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Mcdonalization And The Protestant Ethic

The model of structuration presented by Anthony Giddens directly applies to Weber's theory of "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism." To start out, the structuration model is in simple terms, a way to describe how society has formed throughout history. It basically says that social structures are bound to change throughout time and that they are neither permanent nor impossible to change. Also, it is neither on a micro or macro level in which this structure is formed. Rather, structuration is in essence a balance theory; social structure influences people and people are capable pf changing the social structure that they live in. This is not done just on the micro level of the individual but also through the macro (society) where the two influence each other over and over until a structure is either abstained or changed. This idea directly relates to Weber's theory because his theory entails the same sort of basis.
To explain Protestant Ethic theory, it helps to use the model of structuration. First, there was a social structure, the Protestants, and their belief in following God's "calling." It was just emerging in their religion that God's "calling" was not just for vocation reasons. They believed that it was essential to work a job related to the calling that God gave any individual man. If wealth was acquired during this process, then that was a fruit of labor and therefore God's blessing. This tied into their other view that worldly success was a sign of them being "saved." This gave them a reason for everyone to have jobs that prospered them and made them good money. The other belief the Protestants had was that of asceticism. They believed it should be in all aspects of life which meant on most important grounds, that continuous and systematic work was essential to them. Also, it meant that wealth gained through work was not to be spent on material goods. This gave birth to the spirit of capitalism because Protestants...

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