Weber argued that “the great achievement of the ethical religions, above all the ethical and asceticist sects of Protestantism . . ., [was] to shatter the fetters of the kin” and that, therefore, China did not develop a modern economy on its own.

XREF: Weber's Protestant Ethic thesis connecting religious ethics to economic development — contrasts with Chinese kinship systems.

Russell Hardin, Trust and Trustworthiness, loc. 1018