Max Weber’s Complete Writings on Academic and Political Vocations

Weber made many significant interpretations of both academic and political vocations in his two lectures on Science as a Vocation ( Wissenschaft als Beruf , 1917) and Politics as a Vocation ( Politik als Beruf , 1919), as well as in a series of newspaper articles written between 1908 and 1920. Since these writings are of more than historical interest, there was a need to bring them all together in a single volume.

In the introduction, Prof. Dreijmanis relates the academic and political vocations to each other conceptually, showing that there is considerable overlap and some convergence: the need for passion, an "inward calling," as well as career insecurity in both vocations.

Dreijmanis then examines the person of Weber and provides a new view of him, in part through the lens of Carl G. Jung's theory of psychological types as further developed by the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). As an extravert with a powerful thinking function and intellect, he was driven to take an interest in events outside himself and to speak his mind. The introduction does not retrace Weber's intellectual development but addresses a psychological factor which has remained unmentioned and which provides an explanation for why Weber reacted quickly to significant academic and political developments and became involved in some of them.

The new translations, by Gordon C. Wells, are faithful to Weber's style of expression and correct an accumulation of errors in the oft-translated essays on Politics and Science.