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Classical Sociology

The distribution of power within the community: Classes, Stände, Parties by

Max Weber
Translated by Dagmar Waters, Tony Waters, Elisabeth Hahnke, Maren Lippke, Eva
Ludwig-Glück, Daniel Mai, Nina Ritzi-Messner, Christina Veldhoen and Lucas Fassnacht
Journal of Classical Sociology 2010 10: 137
DOI: 10.1177/1468795X10361546

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Article

Journal of Classical Sociology

The distribution of power

10(2) 137–152
Copyright in the translation © Tony
Waters and Dagmar Waters 2010
within the community: Reprints and permission:

Classes, Stände,1 Parties†1

sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
DOI: 10.1177/1468795X10361546
http://jcs.sagepub.com

Max Weber
Translated by Dagmar Waters, Tony Waters, Elisabeth Hahnke, Maren Lippke, Eva Ludwig-Glück, Daniel Mai,
Nina Ritzi-Messner, Christina Veldhoen and Lucas Fassnacht

Outline
I. Introduction
II. The Phenomena of the Distribution of Power within a Gemeinschaft Community
are ‘Classes,’ ‘Stände,’ and ‘Parties’
(a) Classes
(b) Stände
(c) Parties
III. Conclusion

I. Introduction
Every legal order (state or non-state) directly effects the distribution of power, economic
power, and all other powers, within its respective Gemeinschaft community.2
In general by ‘power’ we understand the chance of a person or a group to enforce their
own will even against the resistance of others involved, through a communal action by
the Gemeinschaft. ‘Economically determined’ power is not, of course, identical with
power in general. The emergence of economic power can rather be the consequence of
power existing for other reasons.
People, however, do not strive for power only to enrich themselves economically.
Power, including economic power, can be valued ‘for its own sake.’ In many cases, the

†This is a translation from German of Max Weber’s chapter “Class, Status, Party” from his
masterwork Economy and Society (Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft). This chapter was probably
written before World War I. Two German versions of Economy and Society have been published.
In 1921, the chapter was published as part of a compilation edited by Marianne Weber. A second
compilation of Economy and Society was first published in German by Johannes Winckelmann
beginning in 1956. For more details see Waters and Waters 2010.

Correspondence to:
Tony Waters, Department of Sociology, California State University, Chico, California, USA.
Email: twaters@csuchico.edu

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138 Journal of Classical Sociology 10(2)

striving for power is also determined by the heightened social ‘honor or reputation’3 it
brings. Not all kinds of power, however, bring such honor: the typical American boss, as
well as the ‘stereotypical’ large-scale speculator will deliberately abstain from develop-
ing an honorable reputation. In general, particularly the ‘mere’ economic power, particu-
larly the ‘naked’ power of money is by no means an accepted basis for such honor. But
neither is power itself the only basis for honor. Social honor (or prestige) can also be the
basis for power, including economic power, and it often has been so.
The legal order can guarantee power as well as honor, but, at least normally, it is not
the primary source of either. The legal order rather is an additional factor that enhances
the chance to possess power and create an honorable reputation, but the legal order
cannot always secure them.
The distribution of power between the typical groups of a community participating in
this distribution is done in what we will call the ‘social order.’ The relation between this
social order and the legal order is certainly similar to the relation between legal and eco-
nomic order. But the social order is nevertheless not identical with the economic order,
as the economic order is merely the way in which economic goods and services are dis-
tributed and used. But, of course, the social order is highly determined by the economic
order, and in its turn reacts upon it.

II.The Phenomena of the Distribution of Power within a

Gemeinschaft Community are ‘Classes,’ ‘Stände,’ and ‘Parties’
(a) Classes
In our terminology, ‘classes’ are not strictly equated with Gemeinschaft communities.
Keep in mind that ‘classes’ represent only one possible and frequent basis for communal
action by the Gemeinschaft. We may also speak about a ‘class’

1. when a large number of people have a specific causal component of their life
chances in common, and
2. when this causal component is represented exclusively by economic interests in
the possession of goods and the opportunities of income, and
3. when the causal component is represented under the conditions of the commodity
or labor markets (‘class situations’4).
It is the most elementary economic fact that specific life chances are created already
by the manner in which the material property is distributed among a plurality of people
meeting competitively in the market for the purpose of exchange.
According to the law of marginal utility, it then follows that using the market as the
mode of distribution excludes the propertyless from effectively competing for highly
valued goods with the propertied. In fact, the law of marginal utility gives an effective
monopoly to the propertied for the acquisition of highly valued goods. Thus, other things
being equal, this mode of distribution monopolizes the opportunities for profitable deals
to those who already have goods and do not necessarily have to exchange them.
Using the market as the mode of distribution also increases, at least generally, the com-
modity dealer’s power in price wars with propertyless people over highly valued goods.
Propertyless people have nothing to offer but their labor itself or the products created through

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Waters et al. 139

their own labor. Unlike the owner, such laborers are forced to use their products and labor
immediately in order to even have the possibility to simply eke out the barest of existence.
Using the marketplace as the mode of distribution monopolizes the opportunity to
transfer commodity from the sphere of use as a ‘fortune’ to the sphere of ‘assets.’ This
gives only the owners the entrepreneurial function and all chances to share directly or
indirectly in returns on capital [and excludes the propertyless]. All this holds true in the
sphere in which true market conditions prevail.
‘Property and assets’ and ‘lack of property or assets’ are therefore the basic categories of
all class situations, no matter whether these two categories effect price wars or are effectively
used in competitive struggles. Within these basic categories the class situations are further
differentiated in regards to the kind of property that can be used for returns, on the one hand,
and in regard to the kind of services that can be offered in the market, on the other hand.
All of the following property distinctions differentiate the class situations of the prop-
ertied as well as the ‘meaning’ they can (and do) give to the utilization of their property,
especially liquid assets which are easily converted to cash:

– ownership of residential houses, factories, depots or stores, agriculturally usable

land, all this in large or small holdings which means there is a quantitative differ-
ence with possibly qualitative consequences
– ownership of mines, of domestic animals, people (slaves),
– disposition of the mobile tools of production, or acquired capital goods of any kind,
especially money or goods, that easily and at any time can be exchanged for money,
– ownership of products of one’s own labor or of strangers’ labor differing accord-
ing to their level of desirability, or of marketable monopolies of any kind.

All these different characteristics of ownership differentiate the class situation of the
propertied as well as the meaning that the use of property can give, especially the money
value of it. These distinctions in turn determine whether they belong, for example, to the
class of pensioners5 or the class of mercantile manufacturers.
The asset-less providers of labor are also starkly differentiated from each other,
according to the kind of services they offer, and whether they provide a continuous or
discontinuous relationship to the recipient. This is determined on a case-by-case basis.
The concept of class, however, is always organized around one common principle: it
is the kind of chances in the market that determines the common conditions of the indi-
vidual’s fate. ‘Class situation’ in this sense ultimately is ‘market situation.’
In the context of the preliminary stages of class formation the effect of naked possession
per se can be seen among the cattle breeders, where the propertyless come under the con-
trol of the cattle owners and are subjected as slaves or serfs. Only when a bank loan is given
in which the cattle are used as collateral does the naked cruelty of the law of debt emerge,
and in those communities or Gemeinschaften6 mere ‘possession’ [of property] determines
the individual’s fate for the first time. This is very much in contrast to the traditional agri-
cultural Gemeinschaft community, where one’s fate is determined only by labor.
Thus, the creditor–debtor relation first became a basis of the ‘class situations’ only with
cities, where – no matter how primitive – a credit market emerged in which interest rates
increased depending on the distress [of the debtors] and a factual monopolization of credit
which emerged through a plutocracy. From this plutocratic situation, ‘class struggles’

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140 Journal of Classical Sociology 10(2)

emerged. A lot of people whose fate is not determined by utilizing their own property or
their labor in the market – for example, slaves – are technically not a class (but a ‘Stand’).
So by this terminology classes are created by economic interests which are connected to
the existence of the market.
Nevertheless, the concept of ‘class interest’ is an ambiguous one, especially as an
empirical concept. As soon as one understands by class interest something other than the
factual direction of interests followed by a certain probability from the class situation, it
becomes less ambiguous. As a result of this ambiguity, the direction in which the indi-
vidual worker pursues his interests may vary greatly, even if the class situation and other
circumstances remain the same. This depends on whether he is well qualified for the task
at hand at a high, an average, or a low level of skill. In the same way the direction of
interest may vary according to whether or not this communal action of the Gemeinschaft
grew out of the class situation from which the individual may or may not expect promis-
ing results. This communal action can arise out of a larger or smaller portion of the work-
ers who are commonly affected by their ‘class situation’ or even by an association among
them, e.g. a trade union. The rise of a developing Gesellschaft society, rooted in a
common class situation, is by no means a universal phenomenon.
The class situation, rather, is restricted in its effect to the causes of essentially similar
reactions. This is called by this choice of terminology ‘mass actions.’ However, it may
not even necessarily have this result. Furthermore, often merely an amorphous commu-
nal-type action rooted in Gemeinschaft emerges. An example would be the grumbling of
the workers who disapprove of the work-master’s conduct, which has been described as
occuring in ancient Oriental ethics. This grumbling was probably equivalent to an
increasingly typical phenomenon of the latest industrial development, namely the ‘slow-
down.’ ‘Slow-down’ means to deliberately limit the work effort by the effect of tacit
agreement of laborers.
The degree by which a developing Gesellschaft society emerges from such mass action
by the members of the class is related to general cultural conditions, especially intellectual
conditions. It is also linked to the extent of the evolved contrasts, like, for example, the
transparency of connections between causes and consequences of the ‘class situation.’
But in fact even most different life chances do not necessarily produce ‘class action,’
according to observed experience. The relative cause and effect of the class situation has
to be distinctly recognizable [to the worker] if class action is to actually occur. For only
then can the contrast of life chances be felt by the class as not an absolute given, or fact to
be endured. Then it can be seen as resulting from either

1. the given distribution of property, or

2. the structure of the concrete economic order.

It is only then when these conditions are recognized that people can react [firstly]
against the class structure not only through acts of an intermittent and irrational protest,
but [secondly] in the form of rationalized development of society. There have been ‘class
situations’ of the first category of a specifically naked and transparent sort, in the urban
centers of Antiquity [e.g. Rome] and during the Middle Ages. Especially then, when great
fortunes were accumulated by effectively monopolized trading in industrial products of

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Waters et al. 141

these localities, or in foodstuffs. However, when agriculture was increasingly exploited

in a profit-making manner, great fortunes were also accumulated in the rural economy of
the most diverse epochs. The most important historical example of the second category
is the class situation of the modern ‘proletariat.’ So every class can be the carrier of innu-
merable forms of possible ‘class action,’ although they do not have to be. Likewise, a
class does not constitute a Gemeinschaft community. To equate the term of class with the
term Gemeinschaft or community is a warped form of reasoning.
The class members can react with a mass action. This is particularly the case when
there are shared intense feelings about a similar situation, especially an economic one.
This mass action is based on the mainstream opinion of the group. This fact is both
simple and important for understanding historical events. But this should not lead to the
pseudo-scientific usage of the term ‘class’ or ‘class interest,’ which is frequently done
nowadays, and has found its most classic assertion in the statement of a talented author,7
i.e. that the individual may be in error concerning his interests and only that the ‘class’ is
‘infallible’ about its interests.
Even though classes are not communities or Gemeinschaften communities, class situ-
ations only emerge out of communalization [of the Gemeinschaft]. However, the com-
munal action of the Gemeinschaft which emerges from class situations is based on action
between members not of the same class but of different classes. The communal action of
a Gemeinschaft [emerging from the market-based situation], for example the ones which
directly determine the class situation of the worker and the entrepreneur, are: the labor
market, the commodities market, and the capitalistic business.
The existence of a capitalistic business requires a very specific communal action by
the Gemeinschaft that protects the possession of goods, and especially the free power of
individuals to dispose of the means of production. The existence of a capitalistic business
is preconditioned by the existence of a specific kind of ‘legal order’ [which protects
ownership of property, specifies the rights of individuals to control production, and a
legal order which protects the communal Gemeinschaft actions (of the guilds and other
relevant occupational monopolies)].
Every class situation is based on the pure power of property and becomes most effec-
tive when all other determinants of reciprocal economic relations [except the free market]
lose their significance. [Such class situations emerge when the determinants rest upon
the pure power of property.] In this way by utilizing the market, property obtains its
almost sovereign importance.
The existence of Stände hinders the consequent realization of the naked market prin-
ciple. At this point the term Stand is only from this perspective of interest to us. Before
we briefly talk about the term Stand, note that there is not a lot to be said about the more
specific distinctions between ‘classes.’ The great shift from Stände to classes, which has
been going on in the past up until the present [i.e. about 1915], may be summarized in the
following way, albeit at the cost of some precision. The struggle which effects class situ-
ations has progressively shifted [away from struggles between Stände] to

1. credit for the purposes of consumption to

2. competitive struggle in the commodity market and then to
3. a price war in the labor market.

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142 Journal of Classical Sociology 10(2)

The ‘class struggles’ of Roman Antiquity, insofar as they were really class wars and
not Stände wars, started out as peasant wars. These struggles were initially between the
indebted peasants and urban creditors. A similar situation has existed among the breeders
of domestic livestock. And they were also probably between artisans threatened by debt
bondage and urban creditors. Such debt bondage is the normal result of the differentia-
tion of wealth in trade cities, especially in seaport cities, as well as among cattle breeders.
Debt relations produced class actions up to the time of Catilina.10
Furthermore the struggles over foodstuffs, especially the struggle over the provision
of bread and the price of bread, started when Rome was increasingly supplied with grains
imported from abroad. This lasted throughout Antiquity and the entire Middle Ages, and
united the propertyless poor who had no assets, against those who were actually or sup-
posedly interested in the dearth of bread. The struggles spread until they took focus on
all commodities that were essential to the conduct of life and the raw materials for the
cottage industries. But any resulting wage disputes in Antiquity and the Middle Ages
increased only slowly until modern times. In the earlier periods they were completely
secondary to rebellions of slaves, as well to struggles in the commodity market.
The propertyless people of Antiquity and the Middle Ages protested against monopo-
lies, dumping, hoarding, price-fixing, and acts designed to raise prices. Today, however,
the central point of protest is the determination of the price of labor. The transition from
the Middle Ages to modern times is characterized by the struggles for access to the free
market, and for the determination of the price of products. Such struggles took place
between merchants and workers in the ‘putting-out system’ of manufacturing during the
transition to modern times.11
As it is a general phenomenon we must mention the following: class antagonisms
which are conditioned through the market situation are usually most bitter between those
who directly participate as opponents in price wars [even though they themselves do not
necessarily personally benefit from the success of the struggle]. Thus, it is not the pen-
sioner, the share-holder, and the banker who suffer the animus of the worker, but almost
exclusively the manufacturer and the business executives who are the direct opponents
of workers in price wars. Ironically, it is precisely the cash boxes of the pensioner, the
share-holder, and the banker into which the more or less ‘unearned’ profits flow, rather
than into the pockets of the manufacturers or of the business executives.12
This simple state of affairs has very frequently been decisive for the role the class
situation has played in the formation of political parties. For example, these conditions
have made possible the patriarchal socialism and the earlier common attempts of threat-
ened ‘Stände’ to form alliances with the proletariat against the ‘bourgeoisie’.

(b) Stände
‘Stände,’ in contrast to classes, are normally communally based Gemeinschaften. However,
they are often of an amorphous sort. In contrast to ‘class situation,’ which is purely deter-
mined by the economy, we want to characterize the Stände situation as resulting from the
typical integral part of life, in which the fate of men depends on a specific positive or
negative social assessment of honor. This assessment of honor is tied to the common char-
acteristics of a ‘stereotypical’ member of the particular Stand. Such honor can also be tied

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Waters et al. 143

to a class situation [determined by the assets in the economy]: the differences between the
classes can be combined with the differences between the Stände in numerous ways.
Property as such does not always, as mentioned above,13 generate prestige in terms of
increased honor within the ‘Stand,’ but it does so with extraordinary regularity. For
example, in the subsistence economy of an organized neighborhood anywhere in the
world, the richest man frequently becomes the chief. But this equation of wealth with
‘Stand’ represents just an honorary preference.
In the so-called ‘pure’ modern democracy, where an explicitly ordered privilege of
single individuals according to their Stände does not exist, it happens that only fami-
lies who belong approximately to the same tax class dance with each other (e.g. this is
said about some small Swiss towns). But still the honor based on the ‘Stand’ does not
necessarily need to be linked to the class situation, because such honor normally
stands in stark contrast to the pretensions of ‘naked’ property. So, both propertied and
propertyless people can belong to the same ‘Stand,’ and often they do so with very
perceptible consequences, no matter how precarious this ‘social equality’ becomes in
the long run.
For example, the ‘equality’ based on the Stand of the American ‘gentleman’ and his
subordinate can be seen only in a business context. Thus, where old traditions of shared
Stand still rule outside the objective subordination determined by the different functions
in the business office, it is considered repugnant if, [in deference to the clerk’s birth-
right,] even the richest ‘boss’ did not otherwise but treat his ‘clerk’ equally in every other
sense, e.g. in the evening while playing billiards or cards in a club. The American boss
would never treat his clerk with the condescending ‘benevolence’ that marks differences
connected to ‘position.’ In contrast, such condescension is something that the German
boss can never ban from his sentiments and attitude. This in turn is one of the most
important reasons why the German ‘club culture’ has never been able to attain the attrac-
tion that the American clubs have.
As regards content, the honor of the Stand is predominantly expressed by the imposi-
tion of a specific lifestyle, [which is expressed by anyone who belongs to that social
circle,] and is imposed on anyone who wants to belong to that social circle. Linked with
this lifestyle are restrictions on the ‘social’ intercourse with other Stände, meaning inter-
actions that do not serve an economic or otherwise commercial/material purpose. These
restrictions normally confine marriages to the ‘Stand’-related social circle,14 and are
meant to lead to complete strict endogamy.
When an agreed-upon communal Gemeinschaft action of this exclusive character
exists, and not in only a merely individual case or socially irrelevant imitation of the
foreign conduct of life, then formation of the Stand is underway. This kind of Stände-
related stratification in its characteristic form is currently [in about 1915] emerging in the
United States based upon the conventional conduct of life that emerges within the con-
text of democracy. For example, only the resident of a particular street (‘the street’) is
accepted as a member of the ‘society’,15 therefore being regarded as qualified for social
interaction, and can therefore be visited and invited into each others’ homes.
The strict submission to the dress code which is in vogue in a particular American
‘society’ at a particular moment also among men (to this extent unknown to us Germans)
can be attributed to its members’ need for status. Such submission is an indicator that a

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144 Journal of Classical Sociology 10(2)

given man is claiming or pretending to possess the qualities of a ‘gentleman.’ Consequently,

this submission – at least prima facie – decides that he will be treated as such.
For instance, a man’s ability to assert membership in an emerging ‘Stand’ becomes
important concerning his chances of employment in a ‘good’ business. Above all, the
importance of such becomes clear in matters of social interaction and marriage with
‘esteemed’ families, and is comparable to the capacity to ‘give satisfaction in the conduct
of duels.’16 As for the rest: ‘Stände’-related honor is predominantly usurped by particular
families resident for a long time (and, of course, correspondingly wealthy), such as the
‘F.F.V.’ (‘first families of Virginia’), or the actual and alleged descendants of the ‘Indian
princess’ Pocahontas, or the Pilgrim Fathers, Knickerbockers, the members of almost
inaccessible sects, and various circles which set themselves apart by [wearing] badges or
displaying other distinct features. In this case, the purely conventional stratification is
essentially based on pretension or usurpation of Stand.
But such pretension or usurpation is the origin of almost all Stände-related honor.
However, the way from this purely conventional stratification to legal privilege (positive
or negative) is easily passable everywhere, as soon as a particular stratification of social
order has been factually initiated, and becomes fixed by being expressed through a spe-
cific lifestyle. Furthermore, as a result of the stabilization of the economic distribution of
power, the Stand-related honor finally achieves stability itself.
When the most extreme consequences of stratification are pressed, the Stand evolves
into a closed ‘caste.’ That means, apart from the conventions and legal guarantees, rituals
develop guaranteeing Stände-related distinctions. This is achieved by restricting any
physical contact of members of higher castes with members of castes regarded as ‘lower,’
and protects the higher caste from becoming ritually impure. If ritual impurity neverthe-
less occurs, religious rituals are used to atone for, or expiate, any impure contact.
Therefore, the individual castes partly develop distinctive cults and gods.
As a result of these consequences, the Stände-related stratifications only then lead to
the development of castes where underlying differences can be found which are held to
be ‘ethnic’. Particularly, the ‘caste’ is the normal form of Gemeinschaft communities
which are the precursors of the Gesellschaft-type societies who live along the lines of
‘ethnicity,’ and therefore believe in blood relationship, and restrict both exogamous mar-
riage and social intercourse. These aspects can be found among pariah peoples around
the world. Pariah people are Gemeinschaft communities which have acquired specific
occupational traditions of particular crafts, or other arts, and foster the belief in an ethnic
identity which underlies their community. They now live in a ‘Diaspora,’ strictly segregated
from all inevitable personal intercourse with other castes, and legally are in precarious
situations. However, owing to their economic indispensability they are tolerated, and
often have privileged positions, while living interspersed in political communities. The
Jews are the most impressive historic example.
The structure of segregation differs, depending on whether it is based on ‘Stand’
grown into ‘caste’, or based on ethnic criteria alone. The caste structure transforms the
horizontal unconnected coexistence of the ethnically segregated community into a verti-
cal system of hierarchical stratification. Expressed correctly: the comprehensive strati-
fied community rooted in caste distinction merges ethnically segregated communities,
and enables them to take specific politicized communally based Gemeinschaft action.

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Waters et al. 145

Ethnic and caste segregation also differ regarding their effects. Ethnic coexistence,
which implies mutual rejection and disdain, also permits any ethnic community to value its
personal honor as the highest. However, caste stratification is accompanied by a ‘vertical
social gradation,’ and acknowledges a socially accepted higher ‘honor’ to the benefiting
privileged castes and Stände. This is typically explained by arguing that ethnic differences
were transformed into differences of ‘function’ within a politicized Gesellschaft-like social
order (warrior, priest, and craftsmen who are politically important for war, and building
trades, and so on). Even the most despised pariah people somehow cultivate what is pecu-
liar to them, in the same manner that ethnic and ‘Stände’-related communities do. They
especially continue to cultivate the belief in their own unique ‘honor’ (as do the Jews).
However, Stände which are both despised and negatively privileged show a specific
deviation regarding the ‘sense of dignity’ [that emerges from their position relative to the
positively privileged first. But to understand this, it is necessary to focus on the position
of the privileged.] Their ‘sense of dignity’ is the subjective precipitation in social honor
and of conventional demands which a positively privileged ‘Stand’ requires for the
deportment of its members. As a result, it can be said that the positively privileged
‘Stände’ sense of dignity naturally relies not on transcending values about ‘who they
are’, but refers to their own ‘beauty and excellence.’17 Their kingdom is ‘of this world’,
and they live for the present and justify their privilege by referring to a glorious past.
Naturally the negatively privileged Stand can only draw its sense of dignity by refer-
ring to a future which lies beyond the present, and is temporal or transcendent. In other
words, this sense of dignity is nourished from the belief in a providential ‘mission,’ or a
specific honor before God as the ‘chosen people.’ Therefore, the idea arises that ‘the last
will be the first’ beyond this life, or that in the present life a messiah will arrive who will
shine a light upon the honor of the pariah people (Jews) or ‘Stand,’ which has before been
concealed from the world. These simple facts are the source of a pariah ‘Stand’’s charac-
ter of religiosity. The significance of this religiosity should not be discussed in the con-
text of ‘resentment,’ which is strongly emphasized in Nietzsche’s much admired
construction (in the Genealogy of Morals).18 Moreover, this focus on the resentment
emerging out of religiosity does not at all work well given Nietzsche’s main example of
Buddhism; after all in the case of Buddhism, there are simply no people of pariah status
who have this character trait or ‘resentment’ in their religiosity.
This is to say that the ethnic origin of Stände formation is by no means a normal
phenomenon. On the contrary, since objective ‘racial differences’ are not based on every
subjective ‘ethnic’ mutual feeling, a racialized justification for ‘Stände’-related stratifi-
cation is ultimately tested with concrete individual cases. Quite frequently, the ‘Stand’
itself creates ‘pure-breds’ [or stereotypes] which are an anthropological type. The Stand
functions in a highly exclusive manner and is based on a selection of individuals who are
personally qualified for membership (e.g. the Knighthood), based on their martial, phys-
ical, and psychological eligibility.
However, simple personal characteristics for selection are far from being the only
or predominant way of creating Stände, particularly today. Political affiliation or class
sitatuion are instrumental as well, and eventually class situations become the dominant
reason for eligibility for selection to a Stand. The possibility of a Stände-related conduct
of life naturally tends to be conditioned economically.

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146 Journal of Classical Sociology 10(2)

So, from a practical point of view, the stratification by Stände goes hand in hand
with a monopolization of ideal and material goods or opportunities, in a manner which
we have come to know as typical. Besides the specific honor of Stand, which always
bases itself upon distance and exclusiveness, there are all sorts of material monopolies.
Honorific preferences may be the privilege to wear special costumes or to eat special
dishes which are a taboo to others. Honorific preferences can also consist of the privi-
lege of carrying arms, which is most obvious for others in its consequences [i.e. as an
obvious expression of authority and power], and of having the right to exert certain non-
professional dilettante artistic practices (e.g. to play certain musical instruments).
Material monopolies beside the honor of Stand have naturally provided the most effec-
tive motives for the exclusiveness of a Stand. In themselves these monopolies are
rarely sufficient, but almost always they are the most potent motive for keeping the
Stand exclusive.
With respect to the connubial interests of the Stand, there are two interests which are
of equal importance and reciprocally parallel. These are (1) the interest of the families in
the monopolization of daughters, and (2) the interest of the families in the monopoliza-
tion of the potential bridegrooms who could provide for their daughters.
With an increased rigidification of a Stand membership, the conventional preferred
opportunities for special employments grow into a legal monopoly of special offices for
the Stände members. Certain goods become objects for monopolization by the Stand as
well. In their typical form everywhere, these included ‘knightly estates,’ as well as pos-
session of serfs or bondsmen. Finally specific trades become objects for monopolization
by the Stände [as guilds]. This monopolization has a positive character when the con-
cerned Stand is exclusively entitled to own and manage their rights and privileges. It has
a negative character when the Stand does not own and manage the rights needed to main-
tain its specific way of life. [That is, negatively privileged Stände only react to the rights
and privileges ascribed to them by the more powerful Stände.]
The decisive role that the ‘style of life’ has for the honor of the Stand implies that the
members of the Stand alone are the specific bearers of all conventions. All lifestyles – in
whatever way they may manifest themselves – either arise from the Stand or at least are
preserved by it. Despite the fact that the conventions of the Stände differ greatly, they
show certain typical features, especially among those strata that are from more highly
privileged levels.
Typically the privileged Stände are connected to the avoidance of common physical
labor. This disqualification is even beginning in America, despite older contrary tradi-
tions which esteemed physical labor highly. Every rational economic pursuit and espe-
cially ‘mercantile activity’ is very frequently considered as disqualifying you as a
member of the Stand and is considered to be dishonorable work. Furthermore this applies
to artistic activity that is regarded as degrading work as soon as it is exploited for income.
In particular, artistic activity passes as most degrading when it is connected with hard
physical exertion/effort. An example is the sculptor working like a mason in his dusty
smock. The contrary example is the painter in his salon-like ‘studio,’ and those forms of
musical practice that are accepted by the Stand.
The frequent disqualification of the gainfully employed [membership in privileged
Stand] is a direct result of the principle of social order within the Stand. Furthermore it

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Waters et al. 147

is also a result of its opposition to the principle that power is regulated exclusively
through the economic market. There are other individual reasons alongside these two
main ones. Those will be given further along. We have seen above that the market and its
economic processes do not know ‘personal reputation’; only business-like ‘functional’
interests that dominate the market.
The market knows no ‘honor’ or ‘prestige,’ but the reverse is true for the Stand.
Stratification and privileges in terms of honor and of lifestyles are inherent to each Stand
and as such it is threatened to its very roots by the market.
Mere economic acquisition and naked economic power that still bear the stigma from
their origin outside the Stand could bestow the same honor to anyone who is interested
in Stände by virtue of lifestyle. This especially holds true when property is added to the
same honor through Stände. It would even be possible for the added honor created
through economic acquisition to bring greater honor to the members of the Stand than
they could establish through their lifestyle.
Yet if simple economic acquisition and power by themselves gave any honor at all, the
wealth would result in the agent attaining more honor than those who successfully claim
honor simply by virtue of lifestyle. In this context, all groups interested in the Stände
order react with special sharpness against the pretensions of purely economic acquisition
because, again, it threatens the Stand at its roots. In most cases they react more vigor-
ously the more they themselves feel threatened.
Calderon’s19 respectful treatment of the peasant, for instance, as opposed to Shakespeare’s
simultaneous and ostensible disdain of the ‘riff-raff,’20 illustrates the different ways in
which a firmly and established and secure Stände order reacts compared with a Stände
order that has become economically precarious. This is an example of a state of affairs
which re-occurs everywhere.
The privileged Stände groups never accept the ‘newly arrived neophyte’ personally
and unreservedly, even if he has adapted without reservation his lifestyle to theirs. The
privileged Stände groups only accept their descendants who were raised [from birth] in
the conventions of their Stände group, and who never compromised their honor by par-
ticipating in economic labor.
Accordingly and predictably there is only one way the Stände stratification works: it
restrains the free development of the market. First, the development of the market is hin-
dered by the goods the Stände withdraw directly from free exchange through monopoli-
zation. This can be done by a law or a conventional means of monopolization. Examples
are the inherited estates in many Hellenistic towns during the specific epoch of these
Stände, and originally also in Rome (as the law for incapacitation for debtors shows). It
also happened where the inherited estates were monopolized first as well as the estates of
knights, farmers, monasteries, and especially the clientele of the trade-business and mer-
chant guilds.
So the Stände restrict the free market, and the power of naked property per se is pushed
back, giving future class formation a distinctive stamp. The results of this process vary. Of
course, they do not necessarily soften the contrasts in the economic situation; indeed often
it is quite the opposite. In any case, one cannot speak of an actually free market competi-
tion as we know it today wherever the Stände organization permeates a community as
strongly as they did in all political communities of Antiquity and the Middle Ages.

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148 Journal of Classical Sociology 10(2)

But even more far-reaching than the direct exclusion of certain goods from the market
are the conflicting relationship between Stände and the economic order. From this con-
flicting relationship it follows that in most instances the notion of honor peculiar to the
Stand absolutely abhors the haggling which is essential to the market. In particular, honor
abhors haggling between members of the same Stand, and also haggling is taboo for
members of Stände in general. Therefore there are Stände everywhere, usually the most
influential, for which any straightforward participation in acquisition through market
activity is per se stigmatized.
So with some oversimplification one can summarize:
‘Classes’ are stratified according to the relations to production and acquisition of goods,
‘Stände’ are stratified according to the principles of their consumption of goods as repre-
sented by specific ‘ lifestyles’.
Also, each occupation is a Stand. This kind of Stand normally assumes the social
‘honor’ by virtue of a specific ‘lifestyle,’ which is established by the occupation.. Classes
and Stände are different but at the same time they blend and certainly often overlap.
Especially those Stände communities who are strictly segregated in terms of ‘honor,’ like
the Indian castes, show today a relatively high degree of indifference to pecuniary
income, although within very rigid limits. However, the Brahmins seek such income by
many different means [besides activity within the marketplaces].
So only a general statement can be made regarding the basic economic conditions for
the predominant structuring emergence of Stände stratification.. This general statement
is about a relatively stable base for the acquisition and distribution of goods needed for
Stände stratification to be favored. Destabilization by technical and economic change,
and upheaval, however, can threaten the Stand stratification by pushing the ‘class situa-
tion’ into the foreground.
Eras and countries in which the naked class situation is of predominant significance
are normally the periods of technological and economic transformations; whereas every
slowing down of an economic shifting process in a short time leads to the awakening of
the Stand culture. As a result, the significance of social ‘honor’ is re-established.

(c) Parties
The genuine home of ‘classes’ is within the ‘economic order,’ and the genuine home of
the Stände is within the ‘social order,’ that is, within the sphere of the distribution of
‘prestige and honor.’ From within these spheres, ‘classes’ and ‘Stände’ mutually influence
one another as the legal order that, in turn, influences them as well. The ‘parties,’ however,
are primarily at home within the sphere of ‘power.’
Party actions are oriented towards attaining social ‘power,’ which means that they are
directed towards influencing communal action by the Gemeinschaft, regardless of its
content. In principle, parties can exist as a sociable ‘club’ as well as in a ‘state.’ But the
party-like communal action of the Gemeinschaft of parties always contains an element of
rationally focused Gesellschaft social action as well,21 in contrast to classes and Stände,
where this element is not vital. However, with the communal Gemeinschaft action of
‘classes’ and ‘Stände’ by themselves, this is not necessarily the case. This is because the
communal action of ‘parties’ is always directed towards a tactically chosen goal [as

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Waters et al. 149

opposed to simply the maintenance of an ongoing relationship]. This goal can be ‘fac-
tual,’ like the implementation of a program to reach an ideal. Or the goal can be personal,
for example sinecures, power, and honors for the leaders and the followers of the party.
In general, the Gemeinschaft-rooted communal action of ‘parties’ aims at all these goals
simultaneously. Parties are, therefore, only possible within communities that are developed
along the priniciples of Gesellschaft, that is, the societies have some kind of a rational
order and an apparatus of persons available who are ready to enforce the rational order.
The goal of the party is to influence this apparatus and, if possible, form the apparatus
itself out of party followers [and the exclusion of competitors].
In individual cases, parties can represent interests determined by ‘class situations’ or
the situation of the ‘Stände,’ and thus recruit their followers accordingly. But they neither
have to be pure ‘class’ parties nor pure ‘Stände- related parties; and mostly it is only
partly the case, and often not at all.
Parties show ephemeral or enduring structures, and the parties’ means of attaining
power can be quite diverse. They may range from naked violence of any kind, to cam-
paigning for votes with coarse or subtle means using money, social influence, power of
speech, leading questions, suggestion, and crude hoaxes, to the point of rougher or more
elaborate tactics of obstruction within parliamentary bodies.
The sociological structure of parties has to differ in a basic way, depending on the
kind of communal action generated in the Gemeinschaft, which they seek to influence,
and depending on whether or not the [political] community is stratified by Stände or by
classes. But above all, parties differ depending on the structure of rule within the
Gemeinschaft community, because it is the conquest of this dominion that the party leaders
normally strive for.
However, in a general sense the parties as described here are not only the products of
specific modern forms of rule. The ancient and medieval parties we also can designate as
parties, despite the fact that their structure differs substantially from that of modern par-
ties. Therefore, it is impossible to say anything about the structure of parties without
discussing the structural forms of social domination per se. This is because parties are
bodies which always struggle for dominion and they are very frequently organized in a
very strict ‘authoritarian’ fashion. In order to understand parties, we need to discuss this
central social phenomenon: the structures of social domination.

III. Conclusion
But before we discuss social domination, one more general thing must be said about the
general nature of ‘classes’, Stände, and ‘parties.’ All three need a comprehensive devel-
opment of the rationalized Gesellschaft as a prerequisite, and this only occurs if there is
already a pre-existing political framework for communal Gemeinschaft action on which
to operate. This does not mean that parties themselves are bound to the limits of any
individual political community. On the contrary, at all times the process of becoming a
rational Gesellschaft-based society has commonly reached beyond the frontiers and
boundaries of political communities, even when it aims at the common use of military
force. This has been the case with the solidarity of interests between the oligarchs and the
democrats in Ancient Greece, between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines22 in the Middle

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150 Journal of Classical Sociology 10(2)

Ages, and within the Calvinist party23 during the period of the religious struggle. It has
been the case up to the solidarity of the landlords (the international congress of agrarian
landlords24), and has continued among princes (the Holy Alliance of 1815,25 the Karlsbad
Decrees of 181926), socialist workers, and conservatives (the longing of the Prussian
conservatives for Russian intervention in the 1850s27).
But the aim of the parties is not necessarily the establishment of a new international
or political unit, i.e. territorial rule; rather, the party aims mostly to influence the already
pre-existing political units.

Notes
The essay was translated (from Weber, 1921/1956/1980) at Zeppelin University in Friedrich-
shafen, Germany, in spring 2008 by Dagmar Waters, Tony Waters, Elisabeth Hahnke, Maren
Lippke, Eva Ludwig-Glück, Daniel Mai, Nina Ritzi-Messner, and Christina Veldhoen. Dagmar
Waters, Tony Waters, and Lucas Fassnacht did the final translations and editing in summer
2008 in Auburn, California.

  1. The German ‘Stand’ (plural ‘Stände’) is perhaps best translated as the French word ‘estate,’
as it refers to feudal divisions within society, including those which are both professional,
ethnic, and relational. Unfortunately the word ‘estate’ in English has a wide range of other
meanings as well and we think this translation obfuscates Weber’s original meaning. Previous
translators have compromised by translating the word ‘Stand’ variously as ‘status’ or ‘estate’
depending on the context. However, the translation of ‘Stand’ into ‘status’ is also imprecise.
First, German has the same word ‘Status,’ and Weber did not use it. We suspect he did not use
it because its meaning is lacking the historical content of ‘Stand.’ Because of this ambiguity
in meaning, as well as the fact that precision in this term is so important for this essay, we
have elected to use the German term throughout this translation. For other discussions of
these issues, see Weber (1978 [1968]: 305–306) and Waters and Waters (2010). ‘Stand’
reflects a style of life, and an assumption about the rights that go with this status.
  2. In the original German text it says ‘Gemeinschaft.’ Some translations use the translation
‘group’ instead of ‘community.’
  3. Weber’s ‘soziale Ehre’ is translated variously as ‘prestige,’ ‘honor,’ and ‘reputation.’
  4. ‘Class situations’ is introduced here as the German word ‘Klassenlage,’ which is in parenthe-
ses. It is our belief that Weber intended this to mean that the term was in effect defined by the
three conditions above. Gerth and Mills insert the following definition into their text, which
comes from elsewhere in Weber’s writings:

These points refer to ‘class situation,’ which we may express more briefly as the typical
chance for a supply of goods, external living conditions, and personal life experiences, in so
far as this chance is determined by the amount and kind of power, or lack of such, to dispose
of goods or skills for the sake of income in a given economic order. The term ‘class’ refers
to any group of people that is found in the same class situation.
(Weber, 1946: 181)

  5. By ‘pensioner’ Weber apparently means the class of elderly business people and government/
court officials who do not live off of the daily proceeds of a business they started when

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Waters et al. 151

younger, and accept a ‘pension’ from the new owners. He is probably not referring to pension-
ers funded by modern government-backed payroll taxes.
  6. Communal action, that is, by that of the Gemeinschaft (plural Gemeinschaften), refers to that
action which is oriented by an emotional feeling of the actors that they belong together.
Societal (Gesellschaft) action, on the other hand, is oriented to a rationally motivated adjust-
ment of interests.
  7. The ‘talented author’ Weber refers to is variously believed to be Karl Marx or Gyorgi Lukács
  8. Lucius Sergius Catilina (108 bc–62 bc) was a Roman politician of the first century bc who
is best known for the Catiline conspiracy. In his attempt to capture control of the Roman
Senate, he sought to have debts cancelled at a time when the price of bread was rising rap-
idly in the city of Rome due to fighting in the Italian countryside, which led to the devasta-
tion of farm areas, shortage of money, and the activities of pirates. The debt forgiveness
policy promoted by Catilina was favored by the urban poor, as well as the wealthy who had
lived on borrowed money.
  9. The putting-out system of manufacture involves merchants who provide raw materials such
as yarn to home-bound workers on credit. The manufacturer then purchases the finished prod-
uct, e.g. woven cloth, back from the workers as a finished good, paying them a piece rate for
their labor. This, as Weber implies, is a primitive form of capitalism.
10. Weber’s point here is that the business executives are the visible face of the class struggle
for the worker, even thought they too are on salary, and do not realize the benefits of
increased profits.
11. See paragraph 3 of the Introduction, and the references to ‘the American boss’ and ‘stereo-
typical large-scale speculator.’
12. Weber uses the Latin term ‘Konnubium’ here, using a historic legal terminology for a mar-
riage, which is legitimatized by socially accepted, common, but also official laws.
13. In developing this example, Weber actually uses both German and English. Presumably this
is to reflect the uniqueness of the American example. Terms in which Weber writes in English
include ‘the street,’ ‘society,’ and ‘gentleman’.
14. During the German emperor’s days, a person was ‘satisfaktionsfähig’ (capable of giving sat-
isfaction) when he was officially eligible to carry a weapon, thus being able to solve issues by
fighting a duel. People from lesser ‘Stände’ were not permitted to carry weapons, and there-
fore did not share the status necessary to satisfy questions of honor through dueling, much
less marry with the higher Stand.
15. At this point, Weber emphasizes the classical origins of such concepts of beauty and excel-
lence by inserting the Greek words Kallia and Agathia. Kalokagathia is a concept that denoted
the successful integration of moral, artistic, intellectual, and physical creativity and excel-
lence. The term is used in the Socratic dialogues by Plato, The Symposium and The Apology
of Socrates. See, e.g., The Apology of Socrates, para. 20a (chap. 4) and 21d (chap. 7), and The
Symposium, para. 222a.
16. According to Nietzsche:

You will have already guessed how easily the priestly way of evaluating can split from the
knightly-aristocratic and then continue to develop into its opposite. Such a development
receives a special stimulus every time the priestly caste and the warrior caste confront each
other jealously and are not willing to agree amongst themselves about the winner. …

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152 Journal of Classical Sociology 10(2)

As is well known, priests are the most evil of enemies – but why? Because they are the most
powerless. From their powerlessness, their hate grows among them into something immense
and terrifying, to the most spiritual and most poisonous manifestations. … Human history
would be a really stupid affair without that spirit which entered it from the powerless.
(Nietzsche, 2009 [1887]: essay 1, sec. 7)

17. Pedro Calderón de la Barca (1600–1681) was an important Spanish playwright and dramatist.
18. See, for example, where in The Taming of the Shrew (IV.1.13) Shakespeare (1564–1616) uses
the word ‘peasant’ as an insult.
19. The German word used here is ‘Vergesellschaftung.’ It refers to a rationally motivated adjust-
ment of interests based on self-interest, market exchange, etc. It is associative in nature, not
communal. For definitions of ‘associative and communal relationships,’ see Weber (1978
[1968]: 40–41) and Waters and Waters (2010).
20. The Guelphs and Ghibellines were political groups from southern Germany who fought in
northern Italy during the twelfth and thirteenth century. They were loyal to the Pope in Rome,
and the Holy Roman Emperor in Vienna, respectively. Guelphs tended to come from trading
families while the Ghibellines came from the landed aristocracy
21. This is apparently a reference to the many Calvinist movements which began in sixteenth-
century Geneva and spread to many countries of Europe and North America, where a number
acquired political power.
22. This is an apparent reference to the associations of landlords which became political forces in
Prussia, and later Germany, in the nineteenth century. Weber is not specific about which
agrarian congresses he is referring to.
23. The alliance between Prussia, Russia, and Austria-Hungary at the end of the Napoleonic Wars.
24. The Karlsbad Decrees of 1819 were issued by a group of German princes, and meant to
restrict the press, universities, and other liberal institutions which could potentially challenge
their power.
25. Prussian conservatives sought assistance from the Russian Tsar following the German
Revolution of 1848.

References
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York: Oxford University Press, 180–195.
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Berkeley: University of California Press.
Weber M (1921/1956/1980) Machtverteilung innerhalb der Gemeinschaft: Klassen, Stände,
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