Rationalization in Weber and Habermas: A Comparative Perspective on a Macrosociological Concept

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Rationalization in Weber and Habermas: A Comparative Perspective on a Macrosociological Concept

This paper overviews the macrosociology of Weber and Habermas by focusing on the ways they conceptualized rationalization. The first section of the paper discusses Weber’s classification for different types of rationality and emphasizes Weber’s criticism of formal rationality. This section outlines how Weber described the Janus-faced character of rationalization, which does bring systematization to society, and may result in the obliteration of the human dimension within systematic concerns. The second section of the paper focuses on Habermas’s reinterpretation of the notion of rationalization. It includes the rationalization and scientization of politics, the rationalization-colonization distinction of the lifeworld, and the rationalization of politics as deliberation process and law. The paper argues that the double character of rationalization can be referred to as the dialectic of rationalization. 

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