Abstract
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>The main subject is given in the title of the book: Weber’s theory of social politics. This theory is unique because it presents a view of politics through categories present in all social life (rule, power, human agency etc.) rather than more specifically political ones (political institutions, political liberty). This then requires consideration of Weber’s ideas about ‘sociology’ in general, which hinge on the interrelation between special sociologies (such as social politics) and a slim body of general theory. This unusual model is quite unlike that of any other “classical” sociologist and here again Weber is original. The book looks at the evolution of these ideas throughout Weber’s life, but with the main emphasis on his last decade (1910–20), when they came to fruition. Together with my previous work, Max Weber and the Protestant Ethic (OUP, 2014), this is the first ever presentation of his thought as a whole by a historian, rather than by a sociologist.</jats:p>