Subjectivism and Economic Analysis: Essays in memory of Ludwig ...

SUBJECTIVISM AND IDEAL TYPESOn the structure and functions of ideal types, see further Weber(1978:6, 9, 20; 1949:50–113).11 Lachmann is plainly wrong when he asserts that hypotheses orempirical generalisations cannot be tested in the social sciences becauseit is impossible to specify knowledge. Cf. the following characteristicstricture:The scientist who proposes an experiment to test his hypothesismust pay close attention to specifying the conditions in whichthe experiment is to take place. But in the case of human action,even were we to grant the existence of ‘universal laws’, it isimpossible to specify such an initial situation for the simplereason that it is impossible to specify knowledge. Evidently theknowledge of the actor is an important element of his action.Were we to test hypotheses concerning action, the canon ofscientific method would require us to describe in detail all theknowledge possessed by the actors—an evident impossibility.We see thus that while ‘description of the initial situation’ is afairly innocuous requirement in nature, where all we have to dois enumerate objects in time and space, for human action thisrequirement cannot be met because we should have to includesomething unspecifiable—knowledge! A human situationwithout specific knowledge makes no sense. It follows that the‘scientific method’ of the natural sciences will be of little use tothe student of action because he is unable to use the testingprocedure this method prescribes.(Lachmann 1971:35–6)12 Weber (1913) distinguishes between subjectively rational andobjectively rational ideal types (the latter he calls Richtigkeits-Typen)in ‘Über einige Kategorien der verstehenden Soziologie’; this essayrepresents his first attempt at a positive and systematic exposition ofhis methodological views.13 According to Weber:[T]hese theorems—since in fact their elements are derived fromexperience and intensified to the point of pure rationality only ina process of thought—are useful both as heuristicinstrumentalities of analysis and as constructive means for therepresentation of the empirical manifold.(Weber 1908:34)14 On the distinction between actual and motivational understanding seeWeber (1978:8–13). ‘Actual’ understanding (aktuelles Verstehen) isrendered in the English translation, somewhat misleadingly, as ‘directobservational’ understanding.101