Exercise 2:

Occupational Work Ethic Inventory

by

William Adkins

for

SOC-323

Sociological Theory

Instructor John “Rick” Johnson

Saint Leo University

July 12th

, 2015

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INTRODUCTION

“After industry and frugality, nothing contributes more to the raising of a young man in

the world than punctuality and justice in all his dealings (Benjamin Franklin as quoted by Max

Weber in Allen 2014:99). This quote from Benjamin Franklin frames the concept of the work

ethic of the Calvinist faith and is included in the introduction of Max Weber’s The Protestant

Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (Allen 2014). To Weber, religion was the largest influence of

capitalism; he said, it “provides us with certain principles…that act as guideposts telling us how

to live” (Allen 2014:98).

RATIONILISM OF CAPITALISM

A work ethic is defined by Dictionary.com as “a belief in the moral benefit and

importance of work and its inherent ability to strengthen character.” Max Weber said that this

precondition of the spirit of capitalism as how a person “exalts work as a moral attitude” (Allen

2014:99). The Occupational Work Ethic Inventory (OWEI) has presented us with a test that will

measure a person’s work ethic: scoring interpersonal, initiative and dependability characteristics

on a scale of one through to seven. The following table represents the mean scores of the three

aforementioned categories – split by gender – as presented on the OWEI website

Interpersonal Skills Initiative Dependability

Female 5.67 6.00 6.34

Male 5.52 5.72 6.07

These scores show (quantitatively) that the average female* is about 2% more social, 4% more

creative and almost 4% more dependable than the average male.* My mean scores, shown

below, show that I am .7% more social, about 1.5% less creative and 1% less dependable than

the men surveyed.

*Regarding the 1133 people sampled per the OWEI website

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Interpersonal Skills Initiative Dependability

Adkins, W. 5.75 5.62 6.00

The question presenting itself here is this, “what does that mean?” Well, according to Max

Weber, interpersonal skill would not have been extremely beneficial unless they were necessary

for me to live my life “with a specific purpose” (Allen 2014:99). Having initiative or being able

to come up with creative solutions to assist the means to that purpose would be more important

because those qualities would help you acquire wealth (read: money) and in the world of rational

capitalism (Allen 2014) the acquisition of money became its own end. Dependability, the final

of the three characteristics, would have been weighted the heaviest because, as was stated in the

opening quote from Benjamin Franklin, your ability to remain trustworthy and reliable were –

ultimately – the “best possible means to acquire the self-confidence that one belonged among the

elect” (Allen 2014:101).

These quantitative legitimations delineate an individualistic nature of capitalism that is

seen in modernity through Marx’s theory of alienation, the division of labor (both as described

by Marx and Durkheim) as well as the Durkheimian theories of social diversity and morality

(Allen 2014) – specifically the mechanistic and organismic analogies. With Marx, the proletariat

– being beholden to the bourgeois – was forced to take vocations that they neither had the skill

nor the desire to perform (forced division of labor) due to the cyclical nature of capitalism

(industrialization, markets and commodification) and it was that simple (in a manner of

speaking). For Durkheim, the effects on society began with social solidarity (Allen 2014),

which, in its most basic terms, is “the degree to which social units are integrated” (P.138). In a

closed system of social solidarity (mechanistic), there is a sense of existing as cog in a machine:

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your relationship to others is compulsory, your degree of solidarity is very high and “[e]ach

individual unit’s actions are absolutely constrained by and coordinated with the whole” (Allen

2014:139). Conversely, the open system of solidarity (organismic) consists of varied parts; each

part has a different job and they relate to one another in a more distinct manner. As society

moves from being more similar to more diverse there is a tendency to move from a mechanistic

solidarity to an organismic solidarity and the familial bonds give way to “mutual need and

abstract ideas and sentiments” (Allen 2014:139). In contrast to that Marx, Durkheim points to

these issues of modernity as the cause for forced division of labor (Allen 2014). As our

populations gather and increase in dynamic density, we further internalize the culture of our in-

groups – what Durkheim called social differentiation (Allen 2014) – and our mechanistic

solidarity shifts to an organismic solidarity even though mechanistic solidarity and similarity

never actually vanish. It is in this state we become less focused on our class consciousness – we

move away from Marx’s ideal of species-being – and become more and more concerned with our

specialized in-groups (Allen 2014).

CONCLUSION

Based on the information provided from our text thus far, coupled with my scores for the

OWEI, it is clear that my socialization has been and continues to be more specialized,

individualistic and focused on Durkheim’s theory of organismic solidarity. My function in life

has been to acquire a means to wealth; to practice frugality (to reciprocate those ideals), to place

emphasis on the intrinsic value of hard work - a strong work ethic as Allen (2014) states – and to

be as competent and proficient in those endeavors as possible. I am to demonstrate the ideals of

rational capitalism and take advantage of every opportunity to increase my own wealth even

while recognizing that, “America may be the land of opportunity, but it is not the land of equal

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opportunity” (Allen 2014:147). It becomes clear, then, that although “Protestantism did not

directly produce capitalism…it did create a culture that…influenced” its rise and its reign (Allen

2014:100).

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Reference

Allen, Kenneth. 2014. The Social Lens: An Invitation to Social and Sociological Theory

3rd Ed. Los Angeles: Sage.

Occupational Work Ethic Inventory. 1993. Retrieved on July 12th

, 2015

(http://workethic.coe.uga.edu/cgi-bin/new_owei/owei.pl).