Book Description

The social role of intellectuals was a pervasive motif in Max Weber's thought, particularly in his works on religion and politics. In his study of world religions, Weber asked such questions as: What is the relation of ideas to social reality? Do the carriers of new ideas create them independently or do they reflect class or other stratum bound traditions? Comprehensively examining and extending Weber's work on the subject, Ahmad Sadri provides a new perspective on intellectuals and the intelligentsia and their respective roles in society. He also provides a synthetic typology of intellectuals which spans both Eastern and Western traditions. Sadri provides a provocative and convincing defense of an heuristic approach to theory as well. The work is further augmented with five appendices discussing such issues as: Weber on the "Positivist-Intuitionist" controversy; Winch, Schutz, and Oakes on the verification of ideal types; Weber and Islam; ideologies and counter-ideologies of intellectuals; and methodology and epistemology. Many attempts have been made by scholars to explain the roles and functions of intellectuals and intelligentsia, each remaining embedded in their commitments to various ideologies. In this work, Sadri synthesizes a review of writers from Europe, as well as Russia and the United States. He also presents a paradigm that focuses on the characteristics that distinguish intellectuals from the intelligentsia.