Influenced by Ernst Troeltsch and Max Weber, he emphasized the continuity and rationality of Western institutions.
[1] Hintze was born in the small town of Pyritz (Pyrzyce) in the Province of Pomerania, the son of a civil servant.
Seven volumes of sources on the economics and administrative organisation in Prussia, with detailed historical commentaries, were published by 1910.
In 1895, his post-doctoral thesis to become a lecturer was accepted by Treitschke and Schmoller; in 1902 as Professor of the newly created Department of Political, Constitutional, Administrative and Economic History.
[3] Hintze ceased publishing after the Nazi Party came to power and, in 1933, he was the only member to speak against Albert Einstein's expulsion from the Prussian Academy of Sciences.