Book Reviews 273

I n addition to morphological indices, calculated zygo-maxillary transverse facial

angles and the general appearance of the mandible force the author to conclude that the
small sample of Dorset skulls belong with other Eskimos rather than Indians.
The one serious criticism of this work is the author’s lack of appreciation for elemen-
tary biostatistical procedures. The reader is presented with mean indices with no mea-
sures of variance for any of the data, thus neither the degree of relationship nor the
probability of relationship of a single isolated skull to any other group can be predicted
with any measurable accuracy.
The typesetters, unfortunately, have achieved a remarkably low score for accuracy
- e v e n to misspelling the author’s name on the first page. However, the book is excel-
lently illustrated with photographs and anatomically exact line drawings of type speci-
mens and is a worthwhile purchase on that account.

OTHER
Basic Concepts in Sociology. MAX WEBER.Translated and with an Introduction by
H. P. SECHER.New York: Philosophical Library, 1962.123 pp. $3.75.
Reviewed by JACK GOODY,
Cambridge C’niversity
It is now some 15 years since Henderson and Parsons published their translation of
Part I of Wirtschaft und Gesellschuft (Edinburgh, 1947; Tubingen, 1925). The present
volume is simply another translation of the first chapter of that work (a chapter previ-
ously called “The Fundamental Concepts of Sociology”) together with a new introduc-
tion by the translator. The original translation was not reviewed in the American
Anlhropologist a t the time; it is a measure of the influence that Weber’s work has had
during the post-war years both that a second translation should have been issued and
that it should be discussed in this journal.
I n the English-speaking world, it has been largely due to Talcott Parsons that Max
Weber has become an accepted part of the sociological curriculum. In the thirties, the
first impact on research concerned the role of protestantism in the rise of capitalism,
and Weber’s thesis was discussed by historians such as Tawney. After the translation of
Wirtschaft und Gesellschuft, it was his treatment of types of authority contained in Chap-
ter 3 that became the center of attention. Recent examinations of bureaucratic institu-
tions, in the work of Gouldner, Blau, and others, owe much to this source. For students
of non-European societies, Weber’s categorization has generally proved more useful
than that of Marx. Neither the original form of “an asiatic mode of production” nor the
transmogrified “oriental despotism” does much to illuminate the processes of world
history, e.g., in the work of Murdock (Africa, 1959) or Suret-Canale (L’AJrique noire,
1961), whereas Fallers and other writers on Eastern Africa have made fruitful use of
Weber’s writings, particularly in discussing the emergence of bureaucratic from tradi-
tional, “patrimonial,” forms of social organization. The phenomenon of Cargo Cults in
the Pacific and the emergence of new leadership in Africa have led to an extensive dis-
cussion of Weber’s concept of charismatic authority.
But despite the stimulus that the more particularistic work of Weber has given (and
will continue to give) to sociologists, there are grounds for disappointment a t the effec-
tive contribution of his more general concepts to the field of comparative research. The
concept of “traditional” authority is simply a residual category, a rag-bag, left after
cutting the cake between bureaucratic and charismatic. Even the split into patriarchal,
patrimonial, and feudal offers little for the student of the non-western world. And the
idea of charismatic leadership and authority has similar limitations as an analytic tool
which there is no point in repeating here. The inadequacy of his typology of authority,
274 American Anthropologist [68, 19661
contained in Chapter 3 of the earlier translation, is surely not unconnected with the
very gencral ideas concerning social action that are put forward in the present extract.
(Parsons translates Verhalten as “behavior” and Handeln as “action,” the latter being
meaningful behavior in Weber’s sense, that is subjectively meaningful. Secher makes no
regular distinction, although he sometimes uses “conduct” where Parsons employs
“action.”) His concern with behavior that is nieaningful to the actor, which he 5aw as
the core though not the totality of the sociologist’s subject matter, meant that “tradi-
tional” behavior, customary behavior, was largely marginal to his interests. Like “tra-
ditional authority,” it was a kind of residual category. Residual, that is, to his main
field of study, which lay in actions that were “rational” in the sense of being con-
sciouslytlirected (oriented, motivated) by the actor towards generalvalues (werlrational)
or towards more specific ends (zweckralional). And these forms of social action were to
1)e found primarily in societies where rational-legal (i,e., bureaucratic) systems of
authority prevailed, that is, in those societies where industrialization had taken place.
Given this focus of interest in the rise of capitalism (to which was linked legal-ra-
tional authority and “rational,” “meaningful” behavior, though not of course exclu-
sively), we can appreciate the paradox of Weber’s work. Despite the valuable com-
ments, despite the illuminating incursion into China, Israel, and India, his “basic con-
cepts of sociology” have little value for the comparative sociologist. The idea that “tra-
ditional” systems should be ruled by the automatic diclatcs of custom was done to
death by Malinowski in Crime and Cuslom. And it does not require prolonged field work
in a “simplc” society to discover that the deliberate, economistic calculation of goals
antl values is an aspect of all human life. True, Webcr was dealing in “ideal types”; the
proportion of traditional, charismatic, and rational elements would vary in different
kinds of society. But the core of the trouble lies in the fact that his idea of rationality,
applied to the tlevelopmcnt of human thought, is open to even more radical objections
than Levy-Bruhl’s Prelogical Mentality, Frazer’s progression from Magic to Science,
and LCvi-Strauss’ dichotomy between the wild and domesticated varieties of thought.
And it turns out to be a n inadequate foundation on which to establish “the basic con-
cepts of sociology.”

social Slrzrrlure and Persoizulily. ’ r A L c o r T I’AKSONS. New York: The Free Press of
Glencoe (Macniillan) , 1961. 376 pp., bibliography of Talcott Parsons, index. $8.50.
Kevicwed by WILLIAMDAVENPORT,
University of Pennsylvuniu
In this volume are collected 12 essays by Talcott Parsons, ten of which have been
published before, antl an Introduction by the author in which he discusses the signifi-
cance of each essay in relation to his Theory of Action. As the title indicates the central
theoretical problem to which all the essays are directed is the relationship of personali-
ties of individuals to the structure of the social system, “ . . . not only in cross-sectional
terms but also i n terms of their bearing on the developmental pattern of personality
through various phases of the life cycle, and of relating both to stable adjustments and
the pathologies of illness.” This theoretical problem is one that social anthropologists
and culture and personality specialists have only just begun to tackle in earnest.
The Iwok is divided into three parts. Part One, entitled “Theoretical Perspectives,”
contains five essays. “The Superego and the Theory of Social Systems” (1952) under-
scores the importance of the psychological processes of internalization as the means by
which iiidividuals integrate the social system of which they are a part. I n “The Father
Symbol . . . ’’ (1954) the father’s role is presented as a point of articulation between the