FROM RATIONALITY TO SUBJECTIVITY
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as having significant impact. Quite different parameters and dichotomies
characterized the iron cage model, as well as those political cultures in
which the state and its laws alone encompass-and
monopolize-all
understandings of the civic domain. The unusual pendulum movement
placed into motion by this uniquely American dualism-a broadened civic
sphere penetrated by ethical values interweaving intimately with an inten–
sified world-mastering individualism-in large part accounted, Weber
argued, for the dynamism and restlessness characteristic of the American
political culture.
Although Weber charted the American political culture's classic dual–
ism, he did not adequately identify the manner in which it would become
weakened. He expected that large-scale bureaucratization would accompa–
ny industrialization in the U.S., and thus the power and prestige of civil
servants and managers would be enhanced. As functionaries in possession
of specialized knowledge and capable of concentrating power in large
organizations entered into policy-making and intruded more and more
into domains of decision-making appropriately ones of open political
debate, party conflict, and the struggle of ideas, the few remaining legacies
of civic sphere ideals, Weber feared, would be whittled down.
In recent years, social commentators have lamented a "loss of the civic"
and of public ethics. However, this transformation has occurred for reasons
Weber only partially identified. Up to now, American politics have repeat–
edly been marked by waves of populist protest against bureaucratization,
and no cohesive caste of functionaries has evolved. Compared to Europe
and Japan, the extent to which the American economy and government
have avoided extreme bureaucratization while reaching the stage of post–
industrialism seems unique. Instead, civic values have weakened more as a
consequence of a ubiquitous consumerism and an extraordinarily vibrant
entertainment culture. Both are attractive domains opposed to, and com–
peting with, the ideals of the civic sphere.
American individualism appears less and less directed to self-oriented
material prosperity and a constellation of civic values, and more and more
directed to self-oriented material prosperi ty and the consumer-entertain–
ment cultures. An intensity unrivalled in other post-industrial nations is
apparent. Originally interwoven wi th, and invigorated by, the civic realm,
activist individualism has become severed from this guiding force and now
is systematically courted and cultivated by Madison Avenue executives with
social science degrees. Civic ideals have been pushed aside and rendered
more narrow in scope by a "public sphere" that is now penetrated widely by
the consumer and entertainment industries. Both offer friendliness, comfort,
excitation, images of romance, and hope for the individual's prosperity.
The new "political culture" differs from the old in yet another man–
ner. While the earlier dualism implied a strong civic component that held
