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Lowith On Weber - A Review of Karl Lowith's Max Weber and Karl
Lowith On Weber - A Review of Karl Lowith's Max Weber and Karl
Marx
Lowith misses the “conflictual drives” that turn “the mantle” into “the cage” and
confuses thus the process of Rationalisierung - its results and institutional and
political outcomes that appear to be “rational” from a logico-scientific viewpoint -
with its “cause”, which is instead to be found in that very conflictual “free-dom”
that Weber says is “irrational” that the capitalist “Kalkulation” or “Akkumulation”
has made entirely consistent with the “rationality” of the Rationalisierung. Lowith
is left then with a dilemma that he attributes to Weber and Marx instead: - that is,
the reconciliation of the “rational process” of the Rationalisierung under capitalism,
on one side, and its “irrational” end-goal of infinite accumulation, on the other.
What is “irrational and incomprehensible” is not the process and substance of the
Rationalisierung or of the Akkumulation, but rather the conflict or “free-dom” that
gives rise to it, the “need-necessities” (“the necessity of destiny” – how is this for
“transcendence” in Weber?) that pro-duce “the iron cage”. The “iron cage” in fact
is not for Weber a social order opposed to individual freedom – which is what
Lowith mistakes it to be - but rather the very objectification of this “freedom of the
will” understood in the sense of the negatives Denken from Schelling to Heidegger.
Much to his merit, Lowith was among the first to identify this novel, negative
approach to “free-dom” (unsurprisingly, given his philosophical background in
the tradition of Schelling and Heidegger). But then he fails to apply this
consistently to Weber’s entire oeuvre.
What neither Weber nor Marx see is that the process of accumulation is neither
“irrational” nor “rational” but is rather a “political project” [Weber’s Kalkulation
made possible by the rigid discipline of the factory] of command over living
labour through the process of valorization and realization of capital [Marx’s
Akkumulation]. (Cf. Nietzsche’s much more useful contrast of “rational man” and
“intuitive man” in ‘Uber Wahrheit und Luge’ based on the former’s need for “safety
and certainty” leading to the theorization of [scientific] “necessity”. On this see
also M.Montinari’s Nietzsche, pp.34-5:
La formulación esencial del problema que preocupa a Nietzsche en los
primeros años de Basilea, se encuentra en la conferencia que pronunció el
1º de febrero de 1870 sobre el tema Sócrates y la tragedia, uno de los
numerosos trabajos que preceden la publicación de El origen de la
tragedia. Al describir la figura de Sócrates como “heraldo de la ciencia”,
Nietzsche dice: “la ciencia y el arte, sin embargo, se excluyen”. La
identificación del socratismo con la ciencia del siglo XIX es, por lo menos,
[35] tan “antihistórica” y arbitraria como la fe de Nietzsche en el “renacimiento”
de la tragedia clásica por obra de Wagner. Pero esa afirmación encierra el
desarrollo ulterior del pensamiento de Nietzsche y podría figurar como
lema de su llamado período positivista. Efectivamente, el postulado de que
la ciencia y el arte se excluyen alternativamente, vale tanto para el
Nietzsche wagneriano como para el Nietzsche “espíritu libre”: sólo las
consecuencias son opuestas. La desvalorización de la racionalidad
“socrática” contrapuesta tanto a la intuición apolínea como al éxtasis
dionisíaco, alcanza su punto culminante en El origen de tragedia.)
Both Marx and Weber – and here Lowith has a point, one of the most important
points in his work! – start from an idealistic, ontogenetic vision of “man” that
neglects the inter-subjectivity of being human.
The problem is that Lowith happens to share this erroneous view of being human:
there is no “hombre mismo” that can form the basis of a “critique” of capitalism;
rather, the critique must start, not from the early Marxian notion of “self-
alienation” (most notably in the Paris Manuscripts), but from the inability of
capitalism to satisfy the very needs that led to its rise, which is the proper focus of
Marx in the Grundrisse. These “needs”, then, are entirely and immanently
historical, and not “social-philosophical” as Lowith contends. The philosophisch
approach to social “science” (Wissenschaft) belongs more appropriately to Weber
and not (at least self-avowedly) to Marx, who preferred to talk of “critique” (and
not in a Kantian antinomic sense, [pace Sohn-Rethel and Habermas!], but instead in
a Hegelian-dialectical dimension, as Lukacs has correctly established – but see also
Colletti in Ideologia e Societa’). It is wrong for Lowith then to seek to homologate
Weber’s and Marx’s approaches to capitalism and “social science” in this regard,
and then, quite incredibly, even to champion Weber’s abstract-formal
categorization of capitalism as the apex of the “Kalkulation”, of the
Rationalisierung, as a “historical-earthly” approach – a Wirklichkeitswissenschaft,
to quote Hans Freyer (to whom Lowith refers) - to be contrasted with Marx’s
“teleo-logical” one!
Lowith therefore also misapprehends Weber’s undeniable atavism for the “value-
neutrality” [Wert-freiheit] of science - even for the possibility of “science” as a
“value-free” instrument [Objektivitat], which is something that Lowith understates
and seeks to minimize, preferring instead to stick to a presumed “relativism” in
Weber’s approach to “science”. And it is for this very reason that Lowith
misinterprets the Weberian notion of Rationalisierung by finding “an apparent
contrast” between “the freedom of the human hero” and the “overwhelming
power of [social institutions]”. In actual fact, there is no such “apparent contrast”
in Weber precisely because he identifies “free-dom” with the antagonistic
assertion of “individual self-interest” which then results “scientifically” in the
adoption of equally “scientific” means to the “stated aims” of individuals – aims
that become “stated” through the “free play” of conflicting “market forces”.
And yet we know very well that for Weber it was possible – indeed essential! – to
attribute an “autonomous” rationality precisely to that “scientific” relation
between “available means” and “stated aims”! In an ab-solutist world only
apparently without conflict, such as the one that preceded market capitalism,
science would be impossible or suppressed because there would be no “alternative
uses” for it, no “choice” [which is the aim of the Katheder-Sozialismus – scientific
socialism!]; it would be impossible to see the “meaning” of science as the
“measurement of the rationality of means for the pursuit of stated aims or ends or
values” given that these aims, ends or values would not be “stated” in a “free”
manner – that is, conflictually. And in such a world without conflict the
Rationalisierung would be ab-solute, without limits, because it would have
hypothetically eliminated by force the “conflict” between “individuals” that
market capitalism allows.
This does not mean that “the laws of science” are inapplicable in a feudal state, for
example. Yet, because science is absolutely meaningless except as human activity, once
that “activity” (Wirk-lichkeit, actu-ality) is denied, there is precious little that
“science” can represent! By opening up “com-petition”, Weber contends, capitalist
society becomes both “scientific” and “rationalized” at the same time because
goals can be “stated” and means can be chosen “freely” and therefore “rationally”
and “scientifically”! Science and rationality are confiscated, as it were, they are
rendered im-possible or in-effectual precisely by those political regimes that
pretend to rationalize even “choice” and thus eliminate conflict!
Once again, Lowith fails to explain how and why “we live today in a world reified
by scientific technique”! Had he tried to answer this, he would have understood
that it is indeed not “the objectified rationality of science [that] has freed us from
moral and religious norms”, nor is it “science as a power that destroys the
authority of tradition by the force of its continuous progress”. Instead, it is those
forces (the need-necessities) that destroy both the force of tradition as well as
moral and religious values that have led to a specific political practice that we now
call “science”!
Empero, sí se puede
discutir científicamente con un marxista que postula la tesis
de que determinadas relaciones sociales y económicas condicionan
también el surgimiento de religiones, así como, inversamente,
Weber ha mostrado que determinadas convicciones
y expectativas religiosas pueden contribuir a determinar la
forma de ordenar la economía. (p.162)
But here once again it is the “instincts for freedom” that seem more central to that
kind of “interdependence” that Weber himself highlighted genially and that does
not escape Lowith’s beady eye:
Quite right! The exakte Kalkulation! That is the arcanum imperii! But there is no
contra-diction or antinomy or opposition between “free-dom”, rational action and
“the disenchantment [Ent-zauberung] of the world”! Weber’s notion of the
Problematik der Sozialismus consists precisely in this: - that the “riddle” of the
rationalization of the economy and society and the preservation of “freedom” is
one that belongs properly to socialism and not to market capitalism (though
perhaps Schumpeter may add “monopoly capitalism”). Socialist planning is not a
“problem” for “market” capitalism; rather, it is the other way around! Capitalism
is “the” problem for Socialism because it shows that the only way to act
“rationally” is by allowing the “free-dom” of social conflict over need-necessities
through the “market”, which is what Socialism wishes to eliminate! For Weber,
the “problematic of socialism” is the impossibility of reconciling choice and
rationality, freedom and science, except from the choices and free-dom of in-
dividuals! This is the “truth” of Weber’s methodological individualism. Lowith
seems to argue that Weber is either seeking to reconcile these opposites or else that
he harbors “illusions” about being able to do so! But we know that neither is the
case because in this exact respect market capitalism represents for Weber the apex
of both human free-dom and scientific rationality.
(This also is the entire tenor of Schumpeter’s approach to “socialism” in C,S and D
where in fact the Austrian seems to accept an evolutionary transition from market
to monopolistic capitalism, and then to socialism. This is something that Weber
denies ferociously! Cf. here also Schumpeter’s high regard for Walras as the
greatest economist for precisely this Machian reason: - the price mechanism
maximizes the satisfaction of individual human needs – human needs taken from
the point of view of atomized human beings! - at equilibrium [TGE, p.79]:
Lowith completely fails to see this point – whence comes his inability to
comprehend what he misconstrues as “the antinomy of Weber’s political science”
between his “opposition” to the Rationalisierung – as “irrational” and “illiberal” –
and his staunch defence of it against the idealistic liberal literati! In fact there is no
antinomy or contradiction because there is no “opposition between freedom and
Rationalisierung” – because Weber sees the Rationalisierung as the outcome of the
very conflict of interests, the “free-dom”, that market capitalism erects to the
centre of social life, to its fulcrum, and not as the source of such conflict between
“individual freedom” and “social order”, between “soul” and “forms”, between
“spirit” and “iron cage”.
La antinomia de la ciencia política de Weber consiste, básicamente,
en que justo la inclusión ineludible en el carácter de
empresa racional de todas las administraciones modernas se
vuelve el lugar del posible ser sí mismo, y la carcasa de «servidumbre
» el único espacio de juego de aquella «libertad de
movimiento» que buscaba Weber, como hombre y político. Él
negó a todas las administraciones actuales aquel sustancial
valor propio, pero las afirmó, sin embargo, como el medio dado
para un fin libre de ser elegido. Por otro lado, precisamente
la comprensión de la subjetividad de nuestra postulación
última del fin y del valor y de nuestras decisiones debía garantizar
la objetividad y austeridad del pensamiento científico
y del hacer político. Como consecuencia de ello, la posición
de Weber se volvió una firme oposición y una defensa única
del individuo autónomo, en medio de y contra la creciente dependencia
del mundo político y económico. Todas las diferencias
rigurosas que trazó en la teoría de la ciencia y en la conducta
práctica, la separación entre cosa y persona,
conocimiento objetivo y valoración subjetiva, funcionariado y
elite, ética de la responsabilidad y ética de la convicción, surgen
de la una y fundamental oposición entre libertad y racionalización….(P.64)
Weber renuncia
a comparar el valor de culturas diferentes de modo
comparativo-distintivo, como ya en el «prefacio» a los Ensayos
sobre sociología de la religión aclaró, lacónico. El motivo para esa
reserva no reside empero en el relativismo de la conciencia
histórica, sino en que Weber llega a la comprensión filosófica
[p.163] de que, frente al «andar de los destinos humanos», se haría
bien en guardar para sí sus «pequeños comentarios personales
», «como se hace también al mirar el mar y la montaña». Eso
vale también para el destino de la racionalización del mundo
por la ciencia, al que Weber ni afirma ciegamente, ni niega como
alienación. (Pp.163-4)
It is Lowith’s failure to understand this difficult but pivotal point that leaves him
beset with doubts and interrogatives about the Weberian scientific and personal
quest:
The obvious antinomy between “science” and “choice” is something that neither
Robbins nor Hayek detected in their oxymoronic description of “economic
science” as “the science of choice”. Like Weber, this Machian strand of the
negatives Denken theorises the conflict of interests between individuals as a divergence
over “scarce” - that is to say, commonly-sought - resources. The difficulty is that to
the extent that “resources” are “scarce” they reveal a “common interest” that is
incompatible with “conflict” as an unqualified concept. And to the extent that
there is unqualified conflict, it is impossible for this to be “resolved”, even through
“com-petition”, because this requires “agreement” over the conduct or rules of
this “com-petition”. The outcome can be decided either belligerently through
endless war or else, if agreement is possible, co-operatively through “science”,
given that the conflict itself reveals a “common interest” – a “com-petition” – in
and for these “resources”. Indeed Weber does not spare even “science” from this
“com-petition” because its direction is determined by “values” whose ultimate
“rationality” [Wert-rationalitat] cannot be de-fined. And yet science needs to retain
a degree of epistemological autonomy if it is to be worthy of the name – and this for
Weber is the “rational scientific” relation between ends/values and means [Zweck-
rationalitat].
The problem with all of these “positions” is that it is impossible to separate
scientific means from the value ends themselves – because “science” itself is a
means devoid of all epistemological autonomy as against political activity! And therefore
science is inseparable from values because it is itself a “value” [Nietzsche’s “will to
truth”, which Lowith misunderstands as applying merely to “philosophy”, to
“truth” as an absolute value, and not to “science” itself! P.43]. As such, science
becomes a political project or activity with given “intentions” by its practitioners
over other human beings. But at this precise point it loses its “scientificity” and
turns into political practice.
This is what Lowith fails to appreciate [pp.69-70] – and what explains his
equivocations on Weber’s notions of ‘Objektivitat’ and Rationalisierung. The very
“formal” definition of the Rationalisierung is reflected and continued in the
“formalistic” definition of capitalism that Lowith takes up from Weber – whereby
he gets entangled in the vicious circle of the Sombartian “profit-motive” being
dictated by a Protestant-religious “ethos”. Lowith uncritically repeats Weber’s
formulation without any critical deepening of “the iron cage” and of “the rational
organization of free labour through the discipline of the factory” – which is what
we have done in the Weberbuch.
The further difficulty attaches to the idealist conception of Sombart and Weber and their school, that if
capitalism as an economic form is the creation of the capitalist spirit, the genesis of the latter must first
of all be accounted for before the origin of Capitalism can be accounted for. If this capitalist spirit is
itself an historical product, what caused its appearance on the historical stage? To this riddle no very
satisfactory answer has been propounded to date…, (Dobb, SDC, p.9)
Even Lowith’s jejune attempt to combine “the economic” and “the religious”
factors in the rise of capitalism founder on his formalistic insistence (with Weber)
that “rationalization” as a pure “ethos” can indeed explain anything at all! The
diatribe between Weber and Marx should not be approached from the
“materialist” or “idealist” divide, as even Dobb does here, but rather from the
much more specific ground that capitalism is not “a mental attitude” but rather a
very real “system of production of needs” – one founded on the wage relation as a
specific mode of political and social organization (as Dobb himself highlights a
little earlier on pp.7 and 8). It is not so much “idealism” that is the problem with
the Sombart-Weber theses. The real problem is that they fail to focus on and
account for “the political reality” of the wage relation as a form of violence
contained in the “exchange” of dead labour for living labour on an
accumulative basis, where the “accumulation” is rendered politically necessary
by the very “free-dom” of the living labour employed. In other words, there is no
need to rely on the “greed” of the capitalist in seeking “infinite accumulation” –
because “accumulation” itself is “indefinite” due to the very character of the
“exchange” involved between dead and living labour! It is obvious that in feudal
society it was the “bond” of the “serf” to the “glebe” that made such indefinite
accumulation impossible. Thus, the wind-mill and the steam-mill represent this
different application of “scientific activity” to the process of surplus production.
And as Dobb himself goes on to show in his masterpiece, it is the feudal lord
himself (!) who first saw the possibility of transforming subsistence production
into capitalist production by “freeing” his serfs. And then it was the turn of the
emancipated serfs to employ other emancipated serfs for the purpose of capitalist
production and accumulation.