Das Collagenwerk

Zur so genannten »Rechtssoziologie« Max Webers

Abstract

The history of the reception of Max Weber’s so called »Legal Sociology« is concealed and complicated. One reason for this lies in the polished impression given to the text by its posthumous publishers Marianne Weber and Melchior Palyi as well as Johannes Winckelmann. The interruptions and cancellations in the original notes, the varying ideas for the composition of the pieces, the swelling appendices and the various inner fragments have been underpinned that way. It is only by an archaeology of the text all these could be reconstructed.
It is possible to distinguish different levels of texts each belonging to a specific scheme of composition: for example the »Epochs of the Development of the actual Situation« of Law and Economics (manuscript-scheme 1910), on the other hand »Conditions for the Development of Law«, Weber’s wording in the script-scheme of 1914 for the so-called »Legal Sociology«.
One can thereby see that the variety of interpretations that followed the publication of »Legal Sociology« of Max Weber – spanning the universal history of law, the paradigm of western rationalization, a comparative cultural sociology of law and the assumed shortcomings of a pure legal sociology – is in no way the fruit of speculations but lies within the work itself. In the end the question of the unity of this work arises. It may be answered by the normative idea of formal and rational law.