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Am Soc (2014) 45:474–482

DOI 10.1007/s12108-014-9218-9

A Note on Max Weber’s Reception on the Part


of Symbolic Interactionism, and its Theoretical
Consequences

Sandro Segre

Published online: 4 May 2014


# Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014

Abstract The overall reception of Max Weber on the part of Symbolic Interactionism
is marked by a lack of consideration, or by perfunctory mention, or by critical rejection.
To the extent that Weber’s work has been considered at all, attention has been devoted
to his notion of Verstehen, variously appraised, rather than to other Weberian catego-
ries. This paper is an attempt to reconsider Weber’s potential contribution to Symbolic
Interactionism in a more positive light. To this end, the Weberian categories of
Verstehen and consensual action have been related, with particular reference to
Blumer (1969), to those of meaningful interaction and definition of the situation. A
discussion of status groups, as Weber and representatives of Symbolic Interactionism
have defined and discussed them, should bring into light the potential relevance of
Weber for this theoretical perspective.

Keywords Max Weber . Symbolic Interactionism . Reception

Preliminary Remarks

The article discusses how representatives of Symbolic Interactionism (SI) have selec-
tively and inadequately received Weber’s work. It maintains that, as a consequence,
they have missed the opportunity to incorporate some of Weber’s concepts and
theoretical statements. The first part presents the different and often diverging views
of authors who are close to, or sympathetic with, Symbolic Interactionism on Weber’s
notion of Verstehen. This first part is conducive to the subsequent and central question
of the article, which concerns the theoretical consequences of this missed opportunity. It
is argued that SI’s selective and inadequate reception of Weber has left out of consid-
eration the study of the conditions and consequences of consensual action by members
of any particular group, such as a status or a national group.

S. Segre (*)
University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy
e-mail: Segre@unige.it
Am Soc (2014) 45:474–482 475

Consensual action is a concept which Weber formulated, but SI has failed to take
into consideration. Weber himself devoted considerable attention to agreed-upon rules
that govern relations between the members of the same group, such as an ethnic or a
status group, as relevant instances of consensual action. He laid stress on how such
rules are symbolic, and also on how their meanings and enforcement are negotiated by
members of the status group within the group, and between them and outside actors. As
representatives of Symbolic Interactionism do not apparently agree on the epistemo-
logical and theoretical relevance of Weber from their point of view, a variety of
positions may be found in this connection.
A general view of these different positions is here provided, and evaluated in the
light of Weber’s own texts. The article indicates how Weber might have contributed to
this perspective by focusing on his definition and discussion of the concepts of status
group and business community. The article neither investigates, nor disputes, the
theoretical relevance of the reverse question; namely, the question as to whether
Weberian sociology could draw benefit from using concepts or theoretical statements
that originate from SI.

A Variety of Positions

Studies of Weber’s reception in the United States on the part of representatives of


Symbolic Interactionism have reached similar, or at least consistent, conclusions.
Building on a survey of the relevant sociological literature until after World War II,
Jennifer Platt (1985) has argued that Weber did not exert influence even on those
American sociologists or social psychologists, such as Cooley, who were close to his
epistemology. This holds true, as she has argued, even though these authors concurred
with Weber in emphasizing “the importance of sympathetic insight or understanding”
(Platt 1985: 157–158). Blumer himself, in an interview with Helle, a German sociol-
ogist who was one of his former students, declared in 1981 that “the general perspective
and approach of Max Weber was something that was kindred in character to what they
were doing in Chicago”, referring to Park and in general to the Chicago school of the
thirties. In Blumer’s judgment, Weber became better known among American sociol-
ogists in the following decades (Helle 1999: 196).
Other scholars, such as Kivisto and Swatos, have also noticed “the similarity
between Weberian and Blumerian sociology” (Kivisto and Swatos 1990: 156).
Despite Weber’s theoretical and epistemological proximity to the Chicago school,
Kivisto and Swatos have maintained that “symbolic interactionists and their predeces-
sors operated with the implicit assumption that they did not need Weber” (Kivisto and
Swatos 1990: 149. See also Horowitz 1964: 344–347). The debate on the Weberian
notion of Verstehen was initiated in the post-War years by Theodore Abel (1948, 1967),
and sparked the contributions of other authors, such as Martin (1968), Munch (1957),
and Wax (1967). The debate may have helped to clarify this notion. But it may also
have had the undesired consequence of diverting scholarly attention from “the major
issues at hand”, as Truzzi (1974: 3) has put it, namely, other and possibly more relevant
epistemological or sociological questions.
In keeping with this interpretative position, the reception of Weber’s notion of
Verstehen in the US has then been substantively unfruitful; to the effect that
476 Am Soc (2014) 45:474–482

sociologists, when and if they discuss this notion, do not refer to Symbolic
Interactionism as a relevant perspective. As a case in point, the American scholar
Robert J. Antonio has compared Weber’s conception of democracy with Mead’s—who
initiated the tradition of Symbolic Interactionism (Truzzi 1974: 103)—and Dewey’s
(Antonio 2005: 37–38). Nevertheless, Antonio has not dwelt in this connection on
Verstehen whether as an agreed-upon research method in the social sciences, or as a
shared epistemological presupposition. The contrast between the similarities of episte-
mology on the one hand, Weber’s lack of influence on Symbolic Interactionism on the
other, may account for the variety of positions on Weber’s relevance among contem-
porary representatives of this perspective.
One interpretive position, advocated by Robert Prus, holds that “Weber’s orienta-
tions are characterized by much ambiguity if not also considerable confusion and
contradiction” (Prus 1996: 42). These inadequacies are indicated, according to Prus,
by the insufficient development of the Weberian notion of Verstehen, which Weber did
not apply to “the viewpoint of particular people and to the ways in which they go about
accomplishing their activities on a ‘here and now’ basis” (Prus 1996: 42). Not only did
Weber fail (according to this interpretive position) to consistently pursue hermeneutic
sociology. He also did not dwell on the significance of symbolic communication for
meaningful social interactions (For a similar criticism, contrasting Weber to Mead, see
also Joas 1997: 34; for an elucidation of the concept of Verstehen, as Weber used it, see
Burger 1987: 102–115; Weiss 1975: 45–64). His sociological impact, which is admit-
tedly considerable, would then result not only from his stress on Verstehen, but also
from the efforts of contemporary social scientists to defend their disciplines from
positivistic orientations (Prus 1996: 40–45).
These criticisms notwithstanding, it seems that Weber did exert a profound, albeit
indirect, influence on anthropological research, which investigates meanings and
culture as formed and preserved in specific social and cultural contexts. In cultural
and social anthropology, participant observation as a method to study a community, and
its different meanings, have been objects of inquiry, rather than Verstehen as such
(Martin 1968). Still, quite a few anthropologists who have been active in the US,
whether born there or in Europe, have taken seriously Weber’s interpretive sociology
(Honigsheim 1948; Keyes 2002). What is more, “the drift toward the rationalization
and routinization of culture through industrialization and the consolidation of the mass
media”—a central theme in cultural and historical studies—has been connoted as an
element of “Max Weber’s lines of analysis”. In general, Weber’s Verstehen as “an
epistemological requirement of adequate explanation” has made it possible to “consider
and reject or tentatively accept a formulation about the actor’s motives” (Hall 1990: 22,
26–27).
It is difficult to assess Weber’s impact on the interpretive social sciences and on
Symbolic Interaction in particular, in light of these different and contrasting evalua-
tions. The absence of references to Weber in Blumer’s well-known Symbolic
Interactionism, and also in other introductory texts to Symbolic Interactionism, corrob-
orates Prus’ argument that Weber did not pursue hermeneutic research sufficiently or
consistently. References rather mention in this connection Cooley, Thomas, Mead, and
Blumer himself (See Meltzer et al. 1975; Platt 1996: 117–119; Plummer 2000;
Sandstrom et al. 2001, 2003). The lack of consideration of exponents of SI for
Weber is not limited to his epistemology of the social sciences, but also encompasses
Am Soc (2014) 45:474–482 477

his substantive sociological investigations. Discussions of social status conducted in


keeping with SI’s theoretical framework similarly fail to mention Weber, and to keep
his status notion into consideration. Goffman’s early and celebrated work on class and
status would be a case in point, for Goffman never cites Weber (Goffman 1951).
Still, there are reasons for arguing the opposite conclusion. Prus himself has tried to
bolster his argument, that Weber has little to do with Symbolic Interactionism, with
references to authors such as Schutz and Parsons who are not considered, generally
speaking, as representatives of Symbolic Interactionism. Moreover, there are quite a
few recent texts written strictly in keeping with the Symbolic Interactionism frame-
work, which deal at some length with Max Weber as a classical forerunner of this
perspective. Epistemological, conceptual or thematic continuities have been stressed in
these cases. For instance, Sheldon Stryker considers “highly influential” Weber’s
epistemology of the social sciences, both for Weber’s recommendation that the subjec-
tive aspects of social life and the meanings underlying social action be taken into
account, and also for his emphasis on legitimacy, which implies—as Stryker points
out—“the centrality of values and norms in structuring social behavior” (1980: 48–49).
Joel Charon (2001: 140–142) brings attention to the importance of motives as
“oversimplified explanations” or statements of reasons that actors put forward to act
and define situations while interacting with others, and mentions Max Weber’s de-
scription of motives as relevant in this regard. Gary Fine is another case in point.
Verstehen, as supplying “a rhetorical grounding for a qualitative methodology”; action
theory, as providing “a means by which Interactionism can address macro-sociological
problems”, are in his judgment the most important conceptual elements of Weber’s
contribution to Symbolic Interactionism, especially regarding Mead’s Interactionism
(Fine 1990: 141; see also Rochberg-Halton 1982: 456, who refers to Thomas and
Blumer in addition to Mead).

Weber’s Discussion of Social Status as a Potential Contribution to Symbolic


Interactionism

As for the question whether Weber as a sociologist and epistemologist anticipated one
way or the other the perspective of Symbolic Interactionism, a curious inconsistency in
the texts that have been cited may be observed. Weber has been often mentioned as a
classical forerunner of Symbolic Interactionism, but representatives of this perspective
have seldom used his conceptual and theoretical legacies. The semantic ambiguity of
his concept of Verstehen can hardly account for this fact, for this ambiguity would have
elicited clarification and elucidation rather than omission if the effort had been deemed
worthwhile. Other explanations seem therefore more plausible. Irving Louis Horowitz,
who long ago stressed the incompatibility of Weber—“a European sociologist par
excellence”, in his own words—with the professional interests and ideological inclina-
tions of Chicago sociologists, may have had a point (Horowitz 1964: 145–147).
We shall here focus on the concept and analyses of social status, as this has been a
central concern both for Weber and for Symbolic Interactionism. A comparative
investigation of how this concept has been defined and applied to sociological theory,
may therefore cast light on how Weber might have contributed to Symbolic
Interactionism, if greater consideration had been paid to his intellectual legacy. In
478 Am Soc (2014) 45:474–482

keeping with Symbolic Interactionism, social statuses (or social positions) are symbolic
categories that social actors use to create and maintain socially recognized behavioral
expectations toward others. Actors are viewed as constantly engaged in collectively
entering, defining, interpreting and shaping social situations “that people have some
relation with and that may affect their conduct, beliefs, or life chances” (Maines 2001:
19). Durable relationships, as associated especially with role behavior, are instrumental
to acquire and preserve stable identities. Identities are also preserved by means of social
categories, such as ethnic groups and social classes, with whom actors self-identify
(Burke et al. 2003: 73–75; Burke and Stets 2009: 36–37, 41; Stryker 1980: 57–59).
Members of the same status group share a life style, and therefore a communication
network and an identity, of their own. They form, accordingly, a subculture endowed
with “particular behaviors, norms, and artifacts”, which they continuously create,
modify, and diffuse both within this subculture and with other networks. Once common
subculture is constructed, it elicits responses on the part of other subcultures with which
the members of this subculture interact (Fine and Kleinman 1979: 6–7, 10–14). Society
is viewed as a negotiated order, which results from bargaining and negotiating between
individuals and between groups willing to pursue their interests; and having different
social statuses and identities. This view of society connotes Symbolic Interactionism,
but it has also been associated with Max Weber (Hall 1972: 178–179). The Weberian
categories of “consensual action” (Gemeinschaftshandeln) and “status group” (Stand)
are relevant in this connection.
Consensual action, according to Weber, is any social action not formally agreed
upon by means of stipulations, but participants act as though (als ob) such formal
stipulations did exist, and feel bound by them as though they had given their formal
consent. If this is the case, they follow conventional rules. Weber defines conventions
as informal rules binding the members of a group, the violation of which produces
sanctions on the part of other member (Weber 1978: 34, 324–325). Weber provides a
number of examples of consensual action. In a language community, participants act as
though other participants share their orientation to the same grammar rules. In an ethnic
group members act as though other members shared some cultural traits, which are
considered characteristic of that group. In a market community, those partaking of
exchanges behave as though the other participants felt bound by and complied with
contractual stipulations (Weber 1973: 452–464, 1978: 635–640, 1375–1380).
As Weber maintains, an important instance of consensual action is by members of a
status group. They enforce conventional rules such as respectability and restrictions on
social intercourse, in particular on marriage and commensality, with members of a
different status or ethnic group. Other members of this group, in keeping with an
unwritten code of social honor prescribing a specific life style, enforce these conven-
tional rules (Weber 1978: 305–307, 932–938). Consensual action is instrumental to
achieve and maintain social honor. This sort of action is oriented toward social
recognition—inside and outside of the group—of the specific status qualification of
its members. This recognition is demanded but not necessarily granted, and if obtained
results from previous processes of usurpation of a higher social status, and social
closure toward lower-status members (Weber 1978: 932– 933. See also Collins 1986:
128-129; Parkin 1979). Stable trading of financial goods in Stock Exchanges, in
particular, rests on mutual trust within the circle of the brokers, and also between them
and those (whether individuals or corporations) who wish to invest there their capitals.
Am Soc (2014) 45:474–482 479

This trust—as Weber argues—presupposes strict observance of a code of honor,


which only a closed group of high social status and economically privileged brokers
can respect and enforce as long as they share ethical principles of honor and moral
accountability. In his view, this was the case of the British Stock Exchange brokers and
of the upper class, from which they were recruited. With the possible exception of the
Hamburg Stock Exchange, this was not however the case of Imperial Germany’s Stock
Exchanges. England then differed from Germany in that moral principles were relevant
in financial, and generally speaking, business transactions. Such a difference was a
reason, according to Weber, for England’s (rather than Germany’s) prominent position
in financial markets (Weber 1988: 281–288).1
Weber’s contribution has been to relate causally the stability and long-run perfor-
mance of markets to their control on the part of members of privileged status groups
and economic classes; provided, however, that they abide by the unwritten rules of the
moral economy. Anticipating Symbolic Interactionism, Weber holds that a social status
presupposes socially recognized behavioral expectations: “Status honor is normally
expressed by the fact that above all else a specific style of life is expected from all those
who wish to belong to the circle” (Weber 1978: 932). Such expectations sanction equal
status honor for members of the same status group, and unequal honor for members of
different groups. Weber seems therefore to be close to a structural view of the social
order, which stresses the patterned regularities in interactions, and the stability of
meanings actors attach to them (Stryker 1980: 66).
Status honor, as Weber argues, “Always rests upon distance and exclusiveness”
(Weber 1978: 935), and is therefore maintained or altered in the course and by means of
social interactions. In this connection, Weber compares the equalitarian conventions
prevailing among the members of American social clubs with those stressing status
differences in the German clubs: “This is one of the most important reasons—as Weber
remarks—why in America the German clubs have never been able to attain the
attraction that the American clubs have” (Weber 1978: 932). Status privilege is
connected with “a monopolization of [some] ideal and material goods or opportuni-
ties”, and avoidance of other to prevent status disqualification, as stipulated by status
conventions (Weber 1978: 935–936). Subsequent research on the American social
clubs at the turn of the ninetieth century and thereafter has supported Weber’s thesis
that the elite social clubs have been instrumental—whatever their stated goals—to
bolster and preserve the social status of the economically most privileged groups
(Kaufman 2002: 91–93).
For Weber, as for Symbolic Interactionism, society is viewed accordingly as a
negotiated order that results from relations between individuals and between groups
who pursue their interests and have distinct social statuses and identities. This negoti-
ated order is constructed and possibly modified in the course of specific, contextual
social situations, which participants create, define, and interpret. Status distinctions,
which rest on claims to social honor, and therefore on the monopolization of certain
goods by the members of privileged status groups, are therefore incompatible with
1
Parenthetically, this Weber’s thesis is in keeping with recent research, which has well documented the
advantages brought by the observance of the unwritten rules and principles of a moral economy on business
firms, and on the market as an institution (Power 2005: 261–265). It has also documented the damage, which
the absence of ethical principles and conduct has wrought on financial markets and the economy as a whole
(Jackall 2010).
480 Am Soc (2014) 45:474–482

market transactions and interests: “The freedom of the market is typically limited …
through monopolistic consociations which render exchange with outsiders impossible”
(Weber 1978: 636–638). Still, “class distinctions are linked in the most varied ways
with status distinctions”. Property, though “as such is not always recognized as a status
qualification, in the long run it is, with extraordinary regularity” (Weber 1978: 932), as
indicated by successful processes of status usurpation on the part of members of
privileged economic classes.
A status groups’ subculture is then intertwined with a market subculture, even
though these two subcultures are based on different principles (Weber 1978: 638–
639). Powerful representatives of the market subculture often bring these two subcul-
tures into line. The ensuing new definition of the status hierarchy tends to be stable:
“The road to legal privilege, positive or negative, is easily travelled—Weber writes—as
soon as a certain stratification of the social order has in fact been ‘lived in’ and has
achieved stability by virtue of a stable distribution of economic power” (Weber 1978:
933). Behaviors, norms, and artifacts are then consistently defined in a variety of
encounters. The principle of honesty in market transactions, which is a prerequisite to
“the future continuation of the market relationship” (Weber 1978: 637), is upheld by
members of a privileged status group who succeed in monopolizing the market (Weber
1978: 639). The power structure in the both the economic and social order may be
thereby changed to their advantage. If this is the case, “negotiated interactions remain
… constrained” (Hall 1972: 46), as “diffusion of information among groups” (Fine and
Kleinman 1979: 8) is limited.
Symbolic Interactionism in the period of the early Chicago school, and in times that
are more recent, has not focused on the constraints or limitations of power relations.
This has been so, despite their relevance for the study of the processes and outcomes of
negotiated interactions (Hall 1972: 46). Weber’s potential contribution to this theoret-
ical perspective would then address attention to negotiated interactions not only within
or between groups and subcultures, but also between their different and incompatible
sources of aggregation and identity, such as market ethic and status honor. 2 For
Goffman’s work, like Weber’s, was interested in analyzing “how social order is
accomplished in everyday life” (Smith 2011: 359). It has however been related, rather
than to Weber, to other classical sources of inspiration, such as Durkheim (Collins
2000), and Simmel (Davis 2000). As a related object of interest, attention may be also
conferred to the interpretation and negotiation of power constraints on the part of
members of these groups and subcultures; for different power endowments flow from
the prevalence of either market or status relations, rather than from the combination of
these two sources of power.
To the extent that they overlap, members of the dominant group as well as others
tend to define situations similarly, and power negotiations take place within this group
rather than between different groups. There are, moreover, no alternative definitions of
collective identities, and social change—if it occurs at all—originates from outside
sources. Weber did in fact write on national identity as a form of collective identity. The
concept of collective identity refers, according to a recent definition, to any process
whereby “group members … share self-defining attributes”, and “engage in social

2
Weber’s conceptual taxonomies have also been found of potential interest to “Blumer’s program for theory
construction” (Baugh 1990: 85–86).
Am Soc (2014) 45:474–482 481

action to forge an image of what the group stands for and how it is represented and
viewed by others” (Hogg 2006: 116; Jenkins 2004: 23-25). Weber considered national
identities as an instance of consensual action. He was well aware of the arbitrary and
conventional character of a national identity (Weber 1978: 921–926). Accordingly, he
emphasized abidance by tacitly or explicitly agreed-upon norms of conduct on the part
of the members of a national community.

Conclusion

It has been shown, by way of conclusion, that representatives of SI have made limited
use of its conceptual apparatus and the scope of its theoretical investigations because of
their thematically restricted and substantively inadequate reception of Weber. This
thesis has been argued in connection with his concept of consensual action; for
consensual action, according to Weber, connotes their members’ conduct, as instanti-
ated with reference to his discussion of status and national groups. In this sense, and in
contrast to other interpretations, Weber did therefore provide “vital points of reference
for the discipline as a whole” (Baehr and O’Brien 1994: 56), and for SI in particular. It
is hoped that these deficiencies will be corrected in the future, in keeping with the
legacy of this major classical author.

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