Max Weber now presents his own classification of the four ideal types of social action. The first one is called [FOREIGN] which can be translated as goal-rational or means, ends, rational. This is social action that is motivated by the desire to reach in the most efficient way, an end result that can also be defended with rational arguments. In a calculating systematic way, the means are selected that will lead to that goal. However much you would like to achieve that goal, you should at all times keep your emotions under control because they may lead you away from where you want to go. Always keep a cool head. That could be the motto of the engineer who designs a bridge, or the general at the eve of a battle studying his maps. The second ideal typical category consists of social action that seems to be irrational because it is directed at a value that can not be motivated in rational terms. This is what labor calls [FOREIGN] or value-rational social action. In order to achieve that value, the individual may be just as rational as the personal displaying goal rational social action. Most people are not saints or military heroes. And for them, it may be hard to understand. But if you sincerely strive for personal salvation, then you might choose the aesthetic lifestyle of the hermit. Or if you really want to defend your military honor, you may rationally choose a social action that inescapably will result in you losing your life. Those actions can be understood in rational terms. But only if you accept, without a rational argument, the value that they are oriented at. Number three is called affective social action, and it is motivated by the emotional state of the actor. When somebody is overcome with anger, he may react in a certain way that maybe he regrets afterwards. But, that was the only possibility at that very moment. Weber mentions a furious parent that beats a child purely out of anger. Maybe a better example that you will not fined in Weber is a soccer player biting a member of the opposite team. He knows very well that he will be severely punished, that his team will receive bad publicity plus a financial penalty. That his social action may dramatically influence their position in the competition. And still, he cannot stop himself from sinking his teeth in the neck of his fellow soccer player. That is affective social action driven by emotion. And then, there is traditional social action. When you ask somebody why they do the things the way they do them? The answer will be, that's the way we do this. In our community, we always did it this way. Our ancestors always did it this way. We have been raised to do it this way. Again, an example that you will not find in Weber but that I think helps you to understand what it means, is eating with a fork and a knife. There may be hygienic advantages and rational reasons, but you can experience the weight of tradition if you just try to do it, to eat your evening dinner. Just for once, as an experiment, with your bare hand. Those are the four ideal types of rational action. And one more time, those categories are ideal types, so you will never encounter them in the real world out there, in their pure state. What you will find is a mixture, or at least a slightly contaminated case. The four types in their pristine form only exist in the world of ideas. But, we can observe all kinds of phenomena that more or less approached, more or less come close to the types that Weber has constructed. Now, Max Weber is convinced that the first type, goal-rationality, is gaining territory in modernity. More and more, social action in modern Western societies can be characterized as goal-rational. And we also witness the gradual Marginalization of value-rational, affective and traditional social action. Those types can still be found. But, you have to search for them in the periphery. They are pushed into the margin. Now, the kernel of Weber's sociological theory of modernity boils down to this. In modern Western societies, the realm of goal-rational social action is constantly increasing at the expense of the realms of the other three types of social action. All the other aspects of modernity that we will discuss from here, are nothing but the consequences of this central development.
