ABSTRACT
Norman Birnbaum, himself an American-born sociologist, has spent much of his career attempting to bring the power of European social theory to bear on the substance of an American experience that he feels has progressed without the tools equal to its understanding. Having been led to European social theory out of dissatisfaction with the North American conceptual climate, Birnbaum’s exposure to the dogmatic Marxism of Stalinist Russia and the satellite nations of Eastern Europe imposed upon him the necessity of a more subtle, multifaceted appreciation of Marx’s work. The confrontation of Marxism with Weber’s thesis on the role of Protestantism in the emergence of a capitalist economy in Europe represents Birnbaum’s effort to retain a sense of total social structure provided by Marx, while recognizing the manifest presence of religious motivations in the early history of capitalism.
