Max Weber jako klasik civilizační analýzy: komparativní pohledy na souhru kultury a moci
Max Weber as a Classic of Civilizational Analysis – Comparative Approaches to the Interplay of Culture and Power

Summary/Abstract: Max Weber as a Classic of Civilizational Analysis – Comparative Approaches to the Interplay of Culture and Power. Two versions of the civilizational approach are represented in contemporary social theory. One of them, identified with Norbert Elias and his disciples, focuses on the idea of the civilizing process, understood as a transformation of power structures and a corresponding reorganization of individual conduct. The other, most systematically developed by S. N. Eisenstadt, stresses the plurality of civilizational patterns and the need for comparative analysis. Here the main emphasis is on cultural interpretations of the world and their intertwining with social structures. Both these paradigms draw on Weber's legacy, the first on his problematic of rationalization and the second on the idea of cultural worlds. The aim of this essay is to examine more closely the importance of Weber's work for civilizational analysis, particularly for Eisenstadt's version of it, but with a view to integrating some aspects of Eliasian’s. For this purpose, Benajmin Nelson's interpretation of Weber is discussed; Nelson was the first author to combine a civilizational turn in social theory with a close reading of Weber's key texts. His emphasis on structures of consciousness, understood as cultural patterns, is taken as a key to Weber's writings on the cultural premises of politics, with particular emphasis on the theory of legitimacy. A neglected topic of the latter, the question of sacred rulership, is shown to be particularly important for comparative studies. Sociológia 2012, Vol. 44 (No. 5: 548-563)

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