on the basis of human actions and behavior.

The study of the theory of social action by Max Weber, one of the main concepts of sociology, makes it possible in practice to find out the reasons for the interaction of various forces in society, human behavior, to comprehend the factors that make people act this way and not otherwise.

The purpose of this course work– study of the theory of social action by M. Weber.

Objectives of the course work:

1. Expand the definition of social action.

2. Designate the classification of social actions proposed by M. Weber.

1. Biography of M. Weber

M. Weber (1864-1920) belongs to those universally educated minds, which, unfortunately, are becoming less and less as the differentiation of the social sciences grows. Weber was the largest specialist in the field of political economy, law, sociology, and philosophy. He acted as a historian of the economy, political institutions and political theories, religion and science, and, most importantly, as a logician and methodologist who developed the principles of knowledge of the social sciences.

Max Weber was born on April 21, 1864 in Erfurt, Germany. In 1882 he graduated from the classical gymnasium in Berlin and entered the University of Heidelberg. In 1889 defended his thesis. He worked as a professor at the universities of Berlin, Freiburg, Heidelberg, and Munich.

In 1904 Weber becomes editor of the German sociological journal "Archive for Social Science and Social Policy". His most important works are published here, including the programmatic study "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" (1905). This study begins a series of publications by Weber on the sociology of religion, which he pursued until his death. At the same time, he dealt with the problems of logic and methodology of the social sciences. From 1916 to 1919 he published one of his main works - "Economic Ethics of World Religions". Of Weber's last speeches, the reports "Politics as a Profession" (1919) and "Science as a Profession" should be noted.

M. Weber was influenced by a number of thinkers who determined in many respects both his methodological principles and his worldview. In methodological terms, in the field of the theory of knowledge, he was greatly influenced by the ideas of neo-Kantianism, and above all by G. Rickert.

By his own admission, Weber, the works of K. Marx, which prompted him to study the problems of the emergence and development of capitalism, were of great importance in shaping his thinking. In general, he attributed Marx to those thinkers who most strongly influenced the socio-historical thought of the 19th-20th centuries.

As for the general philosophical, worldview plan, Weber experienced two different, and in many respects mutually exclusive influences: on the one hand, the philosophy of I. Kant, especially in his youth; on the other hand, almost in the same period, he was under the influence and was a great admirer of N. Machiavelli, T. Hobbes and f. Nietzsche.

To understand the meaning of his views and actions, it should be noted that Kant attracted Weber, first of all, with his ethical pathos. He remained faithful to Kant's moral requirement of honesty and conscientiousness in scientific research until the end of his life.

Hobbes and especially Machiavelli made a strong impression on him with their political realism. As the researchers note, it was precisely the attraction to these two mutually exclusive poles "(on the one hand, Kant's ethical idealism with its pathos of "truth", on the other hand, political realism with its installation of "sobriety and strength") determined the peculiar duality of M. Weber's worldview.

The first works of M. Weber - "On the history of trading societies in the Middle Ages" (1889), "Roman agrarian history and its significance for public and private law" (1891) - immediately put him in a number of prominent scientists. In them, he analyzed the relationship of state-legal formations with the economic structure of society. In these works, especially in Roman Agrarian History, the general contours of an "empirical sociology" (Weber's expression) were outlined, which was most closely associated with history. In accordance with the requirements of the historical school that dominated German political economy, he considered the evolution of ancient agriculture in connection with social and political development, and did not miss the analysis of the forms of family life, way of life, customs, and religious cults.

A trip to the United States in 1904, where he was invited to give a course of lectures, had a great influence on his formation as a sociologist. In 1904, Weber became the editor of the German sociological journal "Archive of Social Science and Social Policy". Here his most important works are published, including the programmatic study "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" (1905). This study begins a series of publications by Weber on the sociology of religion, which he pursued until his death. At the same time, he dealt with the problems of logic and methodology of the social sciences. From 1916 to 1919 he published one of his main works - "Economic Ethics of World Religions". Of Weber's last speeches, the reports "Politics as a Profession" (1919) and "Science as a Profession" should be noted. They found their expression of Weber's mentality after the First World War. They were quite pessimistic - pessimistic, in relation to the future of industrial civilization, as well as the prospects for the implementation of socialism in Russia. He did not have any special expectations from him. He was convinced that if what is called socialism is realized, then it will only be a system of bureaucratization of society carried to the end.

Weber died in 1920, not having had time to carry out all his plans. His fundamental work "Economy and Society" (1921) was published posthumously, summarizing the results of his sociological research.

2. Basic provisions of the theory of social action

The theory of action has a stable conceptual base in sociology, the formation of which was influenced by various directions of thinking. In order to supplement or expand this theoretical foundation in order to further improve the theory, it is necessary to proceed from the current level of its development, as well as from the contributions of the classics, which today are beginning to take shape in a new way. All this is necessary in order for it to be effective and not lose relevance for the future. Regarding the contribution of M. Weber to the formation of the theory of action among sociologists today there is a complete mutual understanding. There is no doubt that his justification of sociology as a science of social action represented a radical turn against the positivism and historicism that prevailed in the social sciences at the beginning of the twentieth century. However, much ambiguity and inconsistency exists over the interpretation of his views.

2.1 Social action

Weber defines action (regardless of whether it manifests itself externally, for example, in the form of aggression, or is hidden inside the subjective world of a person, like suffering) as such behavior with which the acting individual or individuals associate a subjectively assumed meaning.. "Social" action becomes only if, according to the meaning assumed by the actor or actors, it correlates with the action of other people and focuses on it. "And he declares the explanation of social action to be the central task. In its qualitative originality, it differs from reactive behavior, because in its it is based on subjective meaning. It is a predetermined plan or project of action. As social, it differs from reactive behavior in that this meaning is related to the action of another. Sociology, therefore, must devote itself to the study of the facts of social action.

This is how Weber defines social action. "Action" should be called human behavior (it makes no difference whether external or internal action, non-action and or undergoing), if and insofar as the agent or agents associate with it some subjective meaning. "But "social action" should be called one that, in its meaning, implied by the actor or actors, is related to the behavior of others and is thus oriented in its course." Based on this, "an action cannot be considered social if it is purely imitative, when the individual acts like an atom of the crowd, or when he is guided by some natural phenomenon."

The goal is a significant understanding and explanation of social reality, which appears to be the result of significant social activity.

social action, according to Max Weber, is distinguished by two features that make it social, i.e. different from mere action. Social Action:

1) has a meaning for the one who does it,

2) focused on other people.

Meaning is a certain idea of why or why this action is performed, it is some (sometimes very vague) awareness and direction of it. There is a well-known example by which M. Weber illustrates his definition of a social action: if two cyclists collide on a highway, then this is not a social action (although it happens between people) - that's when they jump up and start to sort things out between themselves (swear or help a friend). friend), then the action acquires the characteristics of the social.

If we analyze social action as a system, the following components can be distinguished in it:

1) acting person (subject of action)
2) the object of the action (the person being acted upon)
3) a means or instrument of action
4) method of action or method of using the means of action
5) the result of the action or the reaction of the person being acted upon.

Social action should be distinguished from the concept of "behavior". Behavior is a response to action. Social action is a system of actions, means and methods by which an individual or group tries to change the behavior, attitudes or opinions of other individuals or groups.

A social action, its performance requires the subject to have a certain attitude or a strong inclination to perform a certain action.

Social action, writes Weber, is considered to be an action whose "subjective meaning refers to the behavior of other people." Based on this, an action cannot be considered social if it is purely imitative, when an individual acts like an atom of a crowd, or when he is oriented towards some natural phenomenon (for example, an action is not social when a lot of people open umbrellas during rain ).

Signs of social action:

1 . the most important sign of social action is subjective meaning - personal understanding of possible behaviors.

2 . the conscious orientation of the subject to the response of others, the expectation of this reaction, is important.

The essential components of an action are subject and an object actions.

Subject- this is the bearer of purposeful activity, the one who acts with consciousness and will.

An object- what the action is directed at.

AT functional aspect stand out action steps :

1. associated with goal setting

2. related to their operational implementation.

At these stages, organizational links are established between the subject and the object of action. The goal is an ideal image of the process and result of the action. The ability to set goals, i.e. to the ideal modeling of upcoming actions, is the most important property of a person as a subject of action.

Six types of social action by their orientation:

M. Weber identified six types of social action:

1. The correct type, in which the end and the chosen means are objectively adequate to each other and therefore strictly rational.

2. The type in which the means chosen to achieve the goal seem adequate to the subject himself. Objectively, they may not be.

3. The action is approximate, without a clearly defined goal and means, according to the principle "maybe something will work out."

4. An action that does not have an exact goal, determined by specific circumstances and understandable only in view of them.

5. An action only partially understood by its circumstances. It also includes a number of obscure elements.

6. An action that is caused by completely incomprehensible psychological or physical factors and is inexplicable from a rational position.

This classification is not contrived or speculative. It allows you to arrange all types of social action according to the degree of decreasing rationality, and, consequently, understandability. In fact, the transition from one type to another is almost imperceptible. But the accumulation of growing quantitative differences eventually turns the type of purposeful rational action into its opposite, into the type of irrational, practically incomprehensible, inexplicable action. Only the last two types need to be explained from a psychological point of view.

Not all types of action - including external ones - are "social" in the sense taken here. An external action cannot be called social if it is oriented only towards the behavior of material objects. An internal relationship is social only if it is oriented toward the behavior of others. So, for example, actions of a religious nature are not social if they do not go beyond the limits of contemplation, a prayer read in solitude, etc. Management (of an individual) is social only if and insofar as it takes into account the behavior of others. In the most general and formal terms, therefore, if such management reflects the recognition by third parties of the actual rights of a given individual to dispose of his economy at his own discretion. Not all types of human relationships are social in nature.

Social action is not identical to either:

a) the uniform behavior of many people (if many people on the street open umbrellas when it rains, then this (as a rule) does not mean that a person’s action is focused on the behavior of others; these are just the same type of actions to protect from rain);

b) one that is influenced by the behavior of others (it is known that a person’s behavior is strongly influenced simply by the fact that he is among a crowded “mass” of people (the subject of “mass psychology” studied in Le Bon’s work); such behavior is defined as behavior The individual may also be subject to mass influence by scattered masses of people if they influence him simultaneously or successively (for example, through the press), and he perceives their behavior as the behavior of many.Reactions of a certain type become possible only due to the fact that the individual feels himself to be part of the “mass”, other reactions, on the contrary, are hindered by this.)

M. Weber sought to show how the most important social facts - relations, order, connections - should be defined as special forms of social action. Another thing is that this aspiration was not actually realized. A systematic explanation of these social facts through the study of the single actions that constitute them has not taken place. Social action leads to social fact. This is Weber's most important thought. But in this case, attention should be paid to the fact that not all the facts that traditional sociology explores can be explained as certain joint actions, and also refuted through the explanation of the individual actions of the participants. These facts include the distribution of income, social ideas about values. Social ideas about the world and values that individuals strive for, ideas that, for their part, determine various phenomena - all this is at the center of attention of social science.

In the context of Weber's theory, it is necessary to understand the principles by which the process of performing an action can be explained, which implies its reduction to the corresponding motives. It is also necessary to explain the result of an action through understanding, which involves establishing and examining those actions that preceded it. Explanation of action through understanding also allows taking into account special principles and techniques for this, i.e. how to use them in each specific case. Weber's judgments regarding the explanation of actions lead to a theory of the latter, which does not pin much hope on the principle of understanding. M. Weber moves along this path, it will become clear after checking and reconstructing those specific techniques that he uses to explain action through understanding.

In order to explain the flow of action through understanding, it is necessary to limit oneself to a set of rules and requirements. Therefore, in Weber it is useful to distinguish between two points:

1. General techniques for explaining action through understanding.

2. Specific guidance on how these techniques and methods should be used in a particular case.

For Weber, the course of action is behavior under certain external conditions. Its explanation, like the explanation of any other event, must be carried out by subsuming it under a general empirical pattern with which the conditions of action are associated. In this approach, understanding will play a twofold role.

Direct explanation is preceded by a special type of understanding aimed at identifying the type of action that needs to be explained by locking its external features to the meaning or purpose of this action, which involves the use of hypotheses regarding the connection of certain external features with the corresponding purpose of the action. Direct explanation must be made by "explaining understanding." We are talking here about reducing the meaning of the action to its subjective grounds, in order to understand why the person we are interested in acts in this way, and not in another.

To discover these subjective grounds, a peculiar representation of oneself in the place of the acting individual, in the conditions in which he is located, is supposed. It is necessary to make available reflections on the ends and means that preceded the actions to be explained. This suggests that "it is necessary to make accessible and understandable the previous connection of feelings and emotions."

Weber thus believes that an action is explained by reference to a particular causal principle. For Weber, explanation is a technique in which the general rules of experience are applied. However, he expresses the idea that the basis for interpreting behavior is one's own knowledge of everyday life. Therefore, the general rules applied in the disclosure of the grounds of action reveals "their direct connection with personal experience, substantiating everyday knowledge, and therefore they are not precisely and not quite definitely formulated." Therefore, in a general interpretation of explanatory understanding, Weber draws attention to the fact that understanding occurs in the light of the general rules of everyday knowledge.

For Weber, understanding is a means to find the most obvious and adequate explanation for a given action. But the presence of an “understandably” defined cause of an action is not a condition for an adequate explanation. The latter occurs when empirical verification reveals that the found explanation is correct. How such a check should look like - Weber does not specify. With any concrete explanation of the action, he seeks to test hypotheses regarding the causal relationship of certain external situations and the subjective grounds for the action, on the one hand, and a number of grounds for the action with the corresponding action, on the other. For Weber, it is important to establish a correspondence between adequacy in meaning and verification through experience.

This test involves some statistical methods, historical comparison and, in the extreme case, a thought experiment. In this test, Weber would like to verify the assumptions applied in explaining the action as to the existence of its determinants. For example, the assumption about what goals, assessments of the situation and ideas about the actions of the participants, consistent with the goal, were contained by the actors.

The psychological understanding of other people's mental states is, according to Weber, only an auxiliary, and not the main tool for the historian and sociologist. It can be resorted to only if the action to be explained cannot be understood according to its meaning.

“In explaining the irrational moments of action, an understanding psychology can indeed render an undoubtedly important service. But this, - he emphasizes, - does not change anything in the methodological principles.

Directly most understandable in its semantic structure is an action oriented subjectively strictly rationally in accordance with the means that are considered uniquely adequate to achieve unambiguous and clearly perceived goals.

The most "understandable" action is meaningful, i.e. directed towards the achievement of goals clearly recognized by the acting individual himself and using to achieve these goals the means recognized as adequate by the acting individual himself. The consciousness of the acting individual is thus necessary for the action under study to act as a social reality.

When explaining an action, Weber assigns decisive importance to motives. Therefore, the typology of actions refers to the existing types of motivation. Within the framework of this approach, the individual acts as something self-evident, as an initial given. Society is a collection of people and the connections between them. Weber is interested in the formation of a certain stereotype of orientation, which is mandatory for many individuals. It presupposes the existence of corresponding values of norms. Consistency arises when the interaction participants are oriented to this stereotype. Therefore, sociology explains, understanding the meaning of the action that is summed up under it. In this context, society for Weber is something that is consciously regulated.

M. Weber considers only its goal as a determinant of action and does not pay due attention to the circumstances that make it possible. He did not indicate sufficient conditions for finding out among which action alternatives one chooses. He has no judgments about what goals of the action and in what situations the actor has, and, finally, what options for action leading to this goal the subject sees, and what type of selection he makes among them.

3. Social action theory

Weber identifies four types of activities, focusing on the possible real behavior of people in life:

- purposeful,

- value-rational,

- affective,

- traditional.

Let us turn to Weber himself: “Social action, like any action, can be defined:

1) purposefully rational, that is, through the expectation of a certain behavior of objects of the external world and other people and when using this expectation as “conditions” or as a “means” for rationally directed and regulated goals (the criterion of rationality is success);

2) value-rationally, that is, in a conscious belief in the ethical, aesthetic, religious or any other understood unconditional own value (self-worth) of a certain behavior, taken simply as such and regardless of success;

3) affectively, especially emotionally - through actual affects and feelings;

4) traditionally, that is, through habit.

Ideal types of social actions

Type	Target	Facilities	General characteristic
Purposeful rational	Understand clearly and distinctly. The consequences are anticipated and assessed	Adequate (appropriate)	Completely rational. Assumes a rational calculation of the reaction of the environment
Value- rational	The action itself (as an independent value)	Adequate to a given goal	Rationality can be limited - irrationality of a given value (ritual; etiquette; dueling code)
Traditional	Minimal goal setting (goal awareness)	Habitual	Automatic response to familiar stimuli
affective	Not conscious	Henchmen	The desire for immediate (or as fast as possible) satisfaction of passion, removal of neuro-emotional stress

3.1 Purposeful rational behavior

In "Economy and Society" it is called differently: first "rational", later - "purposeful", which reveals two distinctive features:

1. It is “subjectively goal-oriented”, i.e. due, on the one hand, to a clearly conscious purpose of the action, which does not raise doubts about its implementation. On the other hand, it is a conscious idea that the action being carried out achieves the goal at the lowest cost.

2. This action is "right oriented". This assumes that in this case the assumption is used that the action of interest to us is consistent with its goal. It depends on the fact that the subject's ideas about this situation - let's call them conditionally "ontological" knowledge - were correct, as well as the ideas about what actions he can use to achieve the intended goal. We will conditionally call these representations “monological” knowledge. Schematically, goal-oriented action can be described using the following determinants:

1. A clear understanding of the goal is crucial here in the sense that undesirable consequences for other subjective goals that may arise in the process of its implementation are called into question. This action is carried out in a given situation with the least expensive means for its implementation.

2. Purposeful rational action can be defined indirectly, due to the existence of two special determinants:

a) through correct information about the uniqueness of the given situation and the causal relationship of various actions with the implementation of the goal pursued in this situation, i.e. through correct “ontological” or “nomological” knowledge;

b) due to the conscious calculation of the proportionality and consistency of the action taken on the basis of the information available. This involves the implementation of at least four operations:

1. Rational calculation of those actions that may be possible with a certain degree of probability. They can also be means to achieve the goal.

2. A conscious calculation of the consequences of actions that can act as means, and this involves paying attention to those costs and undesirable consequences that may arise due to the frustration of other ends.

3. Rational calculation of the desired consequences of any action, which is also considered as a means. Consideration should be given to whether it is acceptable in the face of undesirable consequences.

4. Careful comparison of these actions, considering which of them lead to the goal at the lowest cost.

This model should be applied when explaining a particular action. At the same time, M. Weber outlines two fundamental classes of deviations from the model of goal-oriented action.

1. The actor proceeds from false information about the situation and about the options for action that can lead to the realization of the goal.

2. The actor shows a value-rational, affective or traditional action, which

a) is not determined through a clear awareness of the goal, casting doubt on the frustrations of other goals that arise in its implementation. They are characterized through goals that are directly implemented, without taking into account other goals.

b) Not determined by a rational calculation of the proportionality and consistency of the action relative to the situation, carried out on the basis of available information. Such actions are seen as a limitation of rationality - the further they deviate from it, the more they reveal irrational signs. Therefore, Weber identifies the non-rational with the irrational.

So, on the one hand, a value-rational action is based on a goal, the implementation of which does not take into account the consequences that need to be foreseen. On the one hand, this action is to a certain extent consistent and systematic. It follows from the establishment of those imperatives that are responsible for the choice of action alternatives.

Purpose-rationality, according to Weber, is only a methodological, and not an ontological attitude of a sociologist, it is a means of analyzing reality, and not a characteristic of this reality itself. Weber specifically emphasizes this point: “This method,” he writes, “of course, should be understood not as a rationalistic prejudice of sociology, but only as a methodological means, and, therefore, it should not be considered, for example, as a belief in the actual predominance of the rational principle over life. For it says absolutely nothing about the extent to which rational considerations determine the actual action in reality. Choosing goal-oriented action as a methodological basis, Weber thereby dissociates himself from those sociological theories that take social “totalities” as their initial reality, such as: “people”, “society”, “state”, “economy”, etc. d. In this regard, he sharply criticizes “organic sociology”, which considers an individual as part of a certain social organism, strongly objects to considering society according to a biological model: the concept of an organism as applied to society can only be a metamorphosis - nothing more.

The organicist approach to the study of society abstracts from the fact that man is a being acting consciously. The analogy between the individual and the cell of the body is possible only on the condition that the factor of consciousness is recognized as insignificant. Weber objects to this, putting forward a model of social action that accepts this factor as essential.

It is purposeful rational action that Weber serves as a model of social action, with which all other types of action are correlated. Weber lists them in this order: “The following types of action exist:

1) more or less approximately achieved correct type;

2) (subjectively) goal-oriented type;

3) action, more or less consciously and more or less uniquely goal-oriented rationally;

4) an action that is not goal-oriented, but understandable in its meaning;

5) an action, in its meaning more or less understandably motivated, but violated - more or less strongly - by the intrusion of incomprehensible elements, and, finally,

6) an action in which completely incomprehensible mental or physical facts are connected “with” a person or “in” a person by imperceptible transitions”

3.2 Value-rational behavior

This ideal type of social action involves the performance of such actions, which are based on the belief in the self-sufficient value of the act as such, in other words, here the action itself acts as the goal. Value-rational action, according to Weber, is always subject to certain requirements, in following which the individual sees his duty. If he acts in accordance with these requirements - even if rational calculation predicts a greater likelihood of adverse consequences for him personally - then we are dealing with value-rational action. A classic example of value-rational action: the captain of a sinking ship is the last to leave, even though his life is in danger. Awareness of such an orientation of actions, their correlation with certain ideas about values - about duty, dignity, beauty, morality, etc. - already speaks of a certain rationality, meaningfulness. If, moreover, we are dealing with consistency in the implementation of such behavior, and therefore with premeditation, then we can talk about an even greater degree of its rationality, which distinguishes a value-rational action, say, from an affective one. At the same time, in comparison with the purposeful-rational type, the “value-based rationality” of an action carries something irrational, since it absolutizes the value that the individual is guided by.

“Purely value-rational,” writes Weber, “one acts who, regardless of foreseeable consequences, acts in accordance with his convictions and does what he thinks duty, dignity, beauty, religious prescription require of him, reverence or importance of some ... "case." Value-rational action ... is always an action in accordance with the commandments or requirements that the actor considers presented to himself. In the case of a value-rational action, the purpose of the action and the action itself coincide, they are not dissected, just as in the case of an affective action; side effects, both in the first and in the second, are not taken into account.

It seems that the difference between goal-oriented and value-rational types of social action is approximately the same as between truth and true. The first of these concepts means "that which there is actually", regardless of the system of ideas, beliefs, beliefs that have developed in a particular society. It is really not easy to obtain this kind of knowledge, you can simply approach it consistently, step by step, in the way that the positivist Comte suggests doing. The second means comparing what you observe or intend to do with the norms generally accepted in this society and ideas about what is proper and right.

3.3 Affective behavior

Affect- this is emotional excitement, which develops into passion, a strong spiritual impulse. The affect comes from within, under its influence a person acts unconsciously. Being a short-term emotional state, affective behavior is not oriented towards the behavior of others or the conscious choice of a goal. The state of confusion before an unexpected event, elation and enthusiasm, irritation with others, depression and melancholy - all these are affective forms of behavior.

Due to the fact that this action is based on a goal, the implementation of which is not questioned with established undesirable consequences for other goals. But this goal is not long-term, as in the value-rational action, it is short-term and not stable. An affective action also has a quality that is not subjective-rational, i.e. it is not connected with rational calculation of possible alternatives of action and selection of the best of them. This action signifies a feeling-driven devotion to a goal setting that fluctuates and changes according to the constellation of feelings and emotions. Understanding an affectively established goal in relation to other goals in terms of their compatibility, as well as their consequences, is unproductive here.

"The individual acts under the influence of passion if he seeks immediately to satisfy his need for revenge, pleasure, devotion, blissful contemplation, or to relieve the tension of any other affects, no matter how base or refined they may be"

3.4 traditional behavior

It cannot even be called conscious, because it is based on a blunted reaction to habitual stimuli. It proceeds according to the once adopted scheme. Various taboos and prohibitions, norms and rules, customs and traditions act as irritants. They are passed down from generation to generation. Such, for example, is the custom of hospitality that exists among all peoples. It is followed automatically, by virtue of the habit of behaving one way and not another.

Traditional action is associated with rules of some order, the meaning and purpose of which is unknown. With this type of action, there is a goal, for the achievement of which a certain sequence of actions is necessary. In this case, this sequence is not calculated. In the traditional orientation, the scope for rational thinking narrows due to norms prescribing in a certain case specific goals and means for their implementation.

However, actions defined through a stable tradition are preceded by an incomplete processing of information about the existing situation, containing a kind of “usual charm”, to which they react with a traditional action, and actions that lead to the goal in this situation.

As Weber himself points out,

"...purely traditional action... is on the very frontier, and often even beyond, what can be called 'meaningfully' oriented action."

Strictly speaking, only the first two types of action are fully social, because they deal with conscious meaning. So, speaking about the early types of society, the sociologist notes that they were dominated by traditional and affective actions, and in an industrial society - purposeful and value-rational with a tendency to dominate the first.

The types of social action described by Weber are not just a methodological device convenient for explanation. Weber is convinced that the rationalization of rational action is a tendency of the historical process itself.

Four of these types of action are arranged by Weber in order of increasing rationality: if traditional and affective actions can be called subjective-irrational (objectively, they can turn out to be rational), then the value-rational action already contains a subjective-rational moment, since the actor consciously correlates his actions with a certain value as a goal; however, this type of action is only relatively rational, since, first of all, the value itself is accepted without further mediation and justification, and (as a result) the side effects of the act are not taken into account. The actual flowing behavior of an individual, says Weber, is usually oriented in accordance with two or more types of action: there are both goal-oriented, and value-rational, and affective, and traditional moments in it. True, in different types of societies, certain types of action may be predominant: in societies that Weber called "traditional", the traditional and affective types of orientation of action predominate, of course, two more rational types of action are not excluded. On the contrary, in an industrial society, goal-oriented action acquires the greatest importance, but all other types of orientation are present to a greater or lesser extent here as well.

Finally, Weber notes that the four ideal types do not exhaust the whole variety of types of orientation of human behavior, but since they can be considered the most characteristic, then for the practical work of a sociologist they are a fairly reliable tool.

The typology of the increase in the rationality of social action expressed, according to Weber, the objective trend of the historical process, which, despite many deviations, had a worldwide character. The increasing weight of purposeful rational action, which displaces the main types, leads to the rationalization of the economy, management, the very way of thinking and the way of life of a person. Universal rationalization is accompanied by an increase in the role of science, which, being the purest manifestation of rationality, becomes the basis of economics and management. Society is gradually transforming from traditional to modern, based on formal rationalism.

Conclusion

The ideas of Max Weber are very fashionable today for the modern sociological thought of the West. They are experiencing a kind of renaissance, rebirth. This indicates that Max Weber was an outstanding scientist. His social ideas, obviously, had a leading character, if they are so in demand today by Western sociology as a science of society and the laws of its development.

In Weber's understanding, human action acquires the character social action, if there are two moments in it: the subjective motivation of the individual and the orientation towards another person. Understanding motivation and relating it to the behavior of other people are the necessary points of sociological research. Weber also identified four possible types of real behavior of people in life: goal-oriented, holistically rational, affective and traditional.

Having thus defined the meaning of social action, Weber came to the conclusion that the main provision of rationality, which is reflected in modern Weber's capitalist society, with its rational management and rational political power.

In all studies, Weber held the idea of rationality as a defining feature of modern European culture. Rationality is opposed to the traditional and charismatic ways of organizing social relations. Weber's central problem is the connection between the economic life of society, the material and ideological interests of various social groups and religious consciousness. Weber viewed personality as the basis of sociological analysis.

The study of Weber's works allows us to draw the necessary conclusion that a person's behavior depends entirely on his worldview, and the interest that each person has in a particular activity is due to the value system that a person is guided by.

Bibliography:

1. Weber M. Basic sociological concepts // Weber M. Selected works. Moscow: Progress, 1990.

3. Gaidenko P.P., Davydov Yu.N. History and Rationality (Max Weber's Sociology and the Weberian Renaissance). Moscow: Politizdat, 1991.

4. Gaidenko P.P., Davydov Yu.N. History and Rationality (Max Weber's Sociology and the Weberian Renaissance). Moscow: Politizdat, 1991.

5. Zborovsky G.E. History of Sociology: Textbook. - M.: Gardariki, 2004.

6. History of sociology in Western Europe and the USA. Textbook for universities./ Managing editor - Academician G.V. Osipov.- M.: Publishing house NORMA, 2001

7. History of theoretical sociology. In 4 tons / holes. Ed. And the compiler Yu.N. Davydov.- M.: Kanon, 1997.

8. Aron R. Stages of development of sociological thought. –M., 1993.

9. Hoffman A.B. Seven lectures on the history of sociology. –M., 1995.

10. Gromov I. et al. Western theoretical sociology. - St. Petersburg, 1996.

11. Radugin A.A., Radugin K.A. Sociology. Lecture course. –M., 1996.

12. Sociology. Fundamentals of the general theory. Tutorial. / G.V. Osipov et al. -M., 1998.

13. Sociology. Textbook./ Ed. E.V. Tadevosyan. –M., 1995.

14. Frolov S.S. Sociology. –M., 1998.

15. Volkov Yu.G., Nechipurenko V.N., Popov A.V., Samygin S.I. Sociology: Course of lectures: Textbook. - Rostov-n / D: Phoenix, 2000.

16. Lukman T. On the sociological vision of morality and moral communication // Sociology on the threshold of the XXI century: New directions of research. Moscow: Intellect, 1998.

17. Berger P., Lukman T. Social construction of reality. Treatise on the sociology of knowledge / Per. from English. E.D. Rutkevich. Moscow: Academia-center, Medium, 1995.

18. Borovik V.S., Kretov B.I. Fundamentals of political science and sociology: Textbook. - M .: Higher school, 2001.

19. Kravchenko A.I. "Sociology of M.Weber".

20. Internet resources (, www.5ballov.ru, yandex.ru, www.gumer.ru)

We continue to publish the book of the famous Russian sociologist Valentina Fedorovna Chesnokova "The Language of Sociology". It will be published by the OGI publishing house in early 2009. Valentina Fedorovna is a consultant to the Public Opinion Foundation and the Institute of the National Economic Model, she is the curator of FOM research on attitudes towards religion. Author of the books “In a Close Way: The Process of the Churching of the Population of Russia at the End of the 20th Century”, “On the Russian National Character”. She worked at Valery Abramkin's Criminal Justice Reform Assistance Center.

Max Weber, who was born in 1864 in Erfurt in Germany, was a lawyer by his early education. His first works were from the field of economic history: on medieval trading companies and on the agriculture of Ancient Rome. In the field of economics, Weber was always interested in the relationship between people, their mode of action, the motives of behavior, and this, ultimately, led him to the field of sociology. It should be noted that in the late XIX - early XX centuries, economists experienced a time of dissatisfaction with the state of their science. The previously popular concept of Adam Smith seemed less and less suitable for solving the practical problems of the era. The concept of "economic man", introduced by Smith to explain the market behavior of people. "Economic man" was certainly the ideal type in Smith's concept, but economists needed to introduce a richer model of behavior into their theories. For new elements, they turned to psychologists, but psychological theories also did not suit them well. The only reasonable direction seemed to be to obtain new theoretical schemes through sociology, but at that time this science was still very poorly developed. And so a number of strong political economists begin to develop sociological theories. Among them were Ferdinand Tönnies, who was a professor of political economy, the Italian scientist Vilfredo Pareto, and somewhat later Talcott Parsons and a number of other major figures. Having come to sociology, they became real professionals and greatly strengthened this science. Among them was Max Weber, one of the most remarkable scientists of his time.

It should be noted that the works of Max Weber, like many other major sociologists, are also poorly known to us. His works, with the exception of the earliest ones, were not translated into Russian before the revolution, and after it there was no longer any hope of their appearance in scientific circulation, since Max Weber criticized Karl Marx. Moreover, he expressed disagreement not with some purely scientific theses of Marx, but with his ideas about classes. And for the Marxists, striving to establish a new society on earth through the class struggle and the emancipation of the proletariat, this was an absolutely unacceptable encroachment on the most advanced teaching.

Although the concept of classes did not belong to the main area of interest of M. Weber, it makes sense to start with it. Firstly, our country has been "sick" of Marxism for quite a long time, and some clichés of Marxist and near-Marxist teachings still roam in our heads, often completely unaware of us. And secondly, the concept of "class" is very indistinctly separated, especially for non-professionals, from the concept of "social class" that has become established in sociology at the moment.

Marx himself often used the concepts "class" and "classes", but did not give precise definitions to them. However, from a comparison of various texts, it is revealed that a person falls into one class or another, depending on what place he occupies in the production process and what relation he has to property. These are interconnected things: if a person is an owner, then he occupies one place in the production process, if he has nothing, another, he becomes a hired worker. And already on this depends the income of a person and his standard of living. Further, it is concluded that if a person's well-being is at a certain level, then an appropriate lifestyle must also correspond to him. And his interests, ideas and convictions, political sympathies and antipathies, and, therefore, also his behavior in politics and in other spheres already depend on the way of life. All this one follows from the other, one is superimposed on the other and forms a unity. And so the class is formed.

Max Weber agreed that the attitude to property and position in the production process determine the standard of living of a person. But if people receive approximately the same income, they do not necessarily have to spend it in a similar way. Max Weber believed that a person chooses the elements of his lifestyle relatively freely. One, for example, sits all evening in a tavern and plays backgammon, and the other reads books and attends some courses - this is what he is interested in. These two people will have completely different circles of acquaintances, spheres of communication, and there is nothing strange in the fact that they will differ in their views, likes, dislikes, etc. Moreover, not only people with the same income and standard of living can have different beliefs, but also people with the same lifestyle.

Therefore, according to M. Weber, it is much more convenient to consider these three social structures (by position in the production process, by way of life and by beliefs) as different structures. Three different groups are obtained, which he calls "class" (in relation to property and income level), "estate" (in terms of lifestyle) and "party" (in terms of beliefs and ideology). One and the same mass of people is distributed, firstly, according to classes, secondly, according to estates, and, thirdly, according to parties. Belonging to a party does not necessarily require direct membership, sympathy is enough, that is, belonging, as it is now customary to express it, to its electorate.

So, people who belong to the same Class, obviously, have approximately the same level of income, and, consequently, similar living conditions. Changing these conditions, for example, for the worse, leads to the fact that people will react in a similar way to it. M. Weber called this reaction "mass-like": people act in a similar way, but at the same time everyone makes a decision and acts (more precisely, joins the action) himself. It's like when it's raining: everyone who walks down the street opens and raises their umbrellas above them, "as if on command", but at the same time they do not orient themselves at all, but only react to the rain.

AT estates, which stands out in terms of lifestyle, people are already much more oriented towards each other. They feel like a single entity, implement similar cultural behaviors and standards. At the same time, a person chooses for himself and maintains a way of life himself, he consciously relates to it. In fact, the estate is a closed group, where "strangers" are not accepted. However, if a person implements a “correct” way of life, from the point of view of this class, he is recognized as “one of his own”.

BUT parties - these are completely consciously formed social formations. They do not just focus on some general ideas, but actively create them, change them, plan their activities, and so on.

This article by M. Weber remained unfinished, was extracted from his papers and became more or less widely known only in the middle of the 20th century. She is very interesting, she has a mature mind and an experienced hand. A major theoretician analyzes which variables are methodologically more convenient to separate, which to relate to each other, based on the convenience of operating with features. He does not argue with Marx at all, he simply takes a well-known theory (the concept of classes was put forward at the beginning of the 19th century by French historians) and, having worked with it, offers a completely new approach.

It is interesting to note that in the 1930s, when this article by M. Weber was still unpublished in his papers, the idea arose in the United States to conduct a study of an American city. To organize this study, William Lloyd Warner, an anthropologist by profession, who was studying the Australian Aborigines at that time, was invited. The idea interested him, he chose a small city on the east coast, and, having encrypted its name with the pseudonym "Yankee City", interviewed all its inhabitants, asking everyone about each. At the same time, he asked each person to place all the people he knew on a scale "higher - lower." Not by any special signs, but simply by feeling - who occupies a higher position relative to each other, and who is lower. As a result of this procedure, the observed layers stood out: Warner got three of them and at the same time split each of the three into two more (upper and lower).

He called these formations social classes selected according to the specified attribute, i.e. on prestige according to the opinions of others. Initially, Warner assumed that workers would be in one class, entrepreneurs in another, that income and wealth would be well ordered in this scale "up - down." But it turned out differently: the workers turned out to be spaced from the lower - lower class to the upper - middle, some part of the entrepreneurs ended up in the lower class, and incomes were not at all ordered into such an unconditional scale. Prestige turned out to be most closely associated not with income, but with lifestyle. Thus, Warner revealed in the study the social structure that M. Weber set as "social class". It turned out to be really existing in practice - in reality, the American urban society of the 30s. XX century, where there were no estates (in the sense of medieval formations habitually associated with this name), and could not be. It turns out that a similar structure, singled out on the basis of a way of life, existed there - and, apparently, exists in all societies of this type, simply shaped and called differently. That's what it means to correctly set a structure-forming feature! But only a very big theoretician can do this.

A few words about the search for a middle class in contemporary Russia. A lot of articles have been written on the topic: do we have it or not? And how will it be formed? But the middle class has always been in Russia: both in pre-revolutionary (it appeared after the estates broke up and ceased to be called that way), and in the Soviet one. It's just that in Soviet times there were no entrepreneurs in this class, since entrepreneurship in the country at that time did not exist at all. When it arose again, this one also began to form. sector middle class. But in the discussions of modern journalists, economists and sociologists, for some reason only This sector is considered to be the "middle class", only entrepreneurs with a certain income are considered members of this class. And where will we include teachers, doctors, middle-level officials and other categories that are distinguished by a very stable way of life? This, they say, is not the middle class, since they receive almost nothing and are very poor. And as soon as they begin to distribute the population by classes, they always go astray on income, to which is added (and even then not always) a profession. And it doesn't count behavior, according to which, after all, the way of life is evaluated in the minds of others, i.e. most members of society. Namely, this, above all, determines social prestige.

As noted above, the concept of classes is not at the center of the theoretical works of M. Weber. This is, as Robert Merton would call it, "the theory of the middle level." At the center of the general theory of M. Weber are two important concepts - "social action" and "rationalization".

"Social Action", according to Max Weber, is distinguished by two features that make it social, i.e. different from mere action. Social action: 1) has meaning for the one who performs it, and 2) is focused on other people. Meaning is a certain idea of why or why this action is performed, it is some (sometimes very vague) awareness and direction of it. There is a well-known example by which M. Weber illustrates his definition of a social action: if two cyclists collide on a highway, then this is not a social action (although it happens between people) - that's when they jump up and start to sort things out between themselves (swear or help a friend). friend), then the action acquires the characteristics of the social.

M. Weber's interest in social action and its meaning is quite understandable. It has already been noted that economists came to sociology (especially at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries), but this was not the only source of replenishment of our science. It has aroused great interest also among anthropologists, but not among those who measure skulls and so on, but among those who study the culture primarily of primitive societies. This direction is called social anthropology, and in Western Europe it has received great development. Social anthropologists developed such concepts as "culture", "social institutions", etc. It is clear that they showed great interest in sociology, which also dealt with social structures.

but for economists it was important to study the action of an individual: how it is formed, what motives are controlled and how these motives arise in the mind of the acting subject. This is understandable: after all, for economists, the problems of supply and demand in the markets, labor incentives, entrepreneurial motives, etc. are the subject of constant study. All this is directly related to consciousness a person acting at a certain time and under certain conditions, correlating the goals of his action with its results, and so on. These thought processes are the reasons for his behavior. The researcher is obliged to study them in order to understand and explain what is happening. In the end, to make prognostic hypotheses, without which science has no practical value.

Arthur Schopenhauer defined a cause as "an antecedent change that makes a subsequent change necessary." In the natural world, a cause is that which causes mechanical, physical, or chemical changes in the objects of experience. Here the path of transformation is direct and clear: a certain effect causes a certain effect in a direct way. In the organic world, the influence causes not a direct change, but irritation, as a result of which some changes first occur inside the organism and already, as if at the second stage, they cause changes in behavior. But these internal changes in the organism, caused by the same causes, can be of different types, and the strength of the impact does not always determine the magnitude of the changes. And in an organism that has consciousness, this path between influence and effect incomparably increases and acquires a complex structure. The resulting impact is processed by consciousness, which sets in motion entire systems of ideas. The developed concept of the "response" to the impact received is then passed through the sphere of motives, plans and goals - and only on the basis of all these elements does the conscious being finally form its behavior.

Thus, as one moves from one kind of causation to another, cause and effect become more and more separated, clearly distinguished and heterogeneous, and the cause becomes less and less material and tangible. When a person reaches the ability to cognize the "non-contemplative", i.e. not visual, motives acquire independence from the real situation. They do not arise every time before starting a new action, but are thoughts that a person carries in his head and, if necessary, puts into action. Thus, the cause of the social action is not observable to its researcher. He must build it by inference.

It must be said that the need to work with such unobservable facts, using logical constructions, for a very long time aroused the strongest resistance of researchers. For a long time they were looking for some other, more "objective" methods. In particular, at the beginning of the 20th century, a trend of "behaviorism" (from English behavior - behavior) arose and developed throughout the first half of it. His methods were built on the basis of direct observation of the behavior of the person being studied: from morning to evening it was necessary to follow him, fix all his movements and actions, down to the most insignificant ones, in order to then compare, group all these facts, compare the actions of different people, apply statistics. Thus, it was supposed to reveal certain repeatability and regularities. It should be noted that the behaviorists really managed to identify some patterns, and important discoveries were made on the basis of these principles and approaches. But it is obvious that the patterns obtained in this way still need to be explained, and this is practically impossible to do without appealing to the inner motives of a person, to his consciousness. And we are again faced with unobservable phenomena, only at a new level.

M. Weber spoke in favor of introjective sociology, i.e. for sociology, the study of the human mind. To understand an event means to explain it. To know the action of a person means to bring him out of the consciousness of this person - his goals, motivations, interests and points of view. If we do not know the relationship between gravity and metabolism in the body, we will not understand why and how the person walks and breathes. And if we do not know the goals and motives of a person, then we cannot understand why he performs certain actions.

In human action, especially in social action, there is always a more or less clear awareness of its elements, primarily goals and means. When there is an idea of goals and means, motivational dependencies come into play. "Motivational dependencies are dependencies that always exist and should be studied where people actually do (or think they do) something definite, i.e. strive in this way to achieve something else, also definite"

And here the difficulties begin. Firstly, a person can be partially and even completely deceived in his own motivation, even more often he is deceived in the motivation of others, his partners in social action. But a person, participating in social action, can not only be deceived in his motivation, but also consciously deceive others, presenting them not with true motives, but with so-called declarative ones. For example, a daughter wants to place her seriously ill father in a nursing home because caring for him takes a lot of time, the living space is small and the house is cramped. But, starting such an action, she will assure others that "he will be better" there, he needs professional care, which is not available at home, etc. In the same way, partners in social action can deceive the acting individual as to the true motives of their action. At the same time, the degree of openness, i.e. confidence in each other is very rarely mutually equivalent.

Thus, if we take into account all these cases of unconscious, semi-conscious, declarative motivation, and even from both sides (or from all sides, if there are several participants in a social action), an incredibly complex configuration is obtained, from which it is necessary to find out, establish causes, i.e. true motives and representations of its participants. Moreover, it should be taken into account that grade(or terminologically more correct "definition") of the situation in which you have to act, the partners may have different, or one or another definition of the situation may involve completely different sets of motives.

But that's not all. All this diversity will necessarily be superimposed by the researcher's own attitudes and assessments, who must analyze all these motives and ideas. He will like some people and their actions, ideas and motivations, while others may be antipathetic. And this creates a rather strong motivation for the researcher himself to improve something and shift "in favor" of the researcher he likes. This happens quite often, especially with inexperienced researchers who are too enthusiastic and hurried. This is what most of all feared those scientists who opposed the study of the consciousness of the acting individual in every possible way and developed, in the end, the behaviorist approach. External action, they believed, could not be distorted by biased interpretation. If it is known, for example, that a person dine in the dining room and dine at home, what can be distorted here? However, M.Be6ep could object, and there is not much sense from such data, and nothing is known about motivation at all. He himself believed that there was no other way left - only to overcome these difficulties.

It should be emphasized that it was precisely the struggle with such difficulties that forced M. Weber to resort to the help of very strong epistemological philosophers of that time. In particular, he worked extensively with Heinrich Rickert, the head of the Neo-Kantians, who was then teaching in Freiburg. Rickert became very interested in the problems that Weber presented to him. Until then, he dealt mainly with the problems of the natural sciences (the social sciences were only just getting on their feet by that time), there a lot had already been done in the field of methodology, but here there was a lot of problems. The joint work of M. Be6epa and G. Rickert began around 1895, and the result of their long-term cooperation was the laying of the foundation for the methodology of the social sciences. Naturally, two such eminent scientists had to lay a really solid and high-quality foundation of methodology in sociological science. And they really succeeded.

The most promising direction in the theory of knowledge at that time was neo-Kantianism. According to its premises, the concept of "reality" included "an infinite number of individual phenomena", regardless of whether they represent the reality of the external world. or the inner reality of human consciousness, is a mass of adjacent, successive elements. And reality is structured not by some of its own laws, but by the subject who studies it. It is the "processing" of this endless, undivided, rolling "stream of events" by categories that have been worked out and accumulated by science that gives a picture of the world. And the position always remains in force that both historical and sociological research not only finds its empirical material, but shapes and animates it, explicitly and "purely" "linking it" with the help of tools that involuntarily change from era to era, from culture to culture and from researcher to researcher. Concluding ultimately in goals, interests and points of view. To “understand” means to “explain” an event (course of action, etc.) from such goals, interests, and points of view.

For the study of social action, this means that the scientist, observing and interpreting the observed phenomena, builds a certain relationship between the observed elements and the alleged motivations. And if the course of action, its development, confirm this dependence (ie, external phenomena line up exactly in the way that was supposed in the researcher's construction), then we have before us some semantic adequacy. But even the presence of such an adequacy of meaning "to the extent of correctness causal statements means only the proof that there is some (somehow computed) possibility that the course of action, demonstrating semantic adequacy, actually will, usually, detect (on average or quite often) this computed configuration and similarity" .

This approach did not fit in the minds of empirical sociologists for a very long time precisely because of their uncertainty in the probabilistic process of cognition of the world. The researchers needed "real reality", and they were offered some kind of constructed picture, about which it is not known whether it has at least some connection with reality. That it is not given to a person to cognize reality "as it is" - was too sad a conclusion from such a theory of knowledge, I did not want to believe in it. However, gradually this point of view prevailed, and at present the expression "this is how things stand in fact"is most often ironic among researchers. All methodologically savvy sociologists understand that "interpreted social phenomena" or "sociological laws" are nothing more than statistical patterns that correspond to the general meaning of the interpretation of these phenomena and laws. This approach has been established, finally, in sociology, giving it the opportunity to become an empirical science.We emphasize that, paradoxically, it was precisely the operation of these "semantic adequacies" and the probabilistically constructed image of reality that put sociology on empirical basis.

Weber himself constantly emphasized that he was engaged in empirical science. He was not interested in the question of what this or that social object is according to its predetermined or otherwise assigned "essence" to it. He was interested in how this or that event proceeds in the sphere he studied under such and such conditions. How do people with their supposed motivation behave in different conditions? Are certain, regular repetitions of processes, which in everyday language are called mores, customs, conventions, law, enterprise, the state, and so on and so forth, found? However, in order to learn these statistical regularities and somehow interpret them, it is necessary to follow strict methodological principles. As little as possible of your own motivations and emotions should be introduced into these interpretations and explanations necessary in the course of the action. M. Weber outlined two main methodological principles, which, in his opinion, should be observed by any self-respecting researcher.

This is, firstly, the principle of exclusion from the analysis of value judgments. The principle is very simple in its meaning and formulation. It lies in the fact that one should not introduce one’s own assessments into the analyzed material, which, as the researcher of Weber’s works G. Baumgarten puts it, should guarantee him from “going on the road with the idea that some processes (actions, motivations), which he studies should not happen as they happen, or should happen in some other way, or, on the contrary, they "do well" that they happen in this way. The researcher strives to reveal the truth, and he himself owes nothing to want from this truth. Only freedom from value judgments can, as Max Weber believed, make the world of values accessible. for science.

The claims to Weber in connection with this principle most often consisted in the fact that a person (and a researcher cannot stop being a person!) Is not able to free himself from his values, because this is the basis of his personality. Ultimately, it was concluded that the researcher should control their value preferences and take all measures to eliminate inclinations to evaluate the material, which comes from uncontrolled own motivation.

The second principle is aimed at eliminating all kinds of distortions in the material itself, caused by ignorance, half-knowledge, deliberate concealment of one's own motivations, no longer of the researcher, but of the respondent - this main source of information for the social scientist. This is already familiar to us from the analysis of the concept of F. Tönnies ideal type construction principle. Highlighting some of the main variables on which material will be collected makes comparable set of actions of different kinds of people in different situations. And then the imposition of all these actions on each other discards all deviations, accidents, conscious distortions. The result is a scheme of actions of typical individuals in typical circumstances. Those lines that in the real actions of real individuals can be traced only as more or less strong tendencies appear here, as it were, "cleansed" of everything. superfluous and accidental. True, without any details and signs of this very reality, as if incorporeal, but in a strict conceptual sequence) .

Curious, however, is the testimony of Baumgarten. "The skill that Weber discovered in his constructions led, apparently unconsciously, from his on the other hand, to the fact that the ideal-typical constructions, which he drew primarily on past (historical) events, acted on the imagination as a direct picture real reality. The instrumental meaning of the Weberian ideal type was easily lost sight of due to its impact on the reader as a pictorial (artistic) means ". It often happens that a researcher's theoretical construction is mistaken for a picture that he allegedly received from empirical material, and they make claims to him that it is not "reflects" such and such details. We will still encounter this phenomenon when we analyze the concepts of T. Parsons, who was constantly accused of portraying society too idealistically: look, how many conflicts and troubles there are in society, but he has everything smoothly, everything regulates by itself! - they talked about his constructions. Indeed, since T. Parsons studied the process of homeostatic self-regulation of a social system, he also created the corresponding models. And if he studied the problem of the emergence and development of conflicts, then the typologies would be there would be others.

So, we now have to move on to Weber's ideal typology. Naturally, this will typology of social action, and will be built along the axis rationalization actions. Weber was suspicious of the concept of "progress" in its Comte-Spencerian version, but he recognized one all-encompassing, continuous and one-way process, namely: rationalization process. And in particular, this process, in his opinion, extends to human action. Here, his presentation coincides with Toennis's: from that undifferentiated complex of feelings, instinctive movements and value "insights" that is characteristic of the community, individual elements gradually begin to be isolated in the mind of a person, which means the ability to single out separate analytical categories in the analysis. By separating two concepts from each other - "goal" and "means", - a person-doer gets the opportunity to think over and evaluate the paths to the goal, possible results, to make a choice of means before any action. In the mind of the future performer of the action, a chain of reasoning is built according to the principle: "if - then", "means". And since all people think approximately the same way, it is precisely in the plane of these reasoning that they are all capable of more or less definitely understand each other. Why did the person choose such and such a remedy? Because he set himself a certain goal, and from the point of view of this goal, under the given conditions, such a means is convenient, and should it be chosen? Can be built as a pattern correct reasoning under the circumstances - this will be ideal type of action.

Naturally, the actual action performed by "a real person in real circumstances" very rarely corresponds to such a pure type of reasoning. It is necessarily "burdened" with a mass of incidental details, accidents, errors, and so on. "Deflecting influence" can reflect the emotional state of a person at the moment, his misconception about the situation, ignorance of many details, etc. But here the value of an ideal type construction is revealed. It makes it possible not so much to assess the rationality of an action as, in the words of Weber himself, to reveal "the degree of its irrationality". And further, already on the basis of the ratio of these two characteristics: rationality and irrationality, a typology of action on this basis begins to be developed.

"The most understandable type of semantic structure of actions are actions that are subjectively strictly rationally oriented towards means, which (subjectively) are considered as uniquely adequate for achieving (subjectively) clearly and unambiguously understood goals" . This is a clear definition of what M. Weber calls goal-oriented action. Let's pay attention to this repeated word "subjectively": a person could incorrectly determine the circumstances, draw some kind of wrong conclusion. The man reasoned purposefully rationally, but irrational moments invaded the course of his reasoning. And this is where the analytical work of the researcher begins. “It is necessary first of all to establish,” writes Weber, “the following: how would is the action in the rational ideally typical boundary case for absolute rationality of purpose and rational correctness"committing it.

The ideal type plays here, as we see, the role of a research tool, like a ruler or tape measure. And here a whole scale of real actions is built according to the degree of their goal-oriented rationality, assessed by the researcher. These can be actions: (1) very close to the "correct" (ideal) type; (2) subjectively goal-oriented; (3) more or less goal-oriented, but far from completely adhering to this principle; (4) non-purposeful, but understandable in their meaning; (5) motivated to a greater or lesser extent by an understandable semantic connection, but with elements (sometimes even defining ones) that are completely incomprehensible to the researcher; (6) finally, and completely incomprehensible, determined by some kind of mental and physical givens in a person.

Thus, relying on connections that are understandable in a semantic sense, especially, as Weber emphasizes, goal-oriented motivations, the researcher can build a causal chain that will begin with external circumstances and ultimately lead to external behavior. In this way, a path is groped inside this "black box", human consciousness - from external influence to the behavior caused by it. Of course, this chain is nothing more than a hypothesis. But all the facts empirically established by science are not something bigger. If a hypothesis is formulated, then it is up to verification.

Having created such a "measuring device" that the researcher of human consciousness can put between himself and the consciousness of the subject he is studying, thereby achieving distances, which, in his opinion, is absolutely necessary for maintaining objectivity, Weber essentially laid the foundation for the scientific methodology of sociological science. Gnoseologists before Weber studied the cognizing consciousness - purely rational and methodically "correct" in the sense of observing logical principles. Weber with his understanding sociology opened for them a whole new area - the consciousness of the acting subject, determined by specific circumstances and the specific state of this consciousness at a given moment in time.

It must be said that Rickert also worked seriously on the formation of a number of concepts that could be useful in this area, in particular, on the concept of an ideal type. He also created another way of forming concepts in the humanities: a concept obtained from public consciousness and formalized by "reference to value." He believed that scientists have actually been working with such concepts for a long time, but they do not realize this as a special and peculiar method that should be scientifically "polished" and improved. We will return to this mode of concept formation when we examine Weber's The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Here it suffices to emphasize once again that it was created by M. Weber understanding introjective sociology very noticeably enriched epistemology, opening up a look at social phenomena from an unexpected point of view for that time. In general, the genius of M. Weber had a very strong and many-sided influence on sociology, and through it on the social sciences in general.

But back to social action. On the basis of reference to the ideal-typical goal-rational model, Weber built a typology of a more specific type - a typology of social action as it manifests itself in different historical periods and in different social structures. Here he singled out four major types of action: (a) affective; (b) traditional; (c) value-rational and (d) goal-rational.

affective action practically does not contain any chains of reasoning about ends, means or consequences. If it contains such, then it is not affective, but simply disguises itself as it. This is a pure splash of feelings and emotions.

traditional action is an action that contains very little such reasoning, since it is performed under repetitive conditions and according to a firmly established pattern. F. Tönnies calls it "habitual action". However, after we have become acquainted with the concept of Tönnies, we can assume that in repetitive actions such as rites, rituals and others, characteristic of life in the sphere of customary law, one can find not only feelings, but also value experiences. These are experiences attributed to the ideas of justice, nobility, goodness and beauty, which, perhaps, is completely uncharacteristic of habit. The habit tends to mechanically reproducible action in repeated circumstances. And since rites and rituals in communal life (which is especially characteristic of customary law) are included in almost all actions, especially collective ones (recall the mowing scene from Anna Karenina), these feelings and value experiences actually permeate the entire life of traditional society. As for the traditional action, it is often (or "quite often") aimed at value, and this is already some, although perhaps a weak element of its direction and expediency.

Value-rational action is a development and, as it were, the next stage of the traditional action understood in this way. It may already contain ideas about the choice of means, analysis of motives, and other elements characteristic of goal-oriented action. Only it is not focused on the goal, but directly on the value, therefore, the analysis of the consequences and even the result may not have any effect on the form of the act. This is an action from the category of those that are performed according to the formula "do as you must, and come what may." It can be seen from the formula itself that in the mind of the acting subject there is some idea of the possible consequences, but it is consciously not taken into account by him.

Purposeful rational action we have already described above. It also resembles the solution of a problem by an algorithm, and the solution of an equation with unknowns, and other formalized procedures. It differs from the value-rational action by the rational setting of the goal and the greater development of the chains of reasoning.

In order to somewhat weaken the excessive abstractness of the reasoning, we present some examples illustrating this typology.

affective action does not carry any idea of ends and means. An offended person can hit and even kill the offender - and only then, in hindsight, comprehend what he did. The court, when examining such an act, usually decides on beating or murder in a state of passion and applies a milder measure of punishment than that applied to a conscious or even pre-planned action, i.e. action "with premeditation".

traditional action usually also committed by a person in addition to the choice of ends and means. It happens "as usual". For example, in order to celebrate a wedding, it is necessary to perform a whole (rather long) series of actions that are predetermined and do not depend on the goals of the individual within this action, i.e. weddings. This does not mean that this action has no purpose at all. But this goal is not the individual performing the marriage. It is rooted in culture and tradition. Sociologists and social anthropologists are interested in groping for such goals in the need to bring people together and evoke common experiences. Covered by one feeling, people are aware of themselves as a single whole - society. The more holidays, ceremonies, rituals, the stronger the unity of society. But the individual himself, participating in this action, naturally does not realize such a goal. He follows tradition.

Value-rational action has a goal at the individual level, but it consists in realizing a certain value, not given by the individual. A person chooses the means for realizing this value, but the value itself is invariably given to him, as it were, from outside. An example of this kind is the talented surgeon Luka Voyno-Yasenetsky, who, instead of making a quick and brilliant career, takes the veil as a monk and accepts the ordination offered to him as a bishop. During the period of very severe persecution of the Church, obviously, this did not promise him any benefit. On the contrary, because of this, he spent years in exile, camps and was subsequently shot. But, being a deeply religious person, he felt that the Church was in danger and needed to be protected by all means. Let us remember how many believers in difficult times performed exactly the same feat, how many people during the Great Patriotic War sacrificed themselves in the same way to save the country, and how many people perform their quiet, invisible feat in ordinary peaceful life, sacrificing their interests for the sake of near and far (sick people in trouble, etc.). So value-rational action is not uncommon in our culture.

Finally, an example goal-oriented actions can serve as a person's decision to build himself a house. Here, first of all, the goal is chosen (does a person need this house? what house? in what place? etc.). Then the means are deliberately and rationally weighed (how to build? from what? whether to hire workers or build a log house yourself? etc. etc.). Means must be correlated with the goal, selected, thought out; actions must be planned. It is clear that this is a purposeful action.

This ideal-typical classification of action is a well-established tool for empirical research. With its help, one can, for example, study the goal-setting of various types of people, the way of choosing between motives and means to achieve the goal, and motivation in general. Man, as a being acting rationally to a certain extent, can explain a lot about the process of understanding the action he takes. But we have to state with sadness that this typology seems to have been used very little. First of all, it must be, because empirical sociological research was just in its infancy at that time and had not yet developed truly effective methods of questioning. But there was another reason as well. As a result of the difficult situation in Germany after the defeat in the First World War, the post-war devastation, then the rise of fascism, and then the Second World War, a new defeat and devastation, the works of Max Weber were very slowly introduced into circulation and entered the consciousness of sociologists. Especially American, namely in America at this time, and developed mainly empirical sociology.

Apparently, the circumstance that, in parallel with the activities of M. Weber, Freud's teachings with their characteristic features were developing and capturing the attention of contemporaries: the great importance that was attached to the subconscious in the life and personality of a person, an interest in what later received a somewhat ironic name "mysterious phenomena of the human psyche." Great hopes were associated with all this for the interpretation of the deep layers of the human psyche, the discovery of new laws of nature, this time already within the very mind of man. All this was incomparably more interesting than Weber's rational-rational approach. Firstly, because in general, all sorts of "mysterious phenomena", of course, attract the attention of any person, including a scientist, much more strongly (since he is also a person and nothing human is alien to him). Secondly, because when studying these “mysterious phenomena”, it becomes possible, having penetrated into the sphere of the subconscious, to learn about a person what he himself does not suspect. Having explained this “mysterious” to a person, the researcher finds himself in the position above researched, which gives him authority and a higher status, not only in the relationship “researcher - researched”, but also in society in general: he turns into an expert, laymen should reckon with his opinion. And besides, the researcher can use the knowledge of this "mysterious" for the researcher himself, and manipulate his consciousness.

In the middle of the 20th century, after a period of intense enthusiasm by psychologists and sociologists for tests designed to examine people's abilities in various fields, these tests began to enter practice, and people began to be tested when they entered the job. And not only for work that requires the employee to have specific characteristics (chauffeurs, machinists, pilots). In the absence of these qualities (or vice versa, the presence of the opposite), a person becomes simply dangerous to others. For example, a type of people was discovered with an "increased accident rate", who should not be allowed at all in the profession of a train driver or pilot, especially a test pilot, etc. Such testing raises no objections, but they began to test workers in other, completely "harmless" from this point of view, areas. Well, then reliability tests began to be developed. And then it became completely clear that these batteries of tests are becoming a tool that some people seek to direct against others, respecting their own interests and infringing on the interests of the opposite side. Then, among the scientists involved in the tests, there was an awareness that they give a dangerous tool into the hands of people whose morals are not always at their best and whose actions are often very difficult to control. And then one of the most famous scientists in this field, who himself created a huge number of very ingenious and effective tests, took a decisive step: he published in the open press the keys to the tests he developed. This immediately rendered them harmless to one side, and useless to the other. Naturally, this was a blow to the interests of firms that used test methods to test people hired. There was a scandal, but the danger of manipulating people was eliminated, at least in this area and for the time being.

In general, science is not an ivory tower, especially at the present time. It has a wide field of activity both for disinterested scientists, and for figures and businessmen. As, however, in all other areas of public life. The purpose of our somewhat expanded excursion was to show that dangerous spheres and tools for manipulating people can arise and be deliberately created within science. The more valuable is the direct and honest approach to the study of human consciousness, which was proposed by M. Weber at the beginning of the 20th century - an analysis of the process of human thinking in the sphere of social action in cooperation with the subject himself, which allows the latter to maintain control over the study and its result to a certain extent.

M. Weber, with the help of his typology of social action, offered another direction - to study sustainability or the effectiveness of the social order. Social order is social institutions embodied in social life. Above, speaking of social institutions, we emphasized that these are value-normative structures that exist in the culture of society. They govern social life, and therefore, along with the institution of the family, which formulates, so to speak, "abstractly" the norms and laws of family life adopted in a given society, there are quite real families that embody these norms and rules, but, unfortunately, far not in a perfect way. And besides, every real family also embodies a number of norms and rules. others institutions, because he brings up and educates his children, is engaged in economic activities. Even more areas of activity cover a modern large enterprise, institutions that carry out management, and so on. They implement at a given period of time some normative structures fixed in the culture of society. But by no means all.

Culture is a colossal arsenal of social norms, and in any given period of time, as a rule, not all of them are implemented. Some, and a very significant part of them is stored in "stores". This is the cultural "reserve" of society. When a need arises, some of these "stored for the future" standards can be brought to light and put into circulation. Some time ago, at a meeting of some branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, a proposal was suddenly put forward to restore the "Table of Ranks" introduced by Peter I and existed until 1917. The idea was that it was not good when officials were some kind of faceless mass. Dividing them into ranks would make it possible to assign a degree of responsibility, a certain prestige to each of the ranks, and solve some more problems. Of course, they may not be called as before, but it was suggested that it would be useful to refer to a principle once developed. If this happened, it could become an example of a re- "launch into circulation", it would seem, for a long time fulfilled normative schemes.

Thus, the individual elements of the social order are in constant motion, development, and sometimes fall into decay. Their viability is determined by the clarity of collective action. This is so, because each such element is nothing but a collective action - from the family to the government office. Another criterion is the movement of personnel. High fluidity is generally a reliable indicator of "inconsistencies" in the internal functioning of the cell. For example, today, endless divorces and new marriages testify to the enormous difficulties that the institution of the family experiences, and the difficult position of the family within the social order. But there is one more, perhaps the most effective "tool" for understanding not only the state of this or that sphere or cell of the social order, but also the reasons for the difficulties they experience. And this is precisely the analysis of social action.

And then there is another approach to the idea of all these links of the social order. What do they actually consist of? An ordinary observer will say: from people, of course, well, from all sorts of material "additives". A lawyer and an anthropologist will point out the main role of cultural and normative schemes that are of decisive importance at a given level of social organization. But Max Weber proposed his own approach: the individual elements of the social order, his theory claims, consist of social actions. This perspective at first seems unexpected, somehow difficult to fit in the mind. But really, this is how it is: at the social level It is convenient to imagine all these elements as sets of social actions, each of which combines both a social standard belonging to culture and the motivation and ideas of a person who implements this standard. And since the cultural norm for a long time, as a rule, retains its identity, then strengthening and weakening one or the other constituent parts of the social order happens most often connected precisely with the ideas and, ultimately, with the motivations of people performing actions.

A survey can reveal how people relate not only to this or that person (with the help of ratings), but also to this or that social institution. And their assessment of a given institution or institution depends on this attitude, and further - their assessment of their position in it, their attitude to their duties. What sociologists call "engagement" in a given social action. It is one thing when a person is "attached" to the cell of the social order in which he lives or works. Then he experiences her difficulties, makes his own efforts to improve her shaky position. And it’s completely different - when he treats her indifferently and coolly observes that things are getting worse and the inglorious decline of this link in the social system is approaching.

Attitude but it depends on the current individual ideas and views of a person regarding legitimacy(legality, "correctness" and justice) of that the order in which he orients his behavior. It is the idea of the degree of its legitimacy that determines motivation of the acting subject, prompting him to fulfill the social norm, regardless of how much it is in "his interests" at a given moment in time, in this particular action. An effective (i.e., recognized as legitimate) social order effectively prevents deviations from the existing norm.

These deviations are immanent in any social system, they can arise in any group, in any institution, in any field of activity. But there may be more, or there may be less. When there are a lot of them, or even a lot, it is already dangerous for the social system.

There are two types of deviations: 1) deviation of a person who does not want to comply with any norms or most of them. These are rebels, anarchists; or (somewhat different) individuals involved in a civil disobedience movement. 2) Deviations in the behavior of an individual in a separate action - an attempt to "circumvent the law", to avoid the implementation of an "inconvenient" norm or a norm that greatly violates his (the person's) interests. The last type of deviation is typical for almost all members of society, even the most law-abiding, in some extreme situations for them. In the latter case, a person usually recognizes not only the legitimacy of the social order as a whole, but even the legitimacy of the norm that he seeks to "circumvent" because it is to his advantage. Therefore, the second type of deviation is less dangerous for the stability of the social order, unless it becomes widespread. Man is a rational being, he understands that social order is needed, that it is better when it exists than when it collapses. Except for those cases when it acquires in the minds of many people the characteristics: "unfair", "oppressive", "bloody" and so on. Here we have a rejection of the very legitimacy of the social order. And this is a very dangerous moment.

Hence the need to control people's ideas about the degree of legitimacy of the existing order. And this allows you to do the scheme of social action proposed by M. Weber, which we described above. For this construct includes an element of choosing means, setting goals, motives, and all this is accompanied by the attraction representations acting person about the circumstances in which the action planned by him will take place. He can coherently state these ideas to the researcher, substantiating his action.

Of course, the respondent's declarative answers present a certain difficulty; the person says not what he really thinks and believes, but what he is "supposed" to think and count. But by now, sociologists have developed means for verifying (ie, checking) and identifying such answers, as well as ways to get more or less real ideas. For example, if you put a person in the position of an expert and ask him: how need act in such and such a case and under such and such circumstances, he will communicate not only the norm (of course, as he understands it), but also his idea of the degree of its legitimacy: what it is now and what it should be.

Purposeful rational action in this respect is a very convenient plane for the researcher, in which much can be revealed about the respondent's movement in terms of normative structures. However, both value-rational and even traditional action are very useful when it comes to the effectiveness of customary law.

Speaking about institutions, organizations and other social formations, they usually pay attention, first of all, to their legal design - to those laws, regulations, etc. that require certain behavior from members of these social formations, threatening punishment for violation of the prescribed norm. But all these well-known structures are just the tip of the iceberg. Every institution and group, down to the smallest and shortest, has at its foundation powerful layers of customs in the most diverse forms: rituals, mores, habits, and so on. This fact somehow eludes our consciousness when discussing the laws governing the existence of our entire social order. A custom, we assume, is something not very obligatory: for breaking it I will not be dragged to court, I will not be fined, and certainly not put in jail. It is strange how he generally manages to exist and subjugate the behavior of people, being in fact not protected by anything. At the same time, it is completely forgotten that the custom is sometimes protected stronger than the law, because it is guarded by moral sense.

In the 1950s - 60s. in one of the southern states of the United States, a movement unfolded, as they said then, "for the rights of blacks", more precisely, for the abolition of segregation. Negroes claimed to ride in the same transport with whites, shop in the same stores with them and teach children in the same schools with them. The movement was led by Pastor Martin Luther King Jr. The Negroes declared a boycott of urban transport, shops and took some other similar actions. They behaved quite peacefully, did not smash anything, did not set fire to anything, did not insult anyone. This was most similar to the civil disobedience movement that had previously unfolded in India under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi. The owners of transport and shops gave up the fastest, as the boycott hit hard on their pockets. Laws were passed to abolish the most obvious points of segregation. It would seem that everything is in order, but this is where the real war began. The first Negroes to enter the white salons received a very strong negative reaction. There were beatings and even murders, and Martin Luther King himself died in this struggle. Children who were legally allowed to study with whites were brought to schools under police guard, and so on. etc. It took a couple of months to change laws, and years, if not decades, to change customs. True, when the laws were changed, this struggle with customs and mores was no longer covered so widely in the press. It seemed that with the adoption of new laws, the problem was settled ...

“The stability of a custom (as such), writes M. Weber, is based, in essence, on the fact that an individual who does not focus on him in his behavior is outside the framework of the “accepted” in his circle, i.e. must be ready to endure all sorts of minor and major inconveniences and troubles, as long as the majority of the people around him consider the existence of this custom.

List of links to lecture 3

1. Genseinschaft und Gesellschaft. Grund-begrifte der reinen Soziologie von Ferdinand Tönnies. Auflage 6 and 7. Verlag Karl Curties. Berlin, 1926.

2. Weber Max Werk and Person. Dokumente, ansgewelt und kommentiert / von Edward Baumgarten. Tubingen, 1964.

3. Weber Max Selected works // Ed. Ph.D. Y.Davydova. M., 1990.

Class, estate and party. This article was translated by us and published in the ICSI IFSO Bulletin. However, the collection was arrested and was not sent to the mailing list. Later it was published in the collection "Social Stratification" vol. 1, but in a completely insignificant circulation. Therefore, we send those interested to the original: Baumgarten E. Max Weber.Work und Person. Tubingen. 1964.

We have not conducted such studies. Scientists who studied primitive tribes, M.M. Kovalevsky, who studied the peoples of the Caucasus, etc., were usually called ethnographers, and their activity consisted mainly in describing the rituals and customs of tribes and peoples. Although, of course, these scientists sometimes rose to broader generalizations.

For those who are interested in a very fascinating area of the formation of scientific concepts, we can recommend an essay on this topic by G. Rickert: G. Rickert. Boundaries of the natural-science formation of concepts. Logical introduction to the historical sciences. SPb. 1903.

It is interesting to note that Weber himself sometimes expressed the same point of view. Cm.:

In Russian: Tennis Ferdinand Generality and society. Basic concepts of pure sociology. Moscow: Vladimir Dal, 2002.