AUXILIARY THEORIES TO WEBER'S PROTESTANT ETHIC

Historical analysis, including Weber's thesis, offers rich clues to the complexity and variety of relations existing between Protestant religious institutions and economic institutions. Several of the relationships between Protestantism and Western economic institutions are outlined. These relationships are mediated through Protestant historical traditions left unexplained by Weber's emphasis upon the religious doctrines of predestination (election) and the calling. Protestant views on (a) Education, (b) its own Minority Status, (c) Liberty and Freedom, and (d) Social Reform, suggest hypotheses to analyze when studying American Protestantism. The validity of interpretations of present-day Protestant life hold only if the methods of collecting data permit alternative properties to exhibit themselves.