Max Weber (21 April 1864-14 June 1920) was a German sociologist and philosopher who, along with Karl Marx and Emile Durkheim, founded sociology.
Biography[]
Max Weber was born on 21 April 1864 in Erfurt, Saxony, Prussia, the son of a prominent civil servant. His father's salon welcomed several philosophers, shaping the young Weber's life. Weber worked as a junior lawyer after graduating from the University of Berlin, and he joined the university's faculty. Weber was active in opposing the influx of Polish workers into the German Empire's cities, and he supported Germanization efforts in Poland. Weber argued the capitalism was motivated by Protestantism in his book, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, published in 1904-05. Weber's examination of religions and economics would lead to the formation of the "Frankfurt School", and he founded the German Democratic Party in 1918. He helped in the formation of the Weimar Republic, and he died of pneumonia in 1920 at the age of 56.