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C H A P T E R 4
Value and Rationality:
Definitions in Other Fields
Engineers did not have any doubts about quantitative evaluation of value and mathematical
rationality because they are used to such mathematical approaches. Sociologists, however, are
not happy with such mathematical approaches alone. ey feel there should be other definitions
of value and other interpretations of rationality.
4.1 ZWECKRATIONALITAET AND
WERTRATIONALITAET
Max Weber, a German sociologist, pointed out that there are two kinds of value, i.e., zweckra-
tionalitaet and Wertrationalitaet [11]. Zweckrationalitaet is instrumental rationality or procedu-
ral rationality (Table 4.1). What is very different from the engineering definition of rationality
is Wertrationaiitaet or Value Rationality.
Table 4.1: Zweckrationalitaet and Wertrationalitaet
Zweckrationalitaet Instrumental Rationality
Wertrationalitaet
Sustantive Rationality. If expections are satisfi ed, MY value is secured.
erefore, all approaches to get to this goal are rational.
Weber insists that if the goal is satisfactory, the process or procedures to get to the goal
does not matter. As he is a sociologist, he cites such cases as ethics, aesthetics, religion, etc. is is
the same philosophy as Shakespeare’s “all’s well that ends well,” otherwise known as Pragmatism
(Fig. 4.1).
4.2 ECONOMIST’S RATIONALITY
Herbert A. Simon, American economist and political scientist and Nobel Prize Laureate, on the
other hand, attaches importance to the approaches of a goal. What matters to him is whether
the approach is correct and an adequate approach to the goal is established [1].
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