 The methodological orientation of his research was inspired by Lucien Goldmann's writings -particularly The Hidden God, 1955)- whose approach, associating sociology and history, heterodox Marxism and German sociology, the internal study of cultural works and their connexion to the social structure, served him as starting point.From the mid 1980s Löwy became interested in the Central European Jewish Culture, in Romantic anticapitalism and on the complex interrelations between religion and politics, particularly in Latin America.The concept of elective affinity, borrowed from Max Weber, but re-interpreted, became one of the key methodological tools of his research.