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1.- INTRODUCTION

The intellectual career of Max Weber is governed by three major themes

those that this author paid special attention to, dedicating his works to
development of them. These three topics coincide with the
essential concerns that he maintained throughout his life: religion,
politics and economy, all analyzed from a perspective
sociological and never disregarding a clear historical background. Likewise,
Weber expressed a clear interest in law and jurisprudence. But it
determinant for our purposes is that, as a corollary in the treatment of
From all this theme, we can highlight a specific and novel one.
methodology, which represented a great contribution to the intellectual world.

Based on this, we can affirm that Weber's substantial work is

complements with its own methodology. The Weberian methodology starts
from a clearly individualistic approach, focusing on the individual and on
their motivations. The effective manifestations of this methodology are
they collect a Weberian pluricausalism, in the value-neutrality of the
science, in its comprehensive sociology of individual motivation, and in the
ideal types, ideal utopian constructions born to solve the
problems that the Weberian methodology had led to. To everything
this must be added to the methodology used as a differentiating criterion of
social and human sciences.

The comprehensive method and the theory of ideal types by Max Weber addresses
another dimension of sociology in it: "Sociology must be understood as
: a science that aims to understand social action by interpreting it,
to explain it causally in its development and effects
(Weber, 1984: 5)

For this concept, Weber says that unlike the German method in the
that understanding is achieved empathetically, that is to say by identifying oneself

with the object of study as much as possible, to internalize and understand its

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problem, that or understanding sociology as an objective science as it

they are the natural sciences and with it create a goal which is to explain the
objectively shapes the regularities or laws of the social world; thus, through
these two trends formed a methodological opposition that contains
an alternative: social sciences must on one hand interpret or by
another explain social facts to be sciences

This means that explaining is understanding through the methodology of the

ideal types, the regularities that determine one or more
social behaviors according to the four ideas of real actions
in society. Because we will take a social subject and classify it and
according to the ideal types, we will obtain objectively, since
this will be an object of study, the explanation of it as a phenomenon of
real action.

2.- BACKGROUND

Max Weber (1864-1920) was born in Erfurt into a Protestant industrial family.
and with liberal convictions. He married Marienne in 1893,
who would accompany him throughout his life and contribute to the publication of his
posthumous works. He obtained his doctorate in 1889 with a dissertation on the

commercial societies in the Middle Ages, after having studied Law,

Economics and History between Heidelberg, Göttingen and Berlin. It had begun
teaching Law in Berlin, but then shifted towards Economics,
also exercising journalism at "Frankfurter Zeitung" and in politics,
a line contrary to that of Chancellor Bismarck. His Habilitation Thesis
Verse about Agrarian History in Roman Antiquity (1891).

His work is situated at the crossroads between the various attempts that had been made.

happened in the second half of the 19th century by providing a status

epistemological to the historical-social sciences. These attempts did not end
to be satisfactory. Indeed, despite their eagerness to safeguard the
autonomy of Sociology, French and English sociological positivism had
taken from Biology central sociological categories such as that of

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organism or later the mechanisms of natural selection. On the other

part, in German soil Dilthey had adopted understanding (Verständnis)
psychological as the foundation of the Sciences of the Spirit in contrast to the
Natural Sciences, which employed explanation (Erklärung)
through general laws (the distinction between these two categories
epistemological approaches come from J.G. Droysen in his Outline of Historical Science

from 1851). In turn, H. Rickert took the perspective of values

unconditioned as interpretative criteria of the historical fact, singular and
irrepetible (idiographic sciences versus nomothetic sciences). Well then,
For Weber, neither biologism nor psychologism nor axiologism are points.
ready to highlight the peculiarities of the social sciences.
Initially influenced by the German historical school of W. Sombart and G.
Schmoller, our author, makes his peculiar synthesis between the previous ones.
methodological positions, correcting what is exclusive about them
and based on other knowledge. In this regard, their studies should be highlighted.

The cognitive objectivity of social science and social policy (1904)

About some categories of comprehensive Sociology (1913) or The meaning
from the value neutrality of sociological and economic sciences
(1917)

Among the milestones of his production, the inaugural speech is noteworthy.

access to the Chair of Political Economy in Freiburg im Breisgau in May
from 1895 about the living conditions of the peasants of the East Elbe
(The national state and economic policy), result of a research
carried out at the request of the 'Verein für Sozialpolitik', body of the New
Historical School, for which the German cultural heritage was to be seen
reflected in the socioeconomic order. Its study of the unstable situation
of those peasants in the Second Reich, dependent on the junkers or
rural aristocracy, led him to glimpse that their forced emigration to the cities
he had to bring with him the uprooting of the new workers, being
replaced in the field by the Poles, and the consequent inability to

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Germany to join the train of the capitalist revolution, stopped by

the imperialist policy of Kaiser Wilhelm II.

In 1897 he moved to the University of Heidelberg to succeed his

Master K. Knies, and there, under the influence of E. Troeltsch, noted the
differences between Lutheranism and Calvinism, which were to lead him to put
in relation to the latter, the rise of Western capitalism (The Ethics
Protestant and the spirit of capitalism, 1905). Against the explanation
unilateral Marxist view of sociocultural conditions based on the
technical-economic infrastructure, warns of ascetic motivations
derived from the Protestant spirit a logic and an autonomous development that
they contribute to the gestation of capitalism. In passing, it puts into practice its

theory of ideal types, applying it to the different social formations

in its historical development.

A few months after joining Heidelberg, he abandoned his dedication.

university studies due to mental exhaustion, and would not resume them until 1905.

research activity. On his trip to the United States in 1904, he met with
search for the activity of Protestant sects and the rise of bureaucracy,
that were to be dominant concerns in his work. In 1909 he founded
In Berlin, the German Society of Sociology along with F. Tönnies, G.
Simmel and W. Sombart. When the Great War broke out, he enlisted as
reserve officer in nine military hospitals in Heidelberg,
temporarily suspending its production. Upon its completion, it published its
previous works on Sociology of Religion. In 1918 he accepted a
provisional chair of Political Economy in the summer semester at the
University of Vienna.

Also in 1918, he joined the new liberal party (Deutsche

Democratic Party), without being successful in the constituency of Hesse
for which it was presented. It was contrary to the socialist policy of
nationalizations, advocating for a plurinational federal state with a
unit power. He was part of the German peace delegation in Versailles

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In 1919, and in mid-June, he took charge of the chair of Social Science.

that had been left vacant by Lujo Brentano in Munich.

Another problem that occupied him is the cultural meaning of capitalism,

that at that time focused the attention of sociologists and economists.
While Brentano traced its origin to trade, the loan at interest and the
organization of the war, as it spread during the Crusades,
for Sombart capitalism is related to the financial desire for profit,
sponsored by the Jews in the beginnings of the Modern Age and that
it finally crystallized in the entrepreneurial bourgeois spirit. Closer to the
Austrian marginalist economics —although it does not share the abstraction of
homo oeconomicus— and to Simmel's Philosophy of Money, Weber replies to
those conceptualizations that are specific to the capitalist company
it is in the bureaucratic rationalization of work, where power is separated
of disposition regarding the company's assets of personal interests
of its headlines.

But the growing impersonal rationalization is a historical trend

imperative, which also becomes visible in the modern state configuration
of political power, as it has been adopted in the West. This is highlighted in
his great unfinished work Economy and Society (1913, published in
1922) and later in the conference Socialism, delivered in Vienna
in 1918, or in the one he gave in Munich before the Free Student Association
(1919) and was published under the title The Politician and the Scientist. Finally,
in Parliament and Government in a reorganized Germany (1918) leads its
criticism of rampant bureaucracy and the German configuration of the parties
politicians.

We will begin with the examination of the Weberian notion of meaning,

constitutive in social action and later expanded to the historical process of the
culture. The analytical approach that Weber adopts leads him to resort to the types
abstract sociological concepts: I will exemplify it with their famous studies on the
origin of capitalism from Calvinist ethics and the different forms
community and societal, where social life is grouped. This same

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analytical-reconstructive method that gives you the notion of social types is

the one used for the recomposition of historical-political units, which
it is the city and the State, which will be the focus of the next section beforehand
to draw some conclusions.

3. MAIN CHARACTERISTICS OF THE COMPREHENSIVE METHOD1

One of the breaking points of Weber with other sociological currents is

precisely your comprehensive theory, which is not only concerned with
to discover objective facts or establish laws, but also to investigate the
meaning and motivations behind social action. Human beings first
they think or project what they want and based on that, they guide their actions.
For Weber, social action is any action that we carry out and where the
same time we anticipate the response of another person based on their
future and its values.

In this understanding, this method has the following characteristics:

3.1. Construction of ideal types.- Concepts of types must be constructed.

ideals that are: uniform conceptual frameworks that push to the limit the
unit that is found in a large number of empirical phenomena,
based on a historical knowledge that leads to an analytical unity
from the set of phenomena

3.2. Objectivity Criterion.- The basis of objectivity lies in the

attitude adopted by the subject towards social reality. In this regard we can
to understand that a job is not objective per se, but rather its objectivity
it depends on the perspective that the researcher gives it. Science studies the
culture based on personal values, which can be ethical, aesthetic,
religious, etc. And the researcher gives it objectivity or in other words
studies social phenomena with respect to those values.

3.3. Value Neutrality.- Value judgments must be excluded from

the sociological gaze. In some way they undermine or lead to conclusions

1 E-BOOK: Sociology Topics - Volume 1 (Spanish Edition)

Jose, [Link]

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often false about social reality. That is why Weber explains that The
value neutrality aims to raise awareness that the
objective knowledge must be presented in the same way as it
perceive and make the clarification when it is a personal opinion.

3.4. Rational and Irrational Facts.- Although Weber states that the
sociological research must primarily encompass the study of
rational facts should also be taken into account.
irrational reactions: irrational reactions (from the point of
view of rational action according to goals) derived from them we can
to revive them emotionally, the more evident it is as much
we may be susceptible to those same affections ... and calculate intellectually
its effects on the direction and means of action. The construction of
a strictly rational action in accordance with ends serves in these cases to
sociology - in merits of its evident intelligibility and, as rational,
of its univocity - as a type (ideal type), through which to understand the
real action, influenced by irrationalities of all kinds (affections, errors),
as a deviation from the expected development of rational action. It can
to say that the method of 'comprehensive' sociology is 'rationalist'. In
in this context we can say that Weber distinguishes human facts from
form:

Rationale: It refers to human actions that are carried out with purpose, it is
to say that they aim to achieve certain purposes regarding
the means that are available

Irrational: This is understood as human action being determined in

function of affective drives (courage, fear, etc.) that do not obey
determined sense

3.5. Value Judgments.- Likewise, the Weberian method addresses this issue.
before any other aspect, in the value judgement, we must take into account
it says that we are cultural beings; that is to say, we are born and we

we develop in a specific culture that existed, exists, and will exist

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after us. It is not feasible for the investigation to solve the problems
or purposes with value judgments; the regulating value criteria can and
must be called into question (for example, class interest) In
as much as the problem is broader or universal, it will need to know other
postures of those involved.

3.6. On the Principle of Universality.- This type of research asserts

it is clearly not possible to give a universally valid principle that
can provide solutions to all problems of the type in question, only the
positive religions can propose unconditional ethical mandates
valid: "Worldviews can never be the result of progress in the
empirical knowledge." Taking a position never guarantees objectivity, it
it should be analyzed although reality can be harsh, the middle ground in
some measure can be the closest thing to scientific impartiality: That
the scientist is able to communicate as far as the speaker appeals to the
feelings and where the intellect will not take part in defense when a
this fact is scientifically proven by appealing to a judgment in which
have priority for a sector, class, or others.

4. CONCEPTS AND CATEGORIES USED

With his studies, Weber managed to develop a unique theory to explain

society, to understand the great institutions and social structures
relating the concepts and categories used

Religion
Power
Politics
Economy
Culture

Weber focused his studies on the analysis of the capitalist system, but
it also succeeded in accounting for the characteristic features of society
modern compared to other types of societies.

It is important to understand Weber's contributions to the sciences.

social, but it is necessary to take into account specific elements.

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Four ideal types of action are distinguished that are means for the
explanation through understanding, of the meaning of 'real action'.

4.1 Social Action, like all action, can be:

rational in accordance with purposes

rational according to values

affective, especially emotional

traditional: determined by a deep-rooted custom

This means that explaining is understanding through the methodology of the

ideal types, the regularities that determine one or several
social behaviors according to the four ideas of real actions
in society. Because we will take a social subject and classify it and
according to the ideal types, we will obtain objectively, since
this will be an object of study, the explanation of it as a phenomenon of
real action.

4.1.1. Rational Action According to Purposes.

This action is determined by certain expectations or desires that the actor

is created, and that subsequently become goals to be achieved.

It is also known as rational calculus, where expectations are

they use as conditions that allow for better selection of the
Means to achieve goals. For example:

• Look for a job to get a good salary.

4.1.2. Rational Action According to Values

• This action is established by a conscious belief.

• The action is guided by the value (ethical, religious or political) that
we deposit in something or someone, regardless of their
result. For example:
• An act of faith, considered as an action that is performed with the
belief that a supernatural being will help us.

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4.1.3. Affective Action.

This action is especially emotional, it does not arise from a calculation but rather

is conditioned by affections, feelings, and emotional states. For

example:

• Love, passion, that manifest in actions where sometimes

One does not recognize oneself.
• A music concert, where all actions are the result of
emotional states.

4.1.4. Traditional Action.

This action is determined by a deep-rooted and conditioned custom.

due to the social weight of culture. For example:

• When women are taught that they have to 'arrive

"virgins until marriage" because that is what customs dictate
social (religious).

For these actions, there is no law or regulation that indicates this, it is about
rather a habit

5. APPLICATIONS AND/OR EXAMPLES.

Before giving the examples or applications in which it is reflected

Weber's method, it is important to clarify that for Weber the approach
the core of her theory is TO STUDY SOCIETY FROM
INTERPRETATION OF INDIVIDUAL BEHAVIOR AND ACTION
SOCIAL THAT EACH ONE PERFORMS to understand THE CAUSES
WHAT LED the subject to carry out one action or another.

ACCORDING TO WEBER

TO STUDY SOCIETY SCIENTIFICALLY

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ENOUGH WITH INTERPRETING THE MEANING THAT THE SUBJECTS IMPRINT

HIS DAILY ACTIONS.

WHAT WE DO EVERY DAY CREATES HABITS,

TRADITIONS, HABITS, RITUALS, USAGES OR PRACTICES

Discrimination.

ACTION - ACTIONS OF Working with subjectivity to

THE SUBJECTS (ALWAYS obtain objective explanations.
RATIONALS
2. FINAL CAUSE PURPOSE OR REASON for THE
What about that action.

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To better understand and explain SOCIETY, Weber

proposes the construction of IDEAL types: ANALYSIS INSTRUMENTS
THAT SERVE TO UNDERSTAND, BASED ON ACTIONS
SOCIAL INDIVIDUALS, THE MEANING THEY PRODUCE IN THE
SOCIETY.

2. Fashion.

1. ACTION - ACTIONS OF Working with subjectivity to

THE SUBJECTS (ALWAYS obtain objective explanations.
RATIONALS)
Final Cause PURPOSE OR REASON for THE
What about that action.

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To better understand and explain SOCIETY, Weber

proposes the construction of IDEAL types: ANALYSIS INSTRUMENTS
THEY SERVE TO UNDERSTAND, BASED ON ACTIONS
SOCIAL INDIVIDUALS, THE MEANING THEY PRODUCE IN THE
SOCIETY.

6. GROUP ANALYSIS

We understand as a group that an ideal type is the presentation of

a phenomenon in its purest form, this model serves the researcher
to produce important knowledge.

The ideal type for Weber is constituted by a cultural and historical basis of
each society, which has as its utility a subjective construction for
to organize and understand the human actions of a society, however
considers that sociology is the one that must adapt to society and its
values and not the opposite, for this reason the ideal type is different for each
society.

The model or ideal type does not reflect reality, but it helps to understand it. Max
Weber argues that the researcher cannot escape their subjectivity and to
their values at the time of choosing their research topic however when
moment to do the research, the sociologist must separate the "judgments,
of the facts" and the "value judgments" said in this way we
we must seek to study rigorously the social phenomenon that interests us
without mixing value judgments

7.- CONCLUSION

In conclusion, this method draws on statistics and history as

data collection instrument to understand society, and
establishing the ideal types is for this reason that we consider that the
research method based on understanding within the discipline
Political science allows us to understand a certain reality.
based on the logical explanation of an imaginary reality that for
we refer to it as 'the duty to be', therefore this sense indicates that

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it is better to interpret reality and create patterns of understanding of the

society and differentiate the various categories and components of it
social reality.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Books:

Dictionary: OF SOCIAL SCIENCES, Narcea 1986, page, (18-

19)
WEBER, MAX. "Fundamental Sociological Concepts of the
Economy and Society, Mexico, / Economic Culture Fund, 1977
pages (156-180)
WEBER, MAX. Critical studies on the logic of sciences in the
cultural sciences, in Essays on Sociological Methodology,
Editors, Buenos Aires, 1990, p. (102-174).

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- WEBER, MARX. The Politician and the Scientist Editorial Alianza, Publishers,
Buenos Aires, 1990.

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Max Weber introduced an approach to the analysis of power that had never been seen before.

it had been used, not just to see power from the point of view of
ruler but also from the point of view of the subject

Weber seeks to investigate the possible underlying rationalities in action.

including the "rationalities according to values" (which operates in
relationship with the simple categories of the adequacy of means to the
desired fines and more likely achievable. By admitting that
diverse alternative rationalities coexist and that social action does not
it is always understood in rationalist terms, our author delves into
sociological techniques that were going to become the backdrop for the
violent events that will unfold in the first half of the century
XX. Therefore, the study should not only assess 'the rationality with
arrangement for purposes" but also to hypothetical guides for determined action
for the values of the individual. Therefore, for Weber, sociology must be
comprehensive and not unilateral, not prejudging the substantive elements but
contrasting the rationalities accepting that one of them is
predominant.

One of Weber's most famous analytical tools is the

description of the ideal types, to understand them we must start from the

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basis that Weber considered Sociology as a science of the

culture with a methodology separate from the natural sciences. With this
Weber's manifesto highlights the inseparability that exists between
society and the cultural factors that affect it. The solution for studying
the author finds this complexity in the ideal types which consists of
the application of a methodology that is based on causalities
cultural aspects that imply the predictability of actions. The confluence
between politics, history and the sociological categories appear in the forms
ideals of political domination or legitimacy of authority.

Political power is a social relationship of domination and leadership.

they always go hand in hand, the ruler can exercise power and their
to receive obedience

Max Weber introduced an approach to the analysis of power that had never been seen before.

it had been used, not only sees power from the standpoint of
ruler but also from the perspective of the subject. To achieve this
distinguishes two concepts, the macht (naked power) and the Herrschaft (form)
complex of domination). According to Weber, individuals or groups must
accept authority as something legitimate, therefore this authority must
legitimize themselves through complex processes of domination. When these
authority systems break down throughout history are replaced by
others. Weber distinguishes three ideal types of domination: charismatic,
traditional and the rational-legal.

Charismatic legitimacy is defined as that which rests on the

holiness, heroism, or simplicity of a person, is the way of
legitimacy inherent to ancient societies, the essence of the system
charismatic authority is its exceptionality, as in Israel of
Moses. When charisma becomes routine, a type of domination appears.
traditional, which rests on the tradition of the institutions created in the
previous stage for those exceptional people, which grants you

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legitimacy. Tradition rests on itself, the most notable example of

this type would be the medieval and absolutist monarchies, in which the
Hereditary character implies the acceptance of that authority as legitimate.
In these estate societies, social mobility is nonexistent.
when that desire for mobility appears is when the rational-legal type.
This system is based on the adaptation of a series of standards that are
considered fair, equal, and voluntarily accepted by the whole
of society. The characteristic example of this type of domination would be
the regimes that emerged from the French Revolution or Independence
American

Despite what has been stated here, constitutional regimes develop.

within the sociological field of consolidation of urban society
industrial. A characteristic feature of these regimes will be the emergence of
the bureaucracy with the attributes of assigning fixed powers to the
employees through a regulation, a functional hierarchy, traits
specific to each of the positions and the storage of funds
documented. This trait will be typical of modern societies, since
some attempt at bureaucracy in antiquity, like in the Chinese empire,
hypertrophied and ineffective. Although Weber considered as a
factor of modernity the complexity of bureaucracy, also it
I was terrified that the appearance of this was subject to a profound
process of rationality or loss of content reflected in this rise of the
bureaucracy. For Weber, this modern society should be filled with
constant consultations with the people.

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