Abstract

Analysing two quite rarely considered Max Weber’s essays on social inquiry and on the problems of social psychology the Author places them within the coordinates of weberian historical research about ethics and the spirit of capitalism. These two essays of 1908-09 anticipate many of the principal themes emerging in the successive methodological and political writings of Max Weber. At first Weber discusses the bias between qualitative and quantitative sociological research in or-der to determinate the role of subjective motivations inside the objective conditions of capitalist domination. The analysis of the relationship between entrepreneur and workers becomes conse-quently an important pointer to understand in which way Weber concretely intends the social re-lationship and the sources of power and authority. The weberian reconstruction of social life in the factory meets in fact the possibility of the interruption of the association based on a disci-plined obedience. As registered by Weber in the two categories of Macht and Herrschaft in this situation changes the perception to be submitted to an anonymous power and emerges the pres-ence of a personal domination