Weber Revisited: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Nationalism

Nikolaus Wolf, Felix Kersting and Iris Wohnsiedler

No 14963, CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers

Abstract: We revisit Max Weber's hypothesis on the role of Protestantism for economic development. We show that nationalism is crucial to both, the interpretation of Weber's Protestant Ethic and empirical tests thereof. For late nineteenth-century Prussia we reject Weber's suggestion that Protestantism mattered due to an "ascetic compulsion to save". Moreover, we find that income levels, savings, and literacy rates differed between Germans and Poles, not between Protestants and Catholics, using pooled OLS and IV regressions. We suggest that this result is due to anti-Polish discrimination.

Keywords: Max weber; Protestantism; Nationalism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: N13 N33 O16 Z12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-evo, nep-gro, nep-his and nep-hpe
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (35)

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Journal Article: Weber Revisited: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Nationalism (2020)
Working Paper: Weber Revisited: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Nationalism (2020)
Working Paper: Weber Revisited: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Nationalism (2019)
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