ABSTRACT
The essential tension and conflict of modern life may be characterized as one between an ethic of impersonal relations and one of personal relations. Ferdinand Toennies associated
the former with Gesellschaft (society) and the latter with Gemeinschaft (community). He
explicitly linked gender with society; Gemeinschaft is associated with a feminine
maternal world, Gesellschaft with a masculine world. Mitzman reports that in the earlier
part of Weber’s life, he, Weber, had viewed Gemeinschaft in terms of patriarchy
conceived of as the arbitrary power of the patriarchal overlord. Weber’s “realism”
prevented him from romanticizing traditional society. Mitzman sees Weber as later
reconceiving Gemeinschaft as society based on the bonds of brotherhood (Mitzman,
1971, p. 303), softening somewhat his (Weber’s) initial distaste for traditional society.
