The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

This country was settled primarily by Puritan extremists who imprinted their deep distrust of the body’s needs onto future generations. The Calvinist obsession with sin and predestination led to a uniquely American situation. As wealth became a sign of grace, poverty indicated moral failure.

Weber’s classic book describes the process in which a perspective that began in renunciation was transformed into the drive to work incessantly in the pursuit of worldly success and, eventually, conspicuous consumption. As the strictly religious fervor dissipated over time, the competitive quest for efficiency, productivity, wealth, and the self-validation they symbolized remained and became our… show more.

This book is a powerful argument, logically and sociologically unassailable, about cultural foundations of economic activity, whose specific hypothesis (that Protestantism was responsible for the rise of capitalism) was refuted by empirical evidence.

It served as the point of departure for my research.

I recommend The Protestant Ethic… very strongly because a) it clearly distinguishes capitalism from other economic systems by its historically unique orientation to growth, rather than vaguely defining it as an expression of greed and tendency for exploitation of others, which are present throughout history, and b) because it shows that a logically perfect interpretation of… show more.