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It is now one hundred years since the publication of Max Weber's essay that were to become known collectively as 'The Protestant Ethic & the 'Spirit' of Capitalism'. This article marks this event. Recent scholarship has made it impossible to ignore the complexity of Weber's original text, the history of its reception, & the political & religious context within which it was written. The Protestant Ethic is, in an important sense, a political text that seems to possess 'eternal youth'. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications Ltd., copyright 2006.]

Canipe reviews 'Protestants in America' by Mark A. Noll.

In an excerpt from Bell's The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism, 20th Anniversary Edition (1996), it is noted that so much attention has been focused on the notion of the Protestant ethic that it has obscured the original intent of Max Weber's The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1904), ie, to explain why, in the past 500 years, a total transformation of society occurred only in the West. The reason behind that transformation, according to Weber, is the rationalization of life. Weber contended that the rise of capitalism, a rational economic order, was made possible by the personality type generated by rational ascetic Protestantism, ie, a disciplined & work-oriented individual. The ideas of Werner Sombart are also discussed; he argued that the motivating force behind capitalism, & all human activity, is love of money. It is argued that while both Weber & Sombart dealt with the origins of capitalism, they did not discuss its structural transformations. One such transformation, the 20th century's shift from production to consumption as the basis of capitalism, is discussed, & it is concluded that the ascetic Protestant ethic has now been replaced by acquisitiveness. J. Ferrari

This multi-disciplinary portrayal and analysis of the Protestant tradition in Ireland examines Protestant contributions to literature, culture, religion and politics. It also assesses Protestant authors, churches, Orange Order, Unionist Parties and Ulster loyalism

'Conservative Protestant Politics' by Steve Bruce is reviewed.

On croit savoir quelque chose sur le protestantisme français. On ouvre le beau livre d'ÉMILE-G. LÉONARD et l'on s'aperçoit qu'on ne sait rien du tout. L'aventure n'est pas unique, mais elle est rare.Je dis : « le protestantisme français ». En fait le livre s'intitule : Le Protestant français, ce qui n'est pas la même chose ; je ne puis feindre de l'ignorer puisqu'Émile-G. Léonard veut bien rappeler que je suis pour quelque chose dans la genèse de cet ouvrage. En fait, j'aurais bien voulu le publier dans l'une de nos collections Annales, mais, en ces temps de pénurie généralisée, le sentiment dispose plus vite que la raison n'exécute. L'apparition de ce beau travail ne fait qu'accroître mes regrets ; mais après tout, l'essentiel est qu'il ait vu le jour.

A review essay on Robert Jackall's Moral Mazes: The World of Corporate Managers (Oxford U Press, in publication [see listing IRPS No. 52]). Themes of corporate morality new to the literature of business ethics & morality are used to show residues of the Protestant ethic in corporate ethics. Seven Protestant motifs are identified in Jackall's description of modern corporations, & elaborated, showing the ultimate outcome of bureaucracy, to be a transvaluation of religious norms, ethics, & morality. Bureaucracy is argued to be a decivilizing process that tends to decrease an individual's spontaneous expressiveness. Bureaucratization also acts as a destabilizing force on individual identity & institutions, thus generating a thanatotic ethos. This idea is explored with reference to the death instinct & its two key mechanisms: inertia & the repetition compulsion. Puritan residues in bureaucracy are explored in the emasculation of heroism in politics, & in the ethic of delegated responsibility, & Goffmanian images of front stage & backstage are applied to corporate analysis. Questions are raised about the expression of self, & the character structure of the modern person. C. Grindle