Thus neo-Marxism emerged as an attempt to elucidate the puzzle of why ethnic bonds have proved to be a more compelling basis of group solidarity than class, as predicted by Marx. Similarly neo-functionalism was born out of the effort to account for Durkheim’s hasty judgement that ethnic group attachments will decline under the grindstone of Reason, Enlightenment and Modernity. The neo-Weberian project is very different in this respect. Instead of repairing explanatory deficiencies neo-Weberianism is more of an extension than a reformulation or modern adaptation of Weber’s ideas. Since Weber’s analysis of and arguments on ethnic relations remain highly edifying and applicable in their original form even today, there is very little theoretical intervention or any serious attempts at their re-articulation for present-day social conditions.
This is not to say that there are no criticisms of Weber’s theory of ethnic relations – as with any sociological account this one is also the object of stern critique from Marxist, functionalist and other positions – but that such critique is for the most part external, that is, outside the Weberian framework of analysis. Unlike most other contemporary sociological theories of ethnicity, neoWeberianism is more geared towards supplementing than modifying Weber’s original position. However, being grounded in such secure footsteps does not mean that one is immune to analytical flaws. Although the neo-Weberian theory of ethnicity is extremely productive and pertinent in explaining the dynamics of ethnic group relations, it is also beset with omissions and problems that need to be addressed more thoroughly. Since neoWeberian arguments have developed as a creative articulation of ethnicity, any criticism of these arguments is quite often simultaneously a challenge for Weber’s original stance.
Weber was probably the only classic of sociology who successfully attempted to integrate macro and micro levels of social life, by simultaneously focusing on the individual motives of social action on the one hand, and by pursuing analyses of large-scale phenomena such as his comparative study of world religions or the origins and forms of capitalism on the other. However his theory of ethnicity seems to be, for the most part, unconnected or only sporadically related to his main macro concepts such as domination, legitimacy, charismatic authority or bureaucracy. Although Weber makes a rather patchy link between ethnic groups and nations and states in a very short section of Economy and Society, there is no theory of (ethno-)nationalism or ethnic group mobilization here. Weber’s model of ethnic relations remains a profoundly micro-centred affair. This has led directly to the situation where contemporary neo-Weberianism has fragmented into two distinct and mutually almost incomprehensible approaches; the micro sociology of ethnicity epitomized by the works of Rex and Parkin, and the macro sociology of ethnic relations represented in the writings of Collins and Mann.
The main problem with these positions is that they almost exclusively concentrate on one level of social life, giving the explanatory primacy to one group of factors at the expense of others in their interpretation of ethnic relations.Thus, while Collins and Mann provide a wide, historically sensitive analysis of ethnicity that identifies geopolitics and the logic of the State as the master keys of explanation, and thus neglecting the micro foundations of individual and group action, Rex and Parkin offer micro-centred and largely ahistoric analyses that are mainly preoccupied with individual and group motives behind the use of mechanisms of monopolistic social closure.
Key Lessons of the Rules of Apology in Persia
