ABSTRACT
Max Weber is an elusive classic author, competing traditions claiming his legacy. The interpretation of a classic should take into account formative experiences, context and belonging to a longer tradition. Weber is a scholar of secularized rational modernity, although with a certain ambiguity (the “iron cage”). He is a re-newer of historicism, to become transparent, and a methodological individualist. He contributes to German nation-building, of which historicism is a part. His youthful experiences in jurisprudence color his views of explanation. Weber is moss-grown in the sense that he overestimates the role of the state as a necessary unit of analysis. He is also ethnocentric, taking the imperialistic dominance of the European great powers for granted. He tends to identify Germany’s calling as a cultural one, between Western civilization and Russian barbarism. Weber’s political calling is never fulfilled, and he dies in 1920, disappointed with the outcome of war and peace.
