The Rationalization of Modern Life

For Max Weber, bureaucracy is the ultimate instrument to the rationalization of the modern world. It is a formal structure which uses the most efficient means to attaining set ends (Ritzer, 2004, 25). Nowadays, many analogies can be traced between the functionality of bureaucracy and society. For example, in bureaucracy, as much as in society, people have certain responsibilities and must act in accordance with rules. Indeed, in both settings, everyone performs their task, following pre-set rules and regulations and often in a predetermined arrangement (Ritzer, 2004, 24-25). Despite the benefits of rationalization and its necessity for a modern society, Weber also highlighted its damaging tendency to bringing irrational outcomes. George Ritzer, in his book “The McDonaldization of Society“, defines Weber’s rationalization as the increasing domination of efficiency, predictability, calculability, and control in the modern world. Ritzer used this definition of rationalization to explain the McDonaldization phenomenon. In the following essay, I intend to use Ritzer's definition to formulate a more intimate analytic approach of rationalization, that is, not on a macro level of society nor in its different structures, but on a more individualistic level; in human behavior and in the decisions they make about their lives. Indeed, because of the conveniences and the efficiency of rationalization, most people unconsciously agree to work through a rational approach to life. This agreement has led to the internalization of the mechanism of rationalization in individuals. People are now using bureaucratic principles to guide their lives and this application is reflected in their behavior, their choices, and their life style. As a consequence, people eventually suffer from the paradoxical ‘irrationality of rationality’. Following Weber’s methodology and because the full complexity of our modern lives is too intricate, ideal-types will be used to explain the social phenomenon of ‘rational lives’.

For Weber, the rationalization of society came with the adaptation of a capitalist economy. Before the capitalist era, society was organized through the respect of values and traditions. For example, “officials were subject to tasks because of a personal loyalty to their leader rather than impersonal rules” (Ritzer, 2004, p. 25). Indeed, as people were following the principles of loyalty, pride, and honor, there was little need for written rules. In our modern secular society, we have lost these values and traditions; consequently, we need rational reasons for our actions. For example, as many religious values have been replaced by rational beliefs, instead of helping the poor by Christian obligation (Bolt, 2004, p. 2), people perform ecological actions to protect the environment. This second accomplishment is linked to knowledge about environmental issues, which is supported by scientific research. Rationalization then results in a less magical, increasingly disenchanted world, where science becomes dominant, and as tradition and religion lose power (Tucker, 2002, p. 163).

In a world which seems constantly increasing in pace, efficiency has become a priority. As a result, we are trying to do things as quickly as possible by using the most efficient means. For example, as driving is often the quickest way to get somewhere, we choose to drive a car instead of taking public transport. However, in choosing the most efficient means, we dismiss the broader perspective and the consequences of our actions (Jensen & Draffan, 2004, p. 91). Indeed, driving a car is more damaging to the environment. In addition to doing things as fast as possible, people also try to accumulate tasks, sometimes by doing many things at the same time. Consequently, only little attention is drawn into the tasks performed and it deteriorates its quality. Besides, as people increasingly understand and evaluate the world in terms of strategies for the best means to reach a given end, they become alienated from the enjoyment of their actions (Tucker, 2002, p. 164).

For an evaluative purpose, society has been increasingly focusing on quantitative results. Indeed, everything is nowadays assessed and measured in numbers (e.g. school results, career success, etc.). However, the quantitative approach offers little or no concern for the quality of in these things (Ritzer, 2004, p. 26). In our society, some parents, for example, are more concerned with the money they need to earn, to support their children, rather than with the quality of the upbringing they can offer (in terms of affection, patience, etc.). Numbers also play a crucial role in determining someone’s life as opposed to what is best for someone or what is wanted. For example, a woman will make sure that she is married before a certain age, to have a certain amount of children before a certain age, and will make a certain amount of money performing a job that took her a certain number of years of education, etc. She will calculate these goals and live her life accordingly, instead of being aware of her feelings and the moment when her needs naturally present themselves. Furthermore, wanting to accomplish many things during a short amount of time, leads to granting poor attention to their execution. Our daily tasks become obstacles as oppose to being appreciated for their actual value (e.g. eating). Our materialistic society also encourages the accumulation of calculable objects to promote our well-being. Their acquirement of quantified objects is given a great importance as oppose to their intangible values. Moreover, calculability is used to set objectives and, therefore, enforces the achievement of these objectives. People also use numbers to compare themselves to others which consequently classifies them in a hierarchical manner.

By respecting rules and socially accepted norms, people lead their life in a predicable manner. Weber held that formal rationality is translated to people using optimum means that are formed by rules, regulations, and larger social structures (Ritzer, 2004, 26). Indeed, in the past, people had been left to discover the optimum means for a given end on their own or with vague and general guidance from larger value system (e.g. religion). Now, they use institutionalised rules that help them decide or dictate them what to do (Ritzer, 2004, 26). Therefore almost everyone does the same things, acts the same way, and makes similar choices. Predictability promotes uniformity and, consequently, destroys originality. Also, because we are looking for security in our life, we also look for predictability. For example, people always like to know how much they are going to earn at the end of the month, etc. We are also often trying to predict how our life is going to unfold. As a result, all these expectations sometimes lead to disappointment. Another negative consequence of looking for predictable events is that it allows unpredictable events to be catastrophic. Indeed, if the predicable is often reassuring, on the other hand the unknown can bring confusion or panic in people's lives.

Humans seek the control over their lives by setting different goals and planning accordingly. In a competitive world where no room is granted for failure, control is important. However, by doing so, people do not realize that the source of these goals and the planning of their life comes from a rational system. People need to feel like they have control over their lives, however, in reality, this feeling can only be an illusion of power. Indeed, people’s lives are indirectly conducted by social structures. Their behavior and choices are only by-products of this mechanism. Bureaucracies emphasize control over people, through the replacement of human judgment with the dictatorship of rules, regulations, and structures (Ritzer, 2004, 27). To control the course of our day, for example, we divide it into well-defined tasks: getting ready in the morning, working, lunch break, watching TV, etc. At work, our tasks are even more defined. This process comes directly from a bureaucratic scheme. People are seeking so much control that they start to resemble to human-robots. In a similar way, they are often requested to work like machines (whether their job is highly classified in the social hierarchy or not).

By being rationalized, people’s lives suffer from the irrationality of rationality. Some of these irrational consequences have been mentioned above when describing the opposite effects from the original intentions (efficiency, calculability, predictability and control). Weber saw how modern society emphasizes the rational, the instrumental, and the means to achieve certain goals, at the expense of everything else, including life itself (Jensen & Draffan, 2004, p. 96). We are constantly setting ourselves objectives to achieve and planning for the most efficient means to reach these goals. To assess our achievement, social institutions have different types of evaluative tools: the articulation of the first word, the evaluative marks during our education, the achievement of a certain professional career, the promotions in our work, etc. Our performance in these evaluations will not only impact how others evaluate us, it also impacts how we view ourselves and, consequently, how we behave in society. Therefore, it seems like this personal assessment is primordial in determining how people live their lives. Their life path is determined by organizational structures in which people try to achieve certain goals, and, at the same time, their life style is determined by their success in achieving these set goals.

People have lost the control of their lives. The choice of how they live their life does not depend on them anymore. It is directly determined by the rational system of modern society. As a consequence, people can only have the life style that is determined by how well they perform within the system. Such restrictions prevent people from doing what they really want with their life. To fit within the system, they are forced to give up their personal desire and replace them with goals that are socially acceptable. Consequently, a rational way of life forces certain options and removes the possibility of a genuinely free choice. If someone does not follow the rules or work within the system, this person will have to suffer the consequences. For example, one can choose to paint and sing because these are the things this person enjoys doing the most. However, within our modern society, these two things are not considered typical successful achievements as they do not contribute to a rational economy. Therefore, this person will have to live in poverty unless he or she is able to work within the system by selling his or her talent to the commercial industry (but at this point, this person will lose freedom of creativity).

Because people are deprived from creative freedom and from the life they wish to live, we can say that we live in an era where individuals are alienated from their human potential – they are dehumanized and are not able to express their true selves. This characteristic, which is defined by Weber as the ‘Iron Cage’, can also be illustrated in the personality of individuals. Indeed, for Weber, bureaucracy also promotes “the personality type of [a] profession expert” (Weber, Gerth and Mills, 1946, p. 240). In a modern society, personalities are conditioned to suit the rational system. Indeed, people are expected and socialized to act and think a certain way. If they fail, society will label them as ‘eccentric’ or ‘crazy’. The Western culture coerces people into a rational way of thinking from which they cannot escape (Enns, 2004, p. 45). Furthermore, when losing their independence, as the rational society dictates people’s behavior and way of thinking, people ultimately also lose their autonomy. It becomes harder for them to think ‘out of the box’ and to truly act freely.

The irrational consequences of rationality can very well be illustrated by the event of a midlife crisis. Indeed, after spending half of one’s life planning to achieve certain ends set by society, one suddenly feels a discontentment with life. A midlife crisis is characterized by the questioning of the meaning of life, our true identity, and the ultimate goal that our life is aiming for (Mid-Life, 2010). These questionings can easily be explained by the tendencies (developed above) to aim for set objectives and act in a rational manner – in accordance with the expectations from society. The midlife crisis is synonym of disenchantment from life. It is a realization of one’s helplessness when facing the immense mechanism of rationalization of life which has developed from the demand of an increasingly rational society, using social structures to formulate and accomplish this demand. The consequence of this realization/disenchantment is ultimately the opposite type of behavior from the initial one, that is, rational behaviour. Typically, a person facing a midlife crisis will change their career to something that he or she actually enjoys doing (as opposed to something that is safe) or will start to behave in a unreasonable manner and make unreasonable choices, like purchasing a sports car that he or she cannot really afford.

By being surrounded by rationality, people are forced into disenchantment which generated many irrational consequences in people’s behavior. For example, an over consumption of goods can be seen as a means to make up for the beliefs that originally reassured humans (e.g. heaven). Instead of believing in something comforting for the mind (or soul), people are looking for a solution to re-enchantment in the profane realm (Jenkins, 2000, p. 13). They have lost their purpose in life and they are trying to fill its role with something of this world. However, looking for a sense of satisfaction with life in the wrong place leads to the incapability to grasp life. For example, trying to understand the essence of life forms through science will lead to a disillusioned life and a misunderstanding of its beauty (Foster, 2007, p. 10). Indeed, the beauty of life cannot be analysed in any rational way.

For Weber, bureaucracy naturally promotes a ‘rationalist way of life’ (Weber, Gerth and Mills, 1946, p. 240); from the moment we are born, we are enrolled in a mechanism in which we have no control over. Rationalization has created this mechanism and it is now defining human behavior in addition to all societal structures. In the past, people were living according to values and principles promoted by religion and tradition. Nowadays, capitalism has replaced irrational beliefs with rational thinking and is encouraging a methodical approach to life. We need rational motives to guide us as we are trying to control and make sense of our lives in a rational way. But life is not rational and humans are not naturally rational beings. Therefore, they are dehumanized by this process and experience its consequences through the ‘irrationality of rationality’, the ‘Iron Cage’, and disenchantment. These products of rationality can have extremely damaging consequences on the lives of human beings by removing their freedom, their autonomy, and alienating them from their human potential. Weber anticipated that society would eventually lock people into a series of rational structures and he only held little hope that we would be able to oppose to the “supreme mastery of the bureaucratic way of life” (Jensen & Draffan, 2004, p. 103). However, once rationalization and its process are understood, we could hope for the possibility of conscious effort to making a genuinely free choice on our life’s objective. Indeed, the only goal, for everyone, should be happiness. However discourses have poisoned the notion of happiness, by rationalize it, as happiness is to be found in the simple things of life and this idea has no place in the complexity of our modern world.

 

References

Bolt, J. (2004). Christian Obligations: The Poor You Will Always Have with You. Journal of Markets & Morality, 7(2), 467-493. Retrieved on June 17, 2012, from http://www.acton.org/sites/v4.acton.org/files/pdf/7.2.467-493.ARTICLE.Bolt,%20John--Christian%20Obligations.pdf

Jenkins, R. (2000). Disenchantment, Enchantment and Re-Enchantment: Max Weber at the Millennium. MWS, 1, 13.

Jensen, D., & Draffan, G. (2004). Rationalization. Welcome to the Machine (pp. 88-111). White Tiver Junction, VT: Chelsea Green Publishing Company.

Enns, S. (2012). Max Weber - Part 1. Concepts & Theories of Society. Lecture conducted from Capilano University, North Vancouver.

Foster, R. (2007). The Consequences of Disenchantment. Adorno: The Recovery Experience (p. 10). Albany: State University of New York Press.

Mid-Life. (2010, January 15). Psychology Today. Retrieved on June 16, 2012, from http://www.psychologytoday.com/conditions/mid-life

Ritzer, G. (2004). McDonaldization and its Precursors. The McDonaldization of society (Rev. new century ed., pp. 24-26). Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Pine Forge Press.

Tucker, Jr., K. H. (2002). Weber: Modernity and Rationalization. Classical Social Theory (pp. 154-190). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.

Weber, M., Gerth, H. H., & Mills, C. W. (1946). The 'Rationalization' of Education and Training. From Max Weber: Essays in sociology (p. 240). New York: Oxford University Press.