The Relationship Between The Protestant Ethic And The Spirit Of Capitalism

In 1905, Max Weber released an extremely controversial book, The Protestant Ethic And The Spirit Of Capitalism. Weber discusses and explores the question on whether or not there is a link between The Protestant ethic and The spirit of capitalism. Eventually, he comes to the controversial conclusion that there is a link between protestantism and capitalism. He also concludes that protestant ethic did not play the entire role of creating modern capitalism. Weber specifically names protestant churches and groups such as “... sixteenth- seventeenth-century Calvinist, Methodist, Baptist, Mennonite, Pietist, and Quaker churches and sects in England, Holland, and the American colonies” that present protestant ethic Stephan recalls. With such a long
Weber’s idea of what the Protestant ethic means and what the spirit of capitalism means is a subject of debate, specifically whether he discussed “modern capitalism” or “capitalism” as “the spirit of capitalism.” The more compelling reasoning is that he was discussing modern capitalism as the spirit of capitalism. He believed modern capitalism simply meant the implementation of trade with few regulation for the goal of bettering yourself or getting better off. His idea of the protestant ethic can be easily defined as the belief that you are saved in the eyes of God if you are a model of hard work and success. One thing that backs Weber’s merit is the clear similarities and parallels through the revolution of communist societies into capitalist societies with the catholic reformation. The revolution of communist societies was a revolution of religion by the people the same way as the government of the
The most discussed case that Weber makes is towards Calvinism’s ideology and ethics, specifically the idea of predestination and the ethics that derive from it. Predestination is an ideology that believes being saved by God is already decided along with the rest of your life. This drove people to work hard, show great amounts of success, and be a model of those aspects, so they would be saved by God because that is their destiny. This clearly shows a relation to the protestant ethic. The process of becoming better off was through capitalism and clearly due to having to work hard and trade to gain higher status, so one would be saved by God. Many assume that if Calvinists believed their fate of being saved by God is predetermined, then it would make them lazy. On the contrary, what actually occurred was the idea of those who are saved by God (being higher in spiritual status) drove calvinists to develop modern capitalistic ways. Calvinists did this through trading and working hard to gain what represented more success than others had like wealth in money, piety, or land. The process of the protestant ethic of Calvinists developing a spirit of capitalism through the pursuit of being saved by God shows a clear link between the two subjects. It may also display the argument of protestantism creating capitalism as