HISTORY'S NARRATIVE EXPLANATION UNDER THE LOGIC OF CAUSAL IMPUTATION: AN ESSAY IN HONOR OF MAX WEBER'S DEATH CENTENARY

Abstract

One hundred years have passed since Max Weber's death. This article explores an aspect of his work that, although fundamental, has received little attention in theoretical discussions about historiography: the relationship between explanation and narration. This article's analysis proceeds from two basic hypotheses: (1) some of the questions posed by narrativism to theory of history were already present in Weber's intellectual context; (2) in Weber's work, we can find a helpful, albeit nearly forgotten, answer to these questions insofar as his proposal situates the narrative explanation of history in the logical framework of causal imputation. Based on these hypotheses, this article's central objective is to examine how and to what extent a return to Weber can shed new light on the problem of historical explanation without disregarding its narrative nature. The article's first step, then, is to briefly review the fundamental questions posed by narrativism to the theory of history, with an emphasis on the structure of a historical narration; after that, it shows how and to what extent we can find a response to these questions in Weber's work. Ultimately, the article seeks to demonstrate the compatibility between the structure of a narrative, as evidenced by Arthur C. Danto, and the logical-causal explanation model proposed by Weber, which will serve as the basis for a clearer distinction between historical narratives and fictional ones.