rking class. For Marx the means to human freedom is a real consciousness that manifests itself in revolution.
Whereas Marx argues that real human relations determine both history and consciousness, Weber suggests that beliefs and ideals determine history, and that capitalist acquisition is a "spirit" or an "irrational impulse" (Weber 17). what is peculiar to Western capitalism, writes Weber, is its "peculiar rationalism," which lends itself to spiritual matters (Weber 26). This rationalism appears in the behavioral codification of the rigid Work Ethic. Conduct, believes Weber, always exists at the "economic level," but it is the "magical and religious forces" (forces that exist outside of the material world, like superstition or faith) that are the "most important formative influences on conduct" (Weber 27). Thus while Marx locates the influence of conduct purely in material relations, Weber suggests that values, particularly religious values, determine material relations.
Consciousness as it manifests itself in the material world, is, for Weber, religi
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