Max Weber: family history, economic policy, exchange reform

Abstract

This article suggests that Weber’s cosmopolitan
dimension has much to do with his extended family history,
which has been relatively neglected even though it influenced
his world view and oeuvre in significant respects. It first sketches
the cosmopolitan family context and then turns to Weber’s
political and scholarly agenda, especially the little-known story
of his strong political and professional engagement in the battle
over exchange reform in the eighteen-nineties.