SOCI 100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 15: Alexis De Tocqueville, Wage Labour, Investment
Document Summary
Tocqueville was afraid that freedom would be threatened by the extension of bureaucratic power. Weber believed that bureaucratic centralization was expanding everywhere. The european state was only part of it. There is a world-wide development to advance rationalization, the rational organization that bureaucracy is a part of. Rationalization is a process that you can"t ignore. It is an expression of humankind"s ability to organize the world. In the process it will create a bureaucratic monster. Weber argued that marx"s concept was a scientific achievement of the first rank. Doesn"t necessarily answer all the questions of new times. Agrees with marx that you cannot understand modern society unless you understand the mode of production. Without a materialist foundation, you cannot fully understand society. The problem with materialism is that people become too reliant on it. Necessary to know but not sufficient for us to have everything we need.
