A Bear Grylls Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism
In The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, Max Weber described the capitalism of today – a “today” in which Weber wrestled with the subject shortly after the turn of the 20th century – as “an immense cosmos into which the individual is born,” inevitably forcing someone, “in so far as he is involved in the system of market relationships, to conform to capitalistic rules of action.”[1] According to Weber, for those who live and work in this context, they must navigate a socio-economic situation that dominates “economic life, educat(ing) and select(ing) the economic subject which (capitalism) needs through a process of economic survival of the fittest.”[2] Capitalism’s spirit “had to fight its way to supremacy against a whole world of hostile forces.”[3] Hostile forces? Survival of the fittest? Okay, so maybe we need a quick excursus into…Man vs. Wild.
Our family has always loved the outdoors. Who knows how many miles our kids have logged running and hiking, often begrudgingly, throughout the foothills of the southern Appalachians. So, given our love of adventure, when our children were young we would gather in our family room and watch the Discovery Channel’s Man vs. Wild starring Bear Grylls. Now, I know what you are thinking. It wasn’t what it appeared to be. The dangers Bear experienced in a show about survival weren’t really all that dangerous. Wasn’t he staying in posh hotels when the cameras weren’t rolling? Regardless, one thing is clear about Mr. Grylls. He knew how to connect his special forces training to an audience of consumers in order to grow his “brand.”[4] He seems to have had a marvelously successful career that continues to re-emerge every other year or so, always on camera and usually with celebrities. So, when Jason Clark highlighted a contemporary example of the way in which Evangelicals have combined “entrepreneurial forces and capitalist market possibilities” to promote Alpha[5], I thought to myself: Didn’t Alpha use the Bear Grylls brand to market their program? Yes they did! In fact, you can see a promo video here. There’s even an interview that Nicky Gumbel, the pastor who helped Alpha become what it is today, conducts with Mr. Grylls about his faith titled, “Bear Grylls Talks About Alpha’s Impact On His Life and Faith,”[6] and it can be viewed here.
Was the ethic behind Bear’s seemingly tireless ability to keep up his adventures in front of the camera informed by…Calvinists? Is there an intersection with the kind of celebrity brand of a Bear Grylls, Evangelical faith, and the “transmission of faith in capitalist markets?”[7] The answer is probably more complex than one could imagine. In fact, “the relationship between religion and the social order is one of the most difficult problems in the sociology of culture.”[8]
Weber argues that it was Calvinism’s theological framework that helped pave the way for capitalism to flourish in the West. It promoted a sort of ethic akin to Bear’s ability to survive a host of natural forces, leverage his abilities to monetize his “product” in front of a massive audience, and somehow connect that to his faith (not on Discovery’s platform, of course). Perhaps Bear isn’t as explicit about his entrepreneurial and capitalistic pursuits in the midst of what he is doing, but it’s there for sure. Mr. Grylls undoubtedly embodies the protestant work ethic Mr. Weber described. The underlying motivation, for the capitalist Calvinist (I don’t think Bear is a Calvinist, by the way), is informed by a working out of the believer’s calling. Weber poses a question to get at the heart of his perspective around the Calvinist and capitalism… “by what fruits the Calvinist thought himself able to identify true faith? the answer is: by a type of Christian conduct which served to increase the glory of God.”[9] And so the entrepreneur works like Bear Grylls to not only survive in the space of competitive markets, he or she works tirelessly to give birth to the product or service that helps humans flourish. This, too, is a part of working out one’s calling to love and glorify God.
Okay, so I’ve stretched the Bear Grylls analogy too far, perhaps.
When connected with Puritanism, Calvinism’s influence in capitalism has to do with “personal dedication and effort in labor, the ‘work ethic’ which it is claimed was fostered by the identification of all useful labor with the fulfillment of a divine vocation.”[10] Jason Clark summarizes these points in his chapter titled “Assurance, Anxiety and the Protestant Work Ethic,” in “Evangelicalism and Capitalism,” stating, “This ascetic combines with a Puritan aesthetic that results in the rational mastery of economic life and the ‘Spirit of Capitalism’, in which much is produced, little is consumed, and the pursuit of profit is established as a morally good issue.”[11]
One or two more thoughts…
I think this week’s reading raises a number of questions that probably need further exploration. One question that I am processing is Dr. Clark’s question: “How did desire and market imaginations take over Evangelicals’ imaginations for Christian living?”[12] With that, who are the current thought leaders and “subject matter experts” figuring out how to navigate the times?
Another question is around “islands of social care,” a subject Dr. Clark brought up in his paper. Given current questions around immigration and refugee resettlement, not to mention the current crisis unfolding in the Middle East, the role that local communities of believers play among displaced people is a timely subject. Clark described these islands of social care, quoting Amos Young’s description of Pentecostalism’s contribution here: “‘Pentecostalism creates communities that provide new networks of social and economic services for uprooted populations. Within this Pentecostalism functions as an alternative system of economics by restructuring kinship relationships within new economic environments. This enables believers to connect with their new context whilst freeing them from their previous obligations to their place of origin.”[13]
For Christians, there is much to work out in this subject, especially with contemporary global challenges.
[1] Weber, Max, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, (Floyd, VA: Wilder Publications, 2015), Kindle version, 15 of 107.
[2] Ibid., 15.
[3] Ibid., 16.
[4] See https://www.beargrylls.com/.
[5] Clark, Jason Paul, “Evangelicalism and Capitalism: A Reparative Account and Diagnosis of Pathogeneses in the Relationship” (2018). Faculty Publications – Portland Seminary. 132. https://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/gfes/132, 117.
[6] See the interview here, accessed on October 7, 2023: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrsLNBbfKko.
[7] Clark, 118.
[8] Goudzwaard, Bob. Capitalism and Progress: A Diagnosis of Western Society, (Toronto: Association for the Advancement of Christian Scholarship, 1979), published by Paternoster Press in the UK in 1997, xxii.
[9] Weber, 56.
[10] Goudzwaard, 8.
[11] Clark, 84.
[12] Ibid., 111.
[13] Ibid., 69. Quoting Amos Young, In the Days of Caesar: Pentecostalism and Political Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2009).
About the Author
Travis Vaughn
6 responses to “A Bear Grylls Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism”
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Hi,
When kids were in their early teens we LOVED Bear Gryllis. My daughter just brought him up the other day in a random conversation about “crazy.”
Marketing…capitalism…selling our brand of faith. While Weber confuses me, I am getting a lot out of our cohorts posts.
You quoted a quote of a quote (?) Pentecostalism’s contribution here: “‘Pentecostalism creates communities that provide new networks of social and economic services for uprooted populations. Within this Pentecostalism functions as an alternative system of economics by restructuring kinship relationships within new economic environments. This enables believers to connect with their new context whilst freeing them from their previous obligations to their place of origin.
Ecc 1:9 “What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.”
As I plow through my NPO (on Immigration), the quote you mentioned brought me back to the work that resettlement agencies (many of them Christian) who are striving to build relationships with “newcomers” as they navigate resettlment into the U.S.
As a nation of immigrants, we certainly are reinventing the wheel (not necessarily a bad thing) …in the process, the church is reshaping itself to meet those at our gate.
Shalom…
Russell, I thought of your NPO when I read that quote and as I thought about the premise behind these “islands of social care.” I have not read Amos Young’s work, yet, but I think there is another author that Dr. Clark references in addition to Young. I believe his last name is “Martin?” That author, I believe, has written quite extensively about what Dr. Clark addressed. Ultimately, I believe the work of these “islands of social care” goes beyond Pentecostalism, but I would need to read the primary source(s). I thought of Rodney Stark’s book, “The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries” in relation to networks of Christians helping displaced peoples, too. I’m sure you’ve read that book. In your research, what (Evangelical?) networks or organizations in the U.S. seem to be engaged with the subject of immigration in a meaningful way…perhaps able to shed light on the subject of newcomers’ intersection with evangelicalism and capitalism? The organization that my wife and I are most familiar with is World Relief.
Hi Travis- Thanks for your post!
You stated: “Given current questions around immigration and refugee resettlement, not to mention the current crisis unfolding in the Middle East, the role that local communities of believers play among displaced people is a timely subject.” I completely agree.
This made me think about the idea that keeps popping up about “rational actors” in our marketplace. Is there a connection? Does the practice of “islands of social care” that we see in faith communities support or detract from this idea of rational behavior?
Travis, you bring up the connection between Bear Gryllis and Alpha. I’m a pastor who has always shamelessly used marketing to get our message out there, and while I try to urge our team to be careful about their motives, I’m pretty open about using various methods to accomplish our ends.
However, after reading Weber, Clark and you, I’m more uncomfortable (in a good way). Our Christian imaginations have been taken over by the world and we then double down on the world’s methods to try to reintroduce a biblical imagination?
Here’s a sad example: I personally increasingly hate what social media is doing to our world, yet I celebrate when our creative team does better and better things with social media to attract more views, likes, comments and ultimately live visits.
I don’t have a solution, just some awkward questions for myself. And I’m asking them out loud on this response because your blog was a great instigator and challenger for me.
Thanks (truly).
You have so much here Travis. Very well done.
And you had me at Bear Grylls.
I’ve watched most of everything he’s put out and even read a couple of his book. I like him. And, we are now getting into ALPHA at our church, so there’s another way that guy is getting into everything. He’s like Taylor Swift…shows up everywhere.
And like T-Swift, Grylls is a fine dandy good marketer of his brand, which is, wait for it, himself!
Which brings me to a church I visited a couple years ago. Big church (but that’s not my point, because I’ve seen this in small ones too). I went into their church bookstore and the pastors FACE was literally everywhere. I mean, everywhere. HUGE posters. Full body standup’s. It was almost creepy, if it wasn’t so laughable. Without question…HE was the brand.
Which brings me to a final story: years ago a friend told me that his church leadership decided it was financially better to fly the pastor back from vacations to the church by private plane for Sunday services than it was to have a guest speaker. So that’s what he did for many years.
Ah, the Protestant Work Ethic.
Thank you for sharing this insightful passage! I love how it connects Max Weber’s ideas about capitalism and the Protestant work ethic to a real-world example like Bear Grylls. It’s fascinating to see how Grylls leveraged his unique skills and persona to build a brand and connect with a broad audience. The parallel drawn between his approach and how Evangelicals promote the Alpha program is really interesting.
The question that Dr. Clark raises about the influence of market desires on Evangelical imaginations for Christian living is a great one. It’s crucial to understand how modern economic forces shape our faith and values.
So, here’s a question for you: Do you think the intersection of faith and capitalism, as exemplified by Bear Grylls and the Alpha program, has a positive or negative impact on the way people practice their religion today?