Basic Issues of the Social Question
GA 23
II. Finding Real Solutions to the Social Problems of the Times
[ 1 ] The characteristic element which has given the social question its particular form in modern times may be described as follows: The economy, along with technology and modern capitalism, has, as a matter of course, brought a certain inner order to modern society. While the attention of humanity has focused on what technology and capitalism have brought, it has been diverted from other branches, other areas of the social organism. It is equally necessary to attain efficacy through human consciousness in these areas if the social organism is to become healthy.
[ 2 ] In order to clearly characterize certain driving forces by means of a comprehensive, universal observation of the social organism, I would like to start with a comparison. It should be borne in mind, however, that nothing more than a comparison is intended. Human understanding can be assisted by such a comparison to form mental pictures about the social organism's restoration to health. To consider the most complicated of all natural organisms, the human organism, from the point of view presented here, it is necessary to direct one's attention to the fact that the total essence of this human organism exhibits three complementary systems, each of which functions with a certain autonomy. These three complementary systems can be characterized as follows. The system consisting of the nerve and sense faculties functions as one area in the natural human organism. It could also be designated, after the most important member of the organism in which the nerve and sense faculties are to a certain extent centralized, the head organism.
[ 3 ] A clear understanding of the human organization will result in recognizing as the second member, what [ I ] would like to call the rhythmic system. It consists of respiration, blood circulation and everything which expresses itself in the rhythmic processes of the human organism.
[ 4 ] The third system is to be recognized in everything which, in the form of organs and functions, is connected with metabolism as such. [ 5 ] These three systems contain everything which, when properly co-ordinated, maintains the entire functioning of the human organism in a healthy manner.2The arrangement meant here is not a spatial delimitation of the bodily members, but is according to the activities (functions) of the organism. The term ‘head-organism’ is only to be used in that one is aware that the nerve-sense faculty is principally centralized in the head. Of course the rhythmic and metabolic functions are also present in the head, as is the nerve-sense faculty in the other bodily members. Nevertheless, the three functional types are, according to their natures, sharply separated.
[ 6 ] In my book “Von Seelenrätseln”*Page 54 Von Seelenrätseln. Extracts from this book have been published by the Rudolf Steiner Press, London, 1970, under the title The Case for Anthroposophy, selected, translated, arranged and with an introduction by Owen Barfield. I have attempted to characterize, at least in outline, this triformation of the human natural organism. It is clear to me that biology, physiology, natural science as a whole will, in the very near future, tend toward a consideration of the human organism which perceives how these three members—the head-system, the circulatory system or breast-system and the metabolic system maintain the total processes in the human organism, how they function with a certain autonomy, how no absolute centralization of the human organism exists and how each of these systems has its own particular relation to the outer world. The head-system through the senses, the circulatory or rhythmic system through respiration and the metabolic system through the organs of nourishment and movement.
[ 7 ] Natural scientific methods are not yet sufficiently advanced for scientific circles to be able to grant recognition, sufficient for an advance in knowledge, to what I have indicated here—which is an attempt to utilize knowledge based on spiritual science for natural scientific purposes.
This means, however, that our habit of thought, the whole way in which we conceive of the world, is not yet completely in accordance with how, for example, the inner essence of nature's functions manifests itself in the human organism. One could very well say: Yes, but natural science can wait, its ideals will develop gradually and it will come to a point where viewpoints such as yours will be recognized. It is not possible, however, to wait where these things are concerned. In every human mind—for every human mind takes part in the functioning of the social organism—and not only in the minds of a few specialists, must be present at least an instinctive knowledge of what this social organism needs. Healthy thinking and feeling, healthy will and aspirations with regard to the formation of the social organism, can only develop when it is clear, albeit more or less instinctively, that in order for the social organism to be healthy it must, like the natural organism, have a threefold organization.
[ 8 ] Ever since Schäffle wrote his book about the structure of the social organism, attempts have been made to encounter analogies between the organization of a natural being—the human being, for example—and human society as such. The cell of the social organism has been sought, the cell structure, tissues and so forth! A short while ago a book by Meray appeared, Weltmutation (World Mutation), in which certain scientific facts and laws were simply transferred to a supposed human society-organism. What is meant here has absolutely nothing to do with all these things, with all these analogy games. To assume that in these considerations such an analogy game between the natural and the social organism is being played is to reveal a failure to enter into the spirit of what is here meant. No attempt is being made to transplant some scientific fact to the social organism; quite the contrary, it is intended that human thinking and feeling learn to sense the vital potentialities in contemplating the natural organism and then to be capable of applying this sensibility to the social organism. When what has supposedly been learned about the natural organism is simply transferred to the social organism, this only indicates an unwillingness to acquire the capacity to contemplate and investigate the social organism just as independently as is necessary for an understanding of the natural organism. If, in order to perceive its laws, one considers the social organism as an independent entity in the same manner as a scientific investigator considers the natural organism, in that instant the seriousness of the contemplation excludes playing with analogies.
[ 9 ] It may also be imagined that what is presented here is based on the belief that the social organism should be ‘constructed’ as an imitation of some bleak scientific theory. Nothing could be farther from the truth. It is my intention to point out something quite different. The present historical human crisis requires that certain sensibilities arise in every individual, that these sensibilities be stimulated by education, i.e., the school system, as is the learning of arithmetical functions. What has hitherto resulted from the old forms of the social organism, without being consciously absorbed by the inner life of the mind, will cease to have effect in the future. A characteristic of the evolutionary impulses which are attempting to manifest themselves in human life at the present time is that such sensibilities are necessary, just as schooling has long been a necessity. From now on mankind should acquire a healthy sense of how the social organism should function in order for it to be viable. A feeling must be acquired that it is unhealthy and anti-social to want to participate in this organism without such sensibilities.
[ 10 ] It is often said that ‘socialization’ is needed for these times. This socialization will not be a curative process for the social organism, but a quack remedy, perhaps even a destructive process, as long as at least an instinctive knowledge of the necessity for the triformation of the social organism has not been absorbed by human hearts, by human souls. If this social organism is to function in a healthy way it must methodically cultivate three constituent members.
[ 11 ] One of these members is the economy. It will be considered first because it has so evidently been able to dominate human society through modern technology and capitalism. This economic life must constitute an autonomous member within the social organism, as relatively autonomous as is the nervous-sensory system in the human organism. The economy is concerned with all aspects of the production, circulation and consumption of commodities.
[ 12 ] The second member of the social organism is that of civil rights, of political life as such. What can be designated as the state, in the sense of the old rights-state, pertains to this member. Whereas the economy is concerned with all aspects of man's natural needs and the production, circulation and consumption of commodities, this second member of the social organism can only concern itself with all aspects of the relations between human beings which derive from purely human sources. It is essential for knowledge about the members of the social organism to be able to differentiate between the legal rights system, which can only concern itself with relations between human beings that derive from human sources, and the economic system, which can only be concerned with the production, circulation and consumption of commodities. It is necessary to sense this difference in life in order that, as a consequence of this sensibility, the economy be separate from the rights member, as in the human natural organism the activity of the lungs in processing the outside air is separate from the processes of the nervous-sensory system.
[ 13 ] The third member, standing autonomous alongside the other two, is to be apprehended in the social organism as that which pertains to spiritual life. To be more precise, because the designations ‘spiritual culture’ or ‘everything which pertains to spiritual life’, are perhaps not sufficiently precise, one could say: everything which is based on the natural aptitudes of each human individual; what must enter into the social organism based on the natural aptitudes, spiritual as well as physical, of each individual. The first system, the economic, is concerned with what must be present in order for man to determine his relation to the outer world. The second system is concerned with what must be present in the social organism in respect to human inter-relationships. The third system is concerned with everything which must blossom forth from each human individuality and be integrated into the social organism.
[ 14 ] Just as it is true that modern technology and capitalism have moulded our society in recent times, it is also imperative that the wounds necessarily inflicted on human society by them be thoroughly healed by correctly relating man and the human community to the three members of the social organism. The economy has, of itself, taken on quite definite forms in recent times. Through one-sided efficiency it has exerted an especially powerful influence on human life. Until now the other two members of society have not been in a position to properly integrate themselves in the social organism with the same certitude and according to their own laws. It is therefore necessary that each individual, in the place where he happens to be, undertakes to work for social formation based on the sensibilities described above. It is inherent in these attempts at solving the social questions that in the present and in the immediate future each individual has his social task.
[ 15 ] The first member of the social organism, the economy, depends primarily on nature, just as the individual, in respect to what he can make of himself through education and experience, depends on the aptitudes of his spiritual and physical organisms. This natural base simply impresses itself on the economy, and thereby on the entire social organism. It is there and cannot be affected essentially by any social organization, by any socialization. It must constitute the foundation of the social organism, as the human being's aptitudes in various areas, his natural physical and spiritual abilities, must constitute the foundation of his education. Every attempt at socialization, at giving human society an economic structure, must take the natural base into account. This elementary, primitive element which binds the human being to a certain piece of nature constitutes the foundation for the circulation of goods, all human labour and every form of cultural-spiritual life. It is necessary to take the relationship of the social organism to its natural base into consideration, just as it is necessary to take the relationship of the individual to his aptitudes into consideration where the learning process is concerned. This can be made clear by citing extreme cases. In certain regions of the earth, where the banana is an easily accessible food, what is taken into consideration is the labour which must be expended in order to transfer the bananas from their place of origin to a certain destination and convert them into items of consumption. If the human labour which must be expended in order to make the bananas consumer items for society is compared with the labour which must be expended in Central Europe to do the same with wheat, it will be seen that the labour necessary for the bananas is at least three hundred times less than for the wheat. [ 16 ] Of course that is an extreme case. Nevertheless, such differences in the required amount of labour in relation to the natural base are also present in the branches of production which are represented in any European society,- not as radically as with the bananas and wheat, but the differences do exist. It is thereby substantiated that the amount of labour power which men must bring to the economic process is conditioned by the natural base of their economy. In Germany, for example, in regions of average fertility, the wheat yield is approximately seven to eight times the amount sown; in Chile the yield is twelvefold, in northern Mexico seventeenfold, and in Peru twentyfold.*Page 61 Carl Jentsch Volkswirtschaftslehre (Economics) published 1895.
[ 17 ] The entire homogeneous entity consisting of processes which begin with man's relation to nature and continue through his activities in transforming the products of nature into consumable goods, all these processes, and only these, comprise the economic member of a healthy social organism. This member is comparable to the head system of the human organism which conditions individual aptitudes and, just as this head-system is dependent on the lung-heart system, the economic system is dependent on human labour. But the head cannot independently regulate breathing; nor should the human labour system be regulated by the same forces which activate the economy.
[ 18 ] The human being is engaged in economic activity in his own interests. These are based on his spiritual needs and on the needs of his soul. How these interests can be most suitably approached within a social organism so that the individual can best satisfy his interests through the social organism and also be economically active to the best advantage, is a question which must be resolved in practice within the various economic facilities. This can only happen if the interests are able to freely assert themselves, and if the will and possibility arise to do what is necessary to satisfy them. The origin of the interests lies beyond the circle which circumscribes economic affairs. They develop together with the development of the human soul and body. The task of economic life is to establish facilities in order to satisfy them. These facilities should be exclusively concerned with the production and interchange of commodities, that is, of goods which acquire value through human need. The commodity has value through the person who consumes it. Due to the fact that the commodity acquires its value through the consumer, its position in the social organism is completely different from the other things which the human being, as a member of this organism, values. The economy, within the circumference of which the production, inter-change and consumption of commodities belong, should be considered without preconceptions. The essential difference between the person-to-person relationship in which one produces commodities for the other, and the rights relationship as such will be evident. Careful consideration will lead to the conviction and the practical requirement that in the social organism legal rights must be completely separated from the economic sector. The activities which are to be carried out in the facilities which serve the production and interchange of commodities are not conducive to the best possible influence on the area of human rights. In the economy one individual turns to another individual because one serves the interests of the other, but the relation of one person to another is fundamentally different in the area of human rights.
[ 19 ] It might seem that the required distinction would be sufficiently realized if the legal element, which must also exist in the relations between the persons engaged in the economy, be provided for in it. Such a belief has no foundation in reality. The individual can only correctly experience the legal relation which must exist between himself and others when he does not experience this relation in the economic area, but in an area which is completely separate from it. Therefore, an area must develop in the social organism alongside the economy and independent of it, in which the rights element is cultivated and administered. The rights element is, moreover, that of the political domain, of the state. If men carry over their economic interests into the legislation and administration of the rights-state, then the resulting rights will only be the expression of these economic interests. When the rights-state manages the economy it loses the ability to regulate human rights. Its acts and facilities must serve the human need for commodities; they are therefore diverted from the impulses which correspond to human rights.
[ 20 ] The healthy social organism requires an autonomous political state as the second member alongside the economic sector. In the autonomous economic sector, through the forces of economic life, people will develop facilities which will best serve the production and interchange of commodities. In the political state facilities will develop which will orient the mutual relations between persons and groups in a way which corresponds to human rights-awareness.
[ 21 ] This viewpoint, which advocates the complete separation of rights-state and economy, is one which corresponds to the realities of life. The same cannot be said for the viewpoint which would merge the economic and rights functions. Those who are active in the economic sector do, of course, possess a rights-awareness; but their participation in legislative and administrative processes will derive exclusively from this rights-awareness only if their judgement in this area occurs within the framework of a rights-state which does not occupy itself with economic matters. Such a rights-state has its own legislative and administrative bodies, both structured according to the principles which derive from the modern rights awareness. It will be structured according to the impulses in human consciousness nowadays referred to as democratic. The economic area will form its legislative and administrative bodies in accordance with economic impulses. The necessary contact between the responsible persons of the legal and economic bodies will ensue in a manner similar to that at present practised by the governments of sovereign states. Through this formation the developments in one body will be able to have the necessary effect on developments in the other. As things are now this effect is hindered by one area trying to develop in itself what should flow toward it from the other.
[ 22 ] The economy is subject, on the one hand, to the conditions of the natural base (climate, regional geography, mineral wealth and so forth) and, on the other hand, it is dependent upon the legal conditions which the state imposes between the persons or groups engaged in economic activity. The boundaries of what economic activity can and should encompass are therefore laid out. Just as nature imposes prerequisites from the outside on the economic process which those engaged in economic activity take for granted as something upon which they must build this economy, so should everything which underlies the legal relationship between persons be regulated, in a healthy social organism, by a rights-state which, like the natural base, is autonomous in its relation to the economy.
[ 23 ] In the social organism that has evolved through the history of mankind and which, by means of the machine age and the modern capitalistic economic form, has given the social movement its characteristic stamp, economic activity encompasses more than is good for a healthy social organism. In today's economic system, in which only commodities should circulate, human labour-power and rights circulate as well. In the economic process of today, which is based on the division of labour, not only are commodities exchanged for commodities, but commodities are exchanged for both labour and for rights. (I call commodity everything which has been prepared by human activity for consumption and brought to a certain locality for this purpose. Although this description may be objectionable or seem insufficient to some economists, it can nevertheless be useful for an understanding of just what should belong to economic activity.t3It is not the task of a work which intends to serve life to give definitions which originate in a theory, but to contribute ideas which illustrate the processes taking place in reality. ‘Commodity’ in this sense indicates something which the human being experiences; any other concept of ‘commodity’ omits or adds something, so that the concept does not correspond to the living process of reality. ) When someone acquires a piece of land through purchase, the process must be considered an exchange of the land for commodities, represented by the purchase money. The land itself, however, does not act as a commodity in economic life. Its position is based on the right of a person to use it. This right is essentially different from the relationship in which the producer of a commodity finds himself. This relationship, by its very nature, does not overlap with the completely different type of person-to-person relationship which results from the fact that someone has the exclusive use of a piece of land. The owner puts those persons who earn their living on the land as his employees, or those who must live on it, in a position of dependence on him. The exchange of real commodities which are produced or consumed does not cause a dependence which has the same effect as this personal kind of relationship.
[ 24 ] Looking at this fact of life impartially, one sees clearly that it must find expression in the institutions of the entire social organism. As long as commodities are exchanged for other commodities in the economic sphere, the value of these commodities is determined independently of the legal relations between persons or groups. As soon as commodities are exchanged for rights, however, the legal relations themselves are affected. It is not a question of the exchange itself. This is a necessary, vital element of the contemporary social organism based on its division of labour; the problem is that through the exchange of rights for commodities the rights become commodities when they originate within the economic sphere. This can only be avoided by the existence of facilities in the social organism which, on the one hand, have the exclusive function of activating the circulation of commodities in the most expedient manner, and, on the other hand, facilities which regulate the rights, inherent in the commodity exchange process, of those individuals who produce, trade and consume. These rights are essentially no different from other rights of a personal nature which exist independently of the commodity exchange process. If I injure or benefit my fellow-man through the sale of a commodity, this belongs in the same social category as an injury or benefit through an act or omission not directly related to commodity exchange.
[ 25 ] The individual's way of life is influenced by rights institutions acting together with economic interests. In a healthy social organism these influences must come from two different directions. In the economic organization formal training, together with experience, is to provide management with the necessary insights. Through law and administration in the rights organization the necessary rights-awareness, in respect to the relations of individuals, or groups of individuals, to each other will be realized. The economic organization will allow persons with similar professional or consumer interests, or with similar needs of other kinds, to unite in cooperative associations which, through reciprocal activities, will underlie the entire economy. This organization will structure itself on an associative foundation and on the interrelations between associations. The associations will engage in purely economic activities. The legal basis for their work is provided by the rights organization. When such economic associations are able to make their economic interests felt in the representative and administrative bodies of the economic organization, they will not feel the need to pressure the legislative or administrative leadership of the rights-state (for example, farmers' and industrialists' lobbies, economically orientated social democrats) in order to attain there what is not attainable within the economic sector. If the rights state is not active in any economic field, then it will only establish facilities which derive from the rights awareness of the persons involved. Even if the same individuals who are active in the economic area also participate in the representation of the rights-state, which would of course be the case, no economic influence can be exerted on the rights sector, due to the formation of separate economic and legal systems. Such influence undermines the health of the social organism, as it can also be undermined when the state organization itself manages branches of the economic sector and when representatives of economic interests determine laws in accordance with those interests.
[ 26 ] Austria offered a typical example of the fusion of the economic and rights sectors with the constitution it adopted in the eighteen-sixties. The representatives of the imperial assembly of this territorial union were elected from the ranks of the four economic branches: The land owners, the chamber of commerce, the cities, markets and industrial areas, and the rural communities. It is clear from this composition of the representative assembly that they thought a rights system would ensue by allowing economic interests to exert themselves. Certainly the divergent forces of its many nationalities contributed a great deal to Austria's disintegration. It is equally certain, however, that a rights organization functioning alongside the economy would have enabled the development of a form of society in which the co-existence of the various nationalities would have been possible.
[ 27 ] Nowadays people interested in public life usually direct their attention to matters of secondary importance. They do this because their thinking habits induce them to consider the social organism as a uniform entity. A suitable elective process for such an entity is not to be found. Regardless of the elective process employed, economic interests and the impulses emanating from the rights sector will conflict with each other in the representative bodies. This conflict must result in extreme social agitation. Priority must be given today to the all-important objective of working toward a drastic separation of the economy from the rights-organization. As this separation becomes a reality, the separating organizations will, each according to their own principles, find the best means of choosing their legislators and administrators. This question of how to choose such representatives, although as such of fundamental significance, is secondary compared to the other pressing decisions which must be made today. Where old conditions still exist, these new forms could be developed from them. Where the old has already disintegrated, or is in the process of doing so, individuals or groups of individuals should take the initiative in attempting to reorganize society in the indicated direction. To expect an overnight transformation is seen even by reasonable socialists as unrealistic. They expect the healing process which they desire to be gradual and relevant. However, that the historical human evolutionary forces of today make a rational desire for a new social structure necessary is perfectly obvious to every objective person who observes current events.
[ 28 ] He who considers ‘practical’ only what he has become accustomed to within the limits of his own horizons, will consider what is presented here as ‘impractical’. If he is not able to change his attitude however, and has influence in some area, his actions will not contribute to the healing, but to the continued degeneration of the social organism, just as the deeds of people of like mind have contributed to present conditions.
[ 29 ] The endeavours which have already begun to be realized by those in authority to turn certain economic functions (post office, railroads, etc.) over to the state must be reversed; the state must be relieved of all economic functions. Thinkers who like to believe that they are on the road to a healthy social organism carry these efforts at nationalization to their logically extreme conclusions. They desire the socialization of all economic means, insofar as they are means of production. Healthy development, however, requires that the economy be autonomous and the political state be able, through the process of law, to affect economic organizations in such a way that the individual does not feel that his integration in the social organism is in conflict with his rights-awareness.
[ 30 ] It is possible to see how the ideas presented here are based on the realities of the human situation by directing one's attention to the physical labour which the human being performs for the social organism. Within the capitalistic economic form, this labour has been incorporated into the social organism in such a way that it is bought like a commodity from the worker by his employer. An exchange takes place between money (representing commodities) and labour. But such an exchange cannot, in reality, take place. It only appears to do so.t4It is not only possible for processes in life to be explained falsely, they can also occur falsely. Money and labour are not inter-changeable values as are money and the products of labour. Therefore, if I give money for labour I do something false. I create a deception. In reality, I can only give money for the products of labour. In reality, the employer receives commodities from the worker, which can only come into existence by the worker devoting his labour-power to their creation. The worker receives one part of the equivalent value of these commodities and the employer the other. The production of commodities results from the cooperation of the employer and the employed. Only the product of their joint action passes into economic circulation. A legal relationship between worker and entrepreneur is necessary for the production of the commodity. Capitalism, however, is capable of converting this relationship into one which is determined by the economic supremacy of the employer over the worker. In the healthy social organism it will be apparent that labour cannot be paid for. It cannot attain an economic value through equivalence with a commodity. These, produced by labour, acquire value through equivalence with other commodities. The kind and amount of work as well as the way in which the individual performs it for the maintenance of the social organism, must be determined by his own abilities as well as the requisites for a decent human existence. This is only possible if the determination is carried out by the political state independently of economic management.
[ 31 ] Through this determination the commodity will acquire a value basis which is comparable to that which exists in the conditions imposed by nature. As the value of a commodity increases in relation to another commodity due to the acquisition of the raw materials necessary for its production becoming more difficult, so must its value also be dependent upon the kind and amount of labour which may be expended for its production in accordance with rights legislation.t5Such a relationship of labour to rights legislation will compel the economic associations to accept what is ‘just’ as a precondition. Thereby a condition will be attained in which the economic organization is dependent on people, and not vice-versa. [ 32 ] In this way the economy becomes subject to two essential conditions: that of the natural base, which humanity must take as it is given, and that of the rights base, which should be created through a rights-awareness with roots in a political state independent of economic interests.
[ 33 ] It is evident that by managing the social organism in this way, economic prosperity will increase and decrease according to the amount of labour rights-awareness decides to expend. In a healthy social organism it is necessary that economic prosperity be dependent in this way, for only such dependence can prevent man from being so consumed by economic life that he can no longer consider his existence worthy of human dignity. And, in truth, all the turmoil in the social organism results from the feeling that existence is unworthy of human dignity.
[ 34 ] A comparison with the means employed to improve the natural base can be used to find possible means of avoiding steep declines in prosperity as an effect of the rights sector's measures.
A low yield soil can be made more productive through the use of technical means; similarly, if prosperity declines excessively the type and amount of labour can be modified. This modification should not emanate directly from economic circles, but from the insight which can develop in a rights organisation which is independent of economic life.
[ 35 ] Everything which occurs in the social organization due to economic activity and rights-awareness is influenced by what emanates from a third source: the individual abilities of each human being. This includes the greatest spiritual accomplishments as well as superior or inferior physical aptitudes. What derives from this source must be introduced into the healthy social organism in quite a different manner than the exchange of commodities or what emanates from the state. This introduction can only be effected in a sound manner if it is left to man's free receptivity and the impulses which come from individual abilities. The human efforts and achievements which result from such abilities are, to a great extent, deprived of the true essence of their being if they are influenced by economic interests or the state organization. This essence can only exist in the forces which human effort and achievement must develop of and by themselves. Free receptivity, the only suitable means, is paralysed when the social integration of these efforts and achievements is directly conditioned by economic life or organized by the state. There is only one possible healthy form of development for spiritual life: what it produces shall be the result of its own impulses and a relationship of mutual understanding shall exist between itself and the recipients of its achievements. (The development of the individual abilities present in society is connected to the development of spiritual life by countless fine threads.)
[ 36 ] The conditions described here for the healthy development of spiritual-cultural life are not recognized today because powers of observation have been clouded by the fusion of a large part of this life with the political state. This fusion has come about in the course of the past centuries and we have grown accustomed to it. There is talk, of course, of ‘scientific and educational freedom’. It is taken for granted however, that the political state should administer the ‘free science’ and the ‘free education’.
It is not understood that in this way the state makes spiritual life dependent on state requirements. People think that the state can provide the educational facilities and that the teachers who occupy them can develop culture and spiritual life ‘freely’ in them. This opinion ignores how closely related the content of spiritual life is to the innermost essence of the human being in which it is developing, and how this development can only be free when it is introduced into the social organism through the impulses which originate in spiritual life itself, and through no others. Through fusion with the state, not only the administration of science and the part of spiritual life connected with it has been determined, but the content as well. Of course what mathematics or physics produce cannot be directly influenced by the state. But the history of the cultural sciences shows that they have become reflections of their representatives' relations to the state and of state requirements. Due to this phenomenon, the contemporary scientifically oriented concepts which dominate spiritual life affect the proletarian as ideology. He has noticed how certain aspects of human thought are determined by state requirements which correspond to the interests of the ruling classes. The thinking proletarian saw therein a reflection of material interests as well as a battle of conflicting interests. This created the feeling that all spiritual life is ideology, a reflection of economic organization.
[ 37 ] This desolating view of human spiritual life ceases when the feeling can arise that in the spiritual sphere a self-containing reality, transcending the material, is at work. It is impossible for such a feeling to arise when spiritual life is not freely self-developing and administering within the social organism. Only those persons who are active in the development and administration of spiritual life have the strength to secure its appropriate place in the social organism. Art, science, philosophical world-views, and all that goes with them, need just such an independent position in human society, for in spiritual life everything is interrelated. The freedom of one cannot flourish without the freedom of the other. Although the content of mathematics and physics cannot be directly influenced by state requirements, what develops from them, what people think of their value, what effects their cultivation can have on the rest of spiritual life, and much more, is conditioned by these requirements when the state administers branches of spiritual life. It is very different if a teacher of the lowest school grades follows the impulses of the state or if he receives these impulses from a spiritual life which is self-contained. The Social Democrats have merely inherited the habits of thought and the customs of the ruling classes in this respect. Their ideal is to include spiritual life in social institutions which are built upon economic principles. If they succeed in reaching their goal, they will only have continued along the path of spiritual depreciation. They were correct, although one-sided, in their demand that religion be a private affair. In a healthy social organism all spiritual life must be, in respect to the state and the economy, a ‘private affair’. But the social democrats' motive in wanting to transfer religion to the private sector is not a desire to create a position within the social organism where a spiritual institution would develop in a more desirable, worthier manner than it can under state influence. They are of the opinion that the social organism should only cultivate with its own means its own necessities of life. And religious values do not belong to this category. A branch of spiritual life cannot flourish when it is unilaterally removed from the public sector in this way, if the other spiritual branches remain fettered. Modern humanity's religious life will only develop its soul-sustaining strength together with all the other liberated branches of spiritual life.
[ 38 ] Not only the creation but also the reception by humanity of this spiritual life must be freely determined in accordance with the soul's necessities. Teachers, artists and such whose only direct connection with a legislature or an administration is with those which have their origin in spiritual life itself, will be able, through their actions, to inspire the development of a receptivity for their efforts and achievements amongst individuals who are protected by a self-reliant, independent political state from being forced to exist only for work, and which guarantees their right to a leisure that can awaken in them an appreciation of spiritual values. Those persons who imagine themselves to be ‘practical’ may object that people would pass their leisure time drinking and that illiteracy would result if the state occupied itself with the right to leisure and if school attendance were left to free human common sense. Let these ‘pessimists’ wait and see what will happen when the world is no longer under their influence all too often determined by a certain feeling which, whispering in their ear, softly reminds them of how they use their leisure time, what they needed to acquire a little ‘learning’. They cannot imagine the power of enthusiasm which a really self-contained spiritual life can have in the social organism, because the fettered one they know cannot exert such an enthusiastic influence over them.
[ 39 ] Both the political state and the economy will receive the spiritual performance they require from a self-administered spiritual organism. Furthermore, practical economic training will reach full effectiveness through free cooperation with this organism. People who have received the appropriate training will be able to vitalize their economic experience through the strength which will come to them from liberated spiritual values. Those with economic experience will also work for the spiritual organization, where their abilities are most needed.
[ 40 ] In the political area, the necessary insights will be formed through the activation of spiritual values. The worker will acquire, through the influence of such spiritual values, a feeling of satisfaction in respect to the function his labour performs in the social organism. He will realize that without management organizing labour in a meaningful way the social organism could not support him. He will sense the need for cooperation between his work and the organizing abilities which derive from the development of individual human abilities. Within the framework of the political state he will acquire the rights which insure him his share of the commodities he produces; and he will freely grant an appropriate share of the proceeds for the formation of the spiritual values which flow toward him. In the field of spiritual-cultural life, it will become possible for those engaged in creative activities to live from the proceeds of their efforts. What someone practices in the field of spiritual life is his own affair. What he is able to contribute to the social organism however, will be recompensed by those who have need of his spiritual contribution. Whoever is not able to support himself within the spiritual organization from such compensation will have to transfer his activities to the political or economic sphere of activity.
[ 41 ] The technical ideas that derive from spiritual life flow into the economic sector. They derive from spiritual life even when they come directly from members of the state or economic sectors. All organizational ideas and forces which fecundate the economic and state sectors originate in spiritual life. Compensation for this input to both social sectors will come either through the free appreciation of the beneficiaries, or through laws determined by the political state. Tax laws will provide this political state with what it needs to maintain itself. These will be devised through a harmonization of ‘rights awareness’ and economic requirements.
[ 42 ] In a healthy social organism the autonomous spiritual sector must function alongside the political and economic sectors. The evolutionary forces in modern mankind point toward a triformation of this organism. As long as society was essentially governed by instinctive forces, the urge for this formation did not arise. What actually derived from three sources functioned somewhat torpidly together in society. Modern times demand the individual's conscious participation in this organism. This consciousness can only give the individual's behaviour and whole life a healthy form if it is oriented from three sides. Modern man, in the unconscious depths of his soul, strives toward this orientation; and what manifests itself in the social movement is only the dim reflection of this striving.
[ 43 ] Toward the end of the eighteenth century, under different circumstances than those under which we at present live, a call for a new formation of the human social organism arose from the depths of human nature. The motto of this reorganization consisted of three words: fraternity, equality, liberty. Anyone with an objective mind, who considers the realities of human social development with healthy sensibilities, cannot help but be sympathetic to the meaning behind these words. However, during the course of the nineteenth century, some very clever thinkers took pains to point out the impossibility of realizing these ideals of fraternity, equality and liberty in a uniform social organism. They felt certain that these three impulses would be contradictory if practised in society. It was clearly demonstrated, for example, that individual freedom would not be possible if the equality principle were practised. One is obliged to agree with those who observed these contradictions; nevertheless, one must at the same time feel sympathy for each of these ideals.
[ 44 ] These contradictions exist because the true social meaning of these three ideals only becomes evident through an understanding of the necessary triformation of the social organism. The three members are not to be united and centralized in some abstract, theoretical parliamentary body. Each of the three members is to be centralized within itself, and then, through their mutual cooperation, the unity of the overall social organism can come about. In real life, the apparent contradictions act as a unifying element. An apprehension of the living social organism can be attained when one is able to observe the true formation of this organism with respect to fraternity, equality and liberty. It will then be evident that human cooperation in economic life must be based on the fraternity which is inherent in associations. In the second member, the civil rights system, which is concerned with purely human, person-to-person relations, it is necessary to strive for the realization of the idea of equality. And in the relatively independent spiritual sector of the social organism it is necessary to strive for the realization of the idea of freedom. Seen in this light, the real worth of these three ideals becomes clear. They cannot be realized in a chaotic society, but only in a healthy, threefold social organism. No abstract, centralized social structure is able to realize the ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity in such disarrangement; but each of the three sectors of the social organism can draw strength from one of these impulses and cooperate in a positive manner with the other sectors.
[ 45 ] Those individuals who demanded and worked for the realization of the three ideas—liberty, equality and fraternity—as well as those who later followed in their footsteps, were able to dimly discern in which direction modern humanity's forces of evolution are pointing. But they have not been able to overcome their belief in the uniform state, so their ideas contain a contradictory element. Nevertheless, they remained faithful to the contradictory, for in the subconscious depths of their souls the impulse toward the triformation of the social organism, in which the triplicity of their ideas can attain to a higher unity, continued to exert itself. The clearly discernible social facts of contemporary life demand that the forces of evolution, which in modern mankind strive toward this triformation, be turned into conscious will.
II. Die vom Leben geforderten wirklichkeitsgemässen Lösungsversuche für die sozialen Fragen und Notwendigkeiten
[ 1 ] Man kann das Charakteristische, das gerade zu der besondern Gestalt der sozialen Frage in der neueren Zeit geführt hat, wohl so aussprechen, daß man sagt: Das Wirtschaftsleben, von der Technik getragen, der moderne Kapitalismus, sie haben mit einer gewissen naturhaften Selbstverständlichkeit gewirkt und die moderne Gesellschaft in eine gewisse innere Ordnung gebracht. Neben der Inanspruchnahme der menschlichen Aufmerksamkeit für dasjenige, was Technik und Kapitalismus gebracht haben, ist die Aufmerksamkeit abgelenkt worden für andere Zweige, andere Gebiete des sozialen Organismus. Diesen muß ebenso notwendig vom menschlichen Bewußtsein aus die rechte Wirksamkeit angewiesen werden, wenn der soziale Organismus gesund sein soll.
[ 2 ] Ich darf, um dasjenige, was hier gerade als treibende Impulse einer umfassenden, allseitigen Beobachtung über die soziale Frage charakterisiert werden soll, deutlich zu sagen, vielleicht von einem Vergleich ausgehen. Aber es wird zu beachten sein, daß mit diesem Vergleich nichts anderes gemeint sein soll als eben ein Vergleich. Ein solcher kann unterstützen das menschliche Verständnis, um es gerade in diejenige Richtung zu bringen, welche notwendig ist, um sich Vorstellungen zu machen über die Gesundung des sozialen Organismus. Wer von dem hier eingenommenen Gesichtspunkt betrachten muß den kompliziertesten natürlichen Organismus, den menschlichen Organismus, der muß seine Aufmerksamkeit darauf richten, daß die ganze Wesenheit dieses menschlichen Organismus drei nebeneinander wirksame Systeme aufzuweisen hat, von denen jedes mit einer gewissen Selbständigkeit wirkt. Diese drei nebeneinander wirksamen Systeme kann man etwa in folgender Weise kennzeichnen. Im menschlichen natürlichen Organismus wirkt als ein Gebiet dasjenige System, welches in sich schließt Nervenleben und Sinnesleben. Man könnte es auch nach dem wichtigsten Gliede des Organismus, wo Nerven- und Sinnesleben gewissermaßen zentralisiert sind, den Kopf-Organismus nennen.
[ 3 ] Als zweites Glied der menschlichen Organisation hat man anzuerkennen, wenn man ein wirkliches Verständnis für sie erwerben will, das, was ich nennen möchte das rhythmische System. Es besteht aus Atmung, Blutzirkulation, aus all dem, was sich ausdrückt in rhythmischen Vorgängen des menschlichen Organismus.
[ 4 ] Als drittes System hat man dann anzuerkennen alles, was als Organe und Tätigkeiten zusammenhängt mit dem eigentlichen Stoffwechsel.
[ 5 ] In diesen drei Systemen ist enthalten alles dasjenige, was in gesunder Art unterhält, wenn es aufeinander organisiert ist, den Gesamtvorgang des menschlichen Organismus.1Die hier gemeinte Gliederung ist niche eine solche nach räumlich abgrenzbaren Leibesgliedern, sondern eine solche nach Tätigkeiten (Funktionen) des Organismus «Kopforganismus» ist nur zu gebrauchen, wenn man sich bewusst ist, dass im Kopfe in erster Linie das Nerven-Sinnesleben zentralisiert ist. Doch ist natürlich im Kopfe auch die rhythmische und die Stoffwechseltätigkeit vorhanden ist. Trotzdem sind die drei Arten der Tätigkeit ihrer Wesenheit nach streng voreinander geschieden.
[ 6 ] Ich habe versucht, in vollem Einklange mit all dem, was naturwissenschaftliche Forschung schon heute sagen kann, diese Dreigliederung des menschlichen natürlichen Organismus wenigstens zunächst skizzenweise in meinem Buche «Von Seelenrätseln» zu charakterisieren. Ich bin mir klar darüber, daß Biologie, Physiologie, die gesamte Naturwissenschaft mit Bezug auf den Menschen in der allernächsten Zeit zu einer solchen Betrachtung des menschlichen Organismus hindrängen werden, welche durchschaut, wie diese drei Glieder - Kopfsystem, Zirkulationssystem oder Brustsystem und Stoffwechselsystem - dadurch den Gesamtvorgang im menschlichen Organismus aufrechterhalten, daß sie in einer gewissen Selbständigkeit wirken, daß nicht eine absolute Zentralisation des menschlichen Organismus vorliegt, daß auch jedes dieser Systeme ein besonderes, für sich bestehendes Verhältnis zur Außenwelt hat. Das Kopfsystem durch die Sinne, das Zirkulationssystem oder rhythmische System durch die Atmung, und das Stoffwechselsystem durch die Ernährungs- und Bewegungsorgane.
[ 7 ] Man ist mit Bezug auf naturwissenschaftliche Methoden noch nicht ganz so weit, um dasjenige, was ich hier angedeutet habe, was aus geisteswissenschaftlichen Untergründen heraus für die Naturwissenschaft von mir zu verwerten gesucht worden ist, auch schon innerhalb der naturwissenschaftlichen Kreise selbst zur allgemeinen Anerkennung in einem solchen Grade zu bringen, wie das wünschenswert für den Erkenntnisfortschritt erscheinen kann. Das bedeutet aber: Unsere Denkgewohnheiten, unsere ganze Art, die Welt vorzustellen, ist noch nicht vollständig angemessen dem, was zum Beispiel im menschlichen Organismus sich als die innere Wesenheit des Naturwirkens darstellt. Man könnte nun wohl sagen: Nun ja, die Naturwissenschaft kann warten, sie wird nach und nach ihren Idealen zueilen, sie wird schon dahin kommen, solch eine Betrachtungsweise als die ihrige anzuerkennen. Aber mit Bezug auf die Betrachtung und namentlich das Wirken des sozialen Organismus kann man nicht warten. Da muß nicht nur bei irgendwelchen Fachmännern, sondern da muß in jeder Menschenseele - denn jede Menschenseele nimmt teil an der Wirksamkeit für den sozialen Organismus - wenigstens eine instinktive Erkenntnis von dem vorhanden sein, was diesem sozialen Organismus notwendig ist. Ein gesundes Denken und Empfinden, ein gesundes T Wollen und Begehren mit Bezug auf die Gestaltung des sozialen Organismus kann sich nur entwickeln, wenn man, sei es auch mehr oder weniger bloß instinktiv, sich klar darüber ist, daß dieser soziale Organismus, soll er gesund sein, ebenso dreigliedrig sein muß wie der natürliche Organismus.
[ 8 ] Es ist nun, seit Schäffle sein Buch geschrieben hat über den Bau des sozialen Organismus, versucht worden, Analogien aufzusuchen zwischen der Organisation eines Naturwesens - sagen wir, der Organisation des Menschen - und der menschlichen Gesellschaft als solcher. Man hat feststellen wollen, was im sozialen Organismus die Zelle ist, was Zellengefüge sind, was Gewebe sind und so weiter! Noch vor kurzem ist ja ein Buch erschienen von Meray, «Weltmutation», in dem gewisse naturwissenschaftliche Tatsachen und naturwissenschaftliche Gesetze einfach übertragen werden auf - wie man meint - den menschlichen Gesellschaftsorganismus. Mit all diesen Dingen, mit all diesen Analogie-Spielereien hat dasjenige, was hier gemeint ist, absolut nichts zu tun. Und wer meint, auch in diesen Betrachtungen werde ein solches Analogienspiel zwischen dem natürlichen Organismus und dem gesellschaftlichen getrieben, der wird dadurch nur beweisen, daß er nicht in den Geist des hier Gemeinten eingedrungen ist. Denn nicht wird hier angestrebt, irgendeine für naturwissenschaftliche Tatsachen passende Wahrheit herüber zu verpflanzen auf den sozialen Organismus; sondern das völlig andere, daß das menschliche Denken, das menschliche Empfinden lerne, das Lebensmögliche an der Betrachtung des naturgemäßen Organismus zu empfinden und dann diese Empfindungsweise anwenden könne auf den sozialen Organismus. Wenn man einfach das, was man glaubt gelernt zu haben am natürlichen Organismus, überträgt auf den sozialen Organismus, wie es oft geschieht, so zeigt man damit nur, daß man sich nicht die Fähigkeiten aneignen will, den sozialen Organismus ebenso selbständig, ebenso für sich zu betrachten, nach dessen eigenen Gesetzen zu forschen, wie man dies nötig hat für das Verständnis des natürlichen Organismus. Indem Augenblicke, wo man wirklich sich objektiv, wie sich der Naturforscher gegenüberstellt dem natürlichen Organismus, dem sozialen Organismus in seiner Selbständigkeit gegenüberstellt, um dessen eigene Gesetze zu empfinden, in diesem Augenblicke hört gegenüber dem Ernst der Betrachtung jedes Analogiespiel auf.
[ 9 ] Man könnte auch denken, der hier gegebenen Darstellung liege der Glaube zugrunde, der soziale Organismus solle von einer grauen, der Naturwissenschaft nachgebildeten Theorie aus «aufgebaut» werden. Das aber liegt dem, wovon hier gesprochen wird, so ferne wie nur möglich. Auf ganz anderes soll hingedeutet werden. Die gegenwärtige geschichtliche Menschheitskrisis fordert, daß gewisse Empfindungen entstehen in jedem einzelnen Menschen, daß die Anregung zu diesen Empfindungen von dem Erziehungs- und Schulsystem so gegeben werde, wie diejenige zur Erlernung der vier Rechnungsarten. Was bisher ohne die bewußte Aufnahme in das menschliche Seelenleben die alten Formen des sozialen Organismus ergeben hat, das wird in der Zukunft nicht mehr wirksam sein. Es gehört zu den Entwickelungsimpulsen, die von der Gegenwart an neu in das Menschenleben eintreten wollen, daß die angedeuteten Empfindungen von dem einzelnen Menschen so gefordert werden, wie seit langem eine gewisse Schulbildung gefordert wird. Daß man gesund empfinden lernen müsse, wie die Kräfte des sozialen Organismus wirken sollen, damit dieser lebensfähig sich erweist, das wird, von der Gegenwart an, von dem Menschen gefordert. Man wird sich ein Gefühl davon aneignen müssen, daß es ungesund, antisozial ist, nicht sich mit solchen Empfindungen in diesen Organismus hineinstellen zu wollen.
[ 10 ] Man kann heute von «Sozialisierung» als von dem reden hören, was der Zeit nötig ist. Diese Sozialisierung wird kein Heilungsprozeß, sondern ein Kurpfuscherprozeß am sozialen Organismus sein, vielleicht sogar ein Zerstörungsprozeß, wenn nicht in die menschlichen Herzen, in die menschlichen Seelen einzieht wenigstens die instinktive Erkenntnis von der Notwendigkeit der Dreigliederung des sozialen Organismus. Dieser soziale Organismus muß, wenn er gesund wirken soll, drei solche Glieder gesetzmäßig ausbilden.
[ 11 ] Eines dieser Glieder ist das Wirtschaftsleben. Hier soll mit seiner Betrachtung begonnen werden, weil es sich ja ganz augenscheinlich, alles übrige Leben beherrschend, durch die moderne Technik und den modernen Kapitalismus in die menschliche Gesellschaft hereingebildet hat. Dieses ökonomische Leben muß ein selbständiges Glied für sich innerhalb des sozialen Organismus sein, so relativ selbständig, wie das Nerven-Sinnes-System im menschlichen Organismus relativ selbständig ist. Zu tun hat es dieses Wirtschaftsleben mit all dem, was Warenproduktion, Warenzirkulation, Warenkonsum ist.
[ 12 ] Als zweites Glied des sozialen Organismus ist zu betrachten das Leben des öffentlichen Rechtes, das eigentliche politische Leben. Zu ihm gehört dasjenige, das man im Sinne des alten Rechtsstaates als das eigentliche Staatsleben bezeichnen könnte. Während es das Wirtschaftsleben mit all dem zu tun hat, was der Mensch braucht aus der Natur und aus seiner eigenen Produktion heraus, mit Waren, Warenzirkulation und Warenkonsum, kann es dieses zweite Glied des sozialen Organismus nur zu tun haben mit all dem, was sich aus rein menschlichen Untergründen heraus auf das Verhältnis des Menschen zum Menschen bezieht. Es ist wesentlich für die Erkenntnis der Glieder des sozialen Organismus, daß man weiß, welcher Unterschied besteht zwischen dem System des öffentlichen Rechtes, das es nur zu tun haben kann aus menschlichen Untergründen heraus mit dem Verhältnis von Mensch zu Mensch, und dem Wirtschafts-System, das es nur zu tun hat mit Warenproduktion, Warenzirkulation, Warenkonsum. Man muß dieses im Leben empfindend unterscheiden, damit sich als Folge dieser Empfindung das Wirtschafts- von dem Rechtsleben scheidet, wie im menschlichen natürlichen Organismus die Tätigkeit der Lunge zur Verarbeitung der äußeren Luft sich abscheidet von den Vorgängen im Nerven-Sinnesleben.
[ 13 ] Als drittes Glied, das ebenso selbständig sich neben die beiden andern Glieder hinstellen muß, hat man im sozialen Organismus das aufzufassen, was sich auf das geistige Leben bezieht. Noch genauer könnte man sagen, weil vielleicht die Bezeichnung «geistige Kultur» oder alles das was sich auf das geistige Leben bezieht durchaus nicht ganz genau ist alles dasjenige was beruht auf der natürlichen Begabung des einzelnen menschlichen Individuums was hineinkommen muß in den sozialen Organismus auf Grundlage dieser natürlichen, sowohl der geistigen wie der physischen Begabung des einzelnen menschlichen Individuums. Das erste System, das Wirtschaftssystem hat es zu tun mit all dem, was da sein muß damit der Mensch sein materielles Verhältnis zur Außenwelt regeln kann Das zweite System hat es zu tun mit dem was da sein muß im sozialen Organismus wegen des Verhältnisses von Mensch zu Mensch Das dritte System hat zu tun mit all dem was hervor sprießen muß und eingegliedert werden muß in den sozialen Qrganismus aus der einzelnen menschlichen Individualität heraus.
[ 14 ] Ebenso wahr, wie es ist, daß moderne Technik und moderner Kapitalismus unserm gesellschaftlichen Leben eigentlich in der neueren Zeit das Gepräge gegeben haben, ebenso notwendig ist es, daß diejenigen Wunden, die von dieser Seite her notwendig der menschlichen Gesellschaft geschlagen worden sind, dadurch geheilt werden, daß man den Menschen und das menschliche Gemeinschaftsleben in ein richtiges Verhältnis bringt zu den drei Gliedern dieses sozialen Organismus. Das Wirtschaftsleben hat einfach durch sich selbst in der neueren Zeit ganz bestimmte Formen angenommen. Es hat durch eine einseitige Wirksamkeit in das menschliche Leben sich besonders machtvoll hereingestellt. Die andern beiden Glieder des sozialen Lebens sind bisher nicht in der Lage gewesen, mit derselben Selbstverständlichkeit sich in der richtigen Weise nach ihren eigenen Gesetzen in den sozialen Organismus einzugliedern. Für sie ist es notwendig, daß der Mensch aus den oben angedeuteten Empfindungen heraus die soziale Gliederung vornimmt, jeder an seinem Orte; an dem Orte, an dem er gerade steht. Denn im Sinne derjenigen Lösungsversuche der sozialen Fragen, die hier gemeint sind, hat jeder einzelne Mensch seine soziale Aufgabe in der Gegenwart und in der nächsten Zukunft.
[ 15 ] Dasjenige, was das erste Glied des sozialen Organismus ist, das Wirtschaftsleben, das ruht zunächst auf der Naturgrundlage geradeso, wie der einzelne Mensch mit Bezug auf dasjenige, was er für sich durch Lernen, durch Erziehung, durch das Leben werden kann, ruht auf der Begabung seines geistigen und körperlichen Organismus. Diese Naturgrundlage drückt einfach dem Wirtschaftsleben und dadurch dem gesamten sozialen Organismus sein Gepräge auf. Aber diese Naturgrundlage ist da, ohne daß sie durch irgendeine soziale Organisation, durch irgendeine Sozialisierung in ursprünglicher Art getroffen werden kann. Sie muß dem Leben des sozialen Organismus so zugrunde gelegt werden, wie bei der Erziehung des Menschen zugrunde gelegt werden muß die Begabung, die er auf den verschiedenen Gebieten hat, seine natürliche körperliche und geistige Tüchtigkeit. Von jeder Sozialisierung, von jedem Versuche, dem menschlichen Zusammenleben eine wirtschaftliche Gestaltung zu geben, muß berücksichtigt werden die Naturgrundlage. Denn aller Warenzirkulation und auch aller menschlichen Arbeit und auch jeglichem geistigen Leben liegt zugrunde als ein erstes elementarisches Ursprüngliches dasjenige, was den Menschen kettet an ein bestimmtes Stück Natur. Man muß über den Zusammenhang des sozialen Organismus mit der Naturgrundlage denken, wie man mit Bezug auf Lernen beim einzelnen Menschen denken muß über sein Verhältnis zu seiner Begabung. Man kann gerade sich dieses klarmachen an extremen Fällen. Man braucht zum Beispiel nur zu bedenken, daß in gewissen Gebieten der Erde, wo die Banane ein naheliegendes Nahrungsmittel für die Menschen abgibt, in Betracht kommt für das menschliche Zusammenleben dasjenige an Arbeit, was aufgebracht werden muß, um die Banane von ihrer Ursprungsstätte aus an einen Bestimmungsort zu bringen und sie zu einem Konsummittel zu machen. Vergleicht man die menschliche Arbeit, die aufgebracht werden muß, um die Banane für die menschliche Gesellschaft konsumfähig zu machen, mit der Arbeit, die aufgebracht werden muß, etwa in unsern Gegenden Mitteleuropas, um den Weizen konsumfähig zu machen, so ist die Arbeit, die für die Banane notwendig ist, gering gerechnet, eine dreihundertmal kleinere als beim Weizen.
[ 16 ] Gewiß, das ist ein extremer Fall. Aber solche Unterschiede mit Bezug auf das notwendige Maß von Arbeit im Verhältnis zu der Naturgrundlage sind auch da unter den Produktionszweigen, die in irgendeinem sozialen Organismus Europas vertreten sind, - nicht in dieser radikalen Verschiedenheit wie bei Banane und Weizen, aber sie sind als Unterschiede da. So ist es im Wirtschaftsorganismus begründet, daß durch das Verhältnis des Menschen zur Naturgrundlage seines Wirtschaftens das Maß von Arbeitskraft bedingt ist, das er in den Wirtschaftsprozeß hineintragen muß. Und man braucht ja nur zum Beispiel zu vergleichen: in Deutschland, in Gegenden mit mittlerer Ertragsfähigkeit, ist ungefähr das Erträgnis der Weizenkultur so, daß das Sieben- bis Achtfache der Aussaat einkommt durch die Ernte; in Chile kommt das Zwölffache herein, in Nordmexiko kommt das Siebzehnfache ein, in Peru das Zwanzigfache. (Vergleiche Jentsch, Volkswirtschaftslehre, S.64.)
[ 17 ] Dieses ganze zusammengehörige Wesen, welches verläuft in Vorgängen, die beginnen mit dem Verhältnis des Menschen zur Natur, die sich fortsetzen in all dem, was der Mensch zu tun hat, um die Naturprodukte umzuwandeln und sie bis zur Konsumfähigkeit zu bringen, alle diese Vorgänge und nur diese umschließen für einen gesunden sozialen Organismus sein Wirtschaftsglied. Dieses steht im sozialen Organismus wie das Kopfsystem, von dem die individuellen Begabungen bedingt sind, im menschlichen Gesamtorganismus drinnen steht. Aber wie dieses Kopfsystem von dem Lungen-Herzsystem abhängig ist, so ist das Wirtschaftssystem von der menschlichen Arbeitsleistung abhängig. Wie nun aber der Kopf nicht selbständig die Atemregelung hervorbringen kann, so sollte das menschliche Arbeitssystem nicht durch die im Wirtschaftsleben wirksamen Kräfte selbst geregelt werden.
[ 18 ] In dem Wirtschaftsleben steht der Mensch durch seine Interessen darinnen. Diese haben ihre Grundlage in seinen seelischen und geistigen Bedürfnissen. Wie den Interessen am zweckmäßigsten entsprochen werden kann innerhalb eines sozialen Organismus, so daß der einzelne Mensch durch diesen Organismus in der bestmöglichen Art zur Befriedigung seines Interesses kommt, und er auch in vorteilhaftester Art sich in die Wirtschaft hineinstellen kann: diese Frage muß praktisch in den Einrichtungen des Wirtschaftskörpers gelöst sein. Das kann nur dadurch sein, daß die Interessen sich wirklich frei geltend machen können und daß auch der Wille und die Möglichkeit entstehen, das Nötige zu ihrer Befriedigung zu tun. Die Entstehung der Interessen liegt außerhalb des Kreises, der das Wirtschaftsleben umgrenzt. Sie bilden sich mit der Entfaltung des seelischen und natürlichen Menschenwesens. Daß Einrichtungen bestehen, sie zu befriedigen, ist die Aufgabe des Wirtschaftslebens. Diese Einrichtungen können es mit nichts anderem zu tun haben als allein mit der Herstellung und dem Tausch von Waren, das heißt von Gütern, die ihren Wert durch das menschliche Bedürfnis erhalten. Die Ware hat ihren Wert durch denjenigen, der sie verbraucht. Dadurch, daß die Ware ihren Wert durch den Verbraucher erhält, steht sie in einer ganz anderen Art im sozialen Organismus als anderes, das für den Menschen als Angehörigen dieses Organismus Wert hat. Man sollte unbefangen das Wirtschaftsleben betrachten, in dessen Umkreis Warenerzeugung, Warenaustausch und Warenverbrauch gehören. Man wird den wesenhaften Unterschied nicht bloß betrachtend bemerken, welcher besteht zwischen dem Verhältnis von Mensch zu Mensch, indem der eine für den anderen Waren erzeugt, und demjenigen, das auf einem Rechtsverhältnis beruhen muß. Man wird von der Betrachtung zu der praktischen Forderung kommen, daß im sozialen Organismus das Rechtsleben völlig von dem Wirtschaftsleben abgesondert gehalten werden muß. Aus den Tätigkeiten, welche die Menschen innerhalb der Einrichtungen zu entwickeln haben, die der Warenerzeugung und dem Warenaustausch dienen, können sich unmittelbar nicht die möglichst besten Impulse ergeben für die rechtlichen Verhältnisse, die unter den Menschen bestehen müssen. Innerhalb der Wirtschaftseinrichtungen wendet sich der Mensch an den Menschen, weil der eine dem Interesse des andern dient; grundverschieden davon ist die Beziehung, welche der eine Mensch zu dem andern innerhalb des Rechtslebens hat.
[ 19 ] Man könnte nun glauben, dieser vom Leben geforderten Unterscheidung wäre schon Genüge geschehen, wenn innerhalb der Einrichtungen, die dem Wirtschaftsleben dienen, auch für die Rechte gesorgt werde, welche in den Verhältnissen der in dieses Wirtschaftsleben hineingestellten Menschen zueinander bestehen müssen. - Ein solcher Glaube hat seine Wurzeln nicht in der Wirklichkeit des Lebens. Der Mensch kann nur dann das Rechtsverhältnis richtig erleben, das zwischen ihm und anderen Menschen bestehen muß, wenn er dieses Verhältnis nicht auf dem Wirtschaftsgebiet erlebt, sondern auf einem davon völlig getrennten Boden. Es muß deshalb im gesunden sozialen Organismus neben dem Wirtschaftsleben und in Selbständigkeit ein Leben sich entfalten, in dem die Rechte entstehen und verwaltet werden, die von Mensch zu Mensch bestehen. Das Rechtsleben ist aber dasjenige des eigentlichen politischen Gebietes, des Staates. Tragen die Menschen diejenigen Interessen, denen sie in ihrem Wirtschaftsleben dienen müssen, in die Gesetzgebung und Verwaltung des Rechtsstaates hinein, so werden die entstehenden Rechte nur der Ausdruck dieser wirtschaftlichen Interessen sein. Ist der Rechtsstaat selbst Wirtschafter, so verliert er die Fähigkeit, das Rechtsleben der Menschen zu regeln. Denn seine Maßnahmen und Einrichtungen werden dem menschlichen Bedürfnisse nach Waren dienen müssen; sie werden dadurch abgedrängt von den Impulsen, die auf das Rechtsleben gerichtet sind.
[ 20 ] Der gesunde soziale Organismus erfordert als zweites Glied neben dem Wirtschaftskörper das selbständige politische Staatsleben. In dem selbständigen Wirtschaftskörper werden die Menschen durch die Kräfte des wirtschaftlichen Lebens zu Einrichtungen kommen, welche der Warenerzeugung und dem Warenaustausch in der möglichst besten Weise dienen. In dem politischen Staatskörper werden solche Einrichtungen entstehen, welche die gegenseitigen Beziehungen zwischen Menschen und Menschengruppen in solcher Art orientieren, daß dem Rechtsbewußtsein des Menschen entsprochen wird.
[ 21 ] Der Gesichtspunkt, von dem aus hier die gekennzeichnete Forderung nach völliger Trennung des Rechtsstaates von dem Wirtschaftsgebiet gestellt wird, ist ein solcher, der im wirklichen Menschenleben drinnen liegt. Einen solchen Gesichtspunkt nimmt derjenige nicht ein, der Rechtsleben und Wirtschaftsleben miteinander verbinden will. Die im wirtschaftlichen Leben stehenden Menschen haben selbstverständlich das Rechtsbewußtsein; aber sie werden nur aus diesem heraus und nicht aus den wirtschaftlichen Interessen Gesetzgebung und Verwaltung im Sinne des Rechtes besorgen, wenn sie darüber zu urteilen haben in dem Rechtsstaat, der als solcher an dem Wirtschaftsleben keinen Anteil hat. Ein solcher Rechtsstaat hat seinen eigenen Gesetzgebungs- und Verwaltungskörper, die beide nach den Grundsätzen aufgebaut sind, welche sich aus dem Rechtsbewußtsein der neueren Zeit ergeben. Er wird aufgebaut sein auf den Impulsen im Menschheitsbewußtsein, die man gegenwärtig die demokratischen nennt. Das Wirtschaftsgebiet wird aus den Impulsen des Wirtschaftslebens heraus seine Gesetzgebungs- und Verwaltungskörperschaften bilden. Der notwendige Verkehr zwischen den Leitungen des Rechts- und Wirtschaftskörpers wird erfolgen annähernd wie gegenwärtig der zwischen den Regierungen souveräner Staatsgebiete. Durch diese Gliederung wird, was in dem einen Körper sich entfaltet, auf dasjenige, was im andern entsteht, die notwendige Wirkung ausüben können. Diese Wirkung wird dadurch gehindert, daß das eine Gebiet in sich selbst das entfalten will, was ihm von dem anderen zufließen soll.
[ 22 ] Wie das Wirtschaftsleben auf der einen Seite den Bedingungen der Naturgrundlage (Klima, geographische Beschaffenheit des Gebietes, Vorhandensein von Bodenschätzen und so weiter) unterworfen ist, so ist es auf der andern Seite von den Rechtsverhältnissen abhängig, welche der Staat zwischen den wirtschaftenden Menschen und Menschengruppen schafft. Damit sind die Grenzen dessen bezeichnet, was die Tätigkeit des Wirtschaftslebens umfassen kann und soll. Wie die Natur Vorbedingungen schafft, die außerhalb des Wirtschaftskreises liegen und die der wirtschaftende Mensch hinnehmen muß als etwas Gegebenes, auf das er erst seine Wirtschaft aufbauen kann, so soll alles, was im Wirtschaftsbereich ein Rechtsverhältnis begründet von Mensch zu Mensch, im gesunden sozialen Organismus durch den Rechtsstaat seine Regelung erfahren, der wie die Naturgrundlage als etwas dem Wirtschaftsleben selbständig Gegenüberstehendes sich entfaltet.
[ 23 ] In dem sozialen Organismus, der sich im bisherigen geschichtlichen Werden der Menschheit herausgebildet hat und der durch das Maschinenzeitalter und durch die moderne kapitalistische Wirtschaftsform zu dem geworden ist, was der sozialen Bewegung ihr Gepräge gibt, umfaßt das Wirtschaftsleben mehr, als es im gesunden sozialen Organismus umfassen soll. Gegenwärtig bewegt sich in dem wirtschaftlichen Kreislauf, in dem sich bloß Waren bewegen sollen, auch die menschliche Arbeitskraft, und es bewegen sich auch Rechte. Man kann gegenwärtig in dem Wirtschaftskörper, der auf der Arbeitsteilung beruht, nicht allein Waren tauschen gegen Waren, sondern durch denselben wirtschaftlichen Vorgang auch Waren gegen Arbeit und Waren gegen Rechte. (Ich nenne Ware jede Sache, die durch menschliche Tätigkeit zu dem geworden ist, als das sie an irgendeinem Orte, an den sie durch den Menschen gebracht wird, ihrem Verbrauch zugeführt wird. Mag diese Bezeichnung manchem Volkswirtschaftslehrer auch anstößig oder nicht genügend erscheinen, sie kann zur Verständigung über das, was dem Wirtschaftsleben angehören soll, ihre guten Dienste tun.2Es kommt eben bei einer Darlegung, die im Dienste das Lebens gemacht wird, nicht darauf an, Definitionen zu geben, die aus einer Theorie heraus stammen, sondern Ideen, die verbildlichen, was in der Wirklichkeit eine lebensvolle Rolle spielt. «Ware», im obigen Sinne gebraucht, weist auf etwas hin, was der Mensch erlebt; jeder andere Begriff von «Ware» lässt etwas weg oder fügt etwas hinzu, sodass sich der Begriff mit den Lebensvorgängen in ihrer wahren Wirklichkeit nicht deckt.) Wenn jemand durch Kauf ein Grundstück erwirbt, so muß das als ein Tausch des Grundstückes gegen Waren, für die das Kaufgeld als Repräsentant zu gelten hat, angesehen werden. Das Grundstück selber aber wirkt im Wirtschaftsleben nicht als Ware. Es steht in dem sozialen Organismus durch das Recht darinnen, das der Mensch auf seine Benützung hat. Dieses Recht ist etwas wesentlich anderes als das Verhältnis, in dem sich der Produzent einer Ware zu dieser befindet. In dem letzteren Verhältnis liegt es wesenhaft begründet, daß es nicht übergreift auf die ganz anders geartete Beziehung von Mensch zu Mensch, die dadurch hergestellt wird, daß jemandem die alleinige Benützung eines Grundstückes zusteht. Der Besitzer bringt andere Menschen, die zu ihrem Lebensunterhalt von ihm zur Arbeit auf diesem Grundstück angestellt werden, oder die darauf wohnen müssen, in Abhängigkeit von sich. Dadurch, daß man gegenseitig wirkliche Waren tauscht, die man produziert oder konsumiert, stellt sich eine Abhängigkeit nicht ein, welche in derselben Art zwischen Mensch und Mensch wirkt.
[ 24 ] Wer eine solche Lebenstatsache unbefangen durchschaut, dem wird einleuchten, daß sie ihren Ausdruck finden muß in den Einrichtungen des gesunden sozialen Organismus. Solange Waren gegen Waren im Wirtschaftsleben ausgetauscht werden, bleibt die Wertgestaltung dieser Waren unabhängig von dem Rechtsverhältnisse zwischen Personen und Personengruppen. Sobald Waren gegen Rechte eingetauscht werden, wird das Rechtsverhältnis selbst berührt. Nicht auf den Tausch als solchen kommt es an. Dieser ist das notwendige Lebenselement des gegenwärtigen, auf Arbeitsteilung ruhenden sozialen Organismus; sondern es handelt sich darum, daß durch den Tausch des Rechtes mit der Ware das Recht selbst zur Ware gemacht wird, wenn das Recht innerhalb des Wirtschaftslebens entsteht. Das wird nur dadurch verhindert, daß im sozialen Organismus einerseits Einrichtungen bestehen, die nur darauf abzielen, den Kreislauf der Waren in der zweckmäßigsten Weise zu bewirken; und anderseits solche, welche die im Warenaustausch lebenden Rechte der produzierenden, Handel treibenden und konsumierenden Personen regeln. Diese Rechte unterscheiden sich ihrem Wesen nach gar nicht von anderen Rechten, die in dem vom Warenaustausch ganz unabhängigen Verhältnis von Person zu Person bestehen müssen. Wenn ich meinen Mitmenschen durch den Verkauf einer Ware schädige oder fördere, so gehört das in das gleiche Gebiet des sozialen Lebens wie eine Schädigung oder Förderung durch eine Tätigkeit oder Unterlassung, die unmittelbar nicht in einem Warenaustausch zum Ausdruck kommt.
[ 25 ] In der Lebenshaltung des einzelnen Menschen fließen die Wirkungen aus den Rechtseinrichtungen mit denen aus der rein wirtschaftlichen Tätigkeit zusammen. Im gesunden sozialen Organismus müssen sie aus zwei verschiedenen Richtungen kommen. In der wirtschaftlichen Organisation hat die aus der Erziehung für einen Wirtschaftszweig und die aus der Erfahrung in demselben gewonnene Vertrautheit mit ihm für die leitenden Persönlichkeiten die nötigen Gesichtspunkte abzugeben. In der Rechtsorganisation wird durch Gesetz und Verwaltung verwirklicht, was aus dem Rechtsbewußtsein als Beziehung einzelner Menschen oder Menschengruppen zueinander gefordert wird. Die Wirtschaftsorganisation wird Menschen mit gleichen Berufs- oder Konsuminteressen oder mit in anderer Beziehung gleichen Bedürfnissen sich zu Genossenschaften zusammenschließen lassen, die im gegenseitigen Wechselverkehr die Gesamtwirtschaft zustande bringen. Diese Organisation wird sich auf assoziativer Grundlage und auf dem Verhältnis der Assoziationen aufbauen. Diese Assoziationen werden eine bloß wirtschaftliche Tätigkeit entfalten. Die Rechtsgrundlage, auf der sie arbeiten, kommt ihnen von der Rechtsorganisation zu. Wenn solche Wirtschaftsassoziationen ihre wirtschaftlichen Interessen in den Vertretungs- und Verwaltungskörpern der Wirtschaftsorganisation zur Geltung bringen können, dann werden sie nicht den Drang entwickeln, in die gesetzgebende oder verwaltende Leitung des Rechtsstaates einzudringen (zum Beispiel als Bund der Landwirte, als Partei der Industriellen, als wirtschaftlich orientierte Sozialdemokratie), um da anzustreben, was ihnen innerhalb des Wirtschaftslebens zu erreichen nicht möglich ist. Und wenn der Rechtsstaat in gar keinem Wirtschaftszweige mitwirtschaftet, dann wird er nur Einrichtungen schaffen, die aus dem Rechtsbewußtsein der zu ihm gehörenden Menschen stammen. Auch wenn in der Vertretung des Rechtsstaates, wie es ja selbstverständlich ist, dieselben Personen sitzen, die im Wirtschaftsleben tätig sind, so wird sich durch die Gliederung in Wirtschafts- und in Rechtsleben nicht ein Einfluß des Wirtschafts- auf das Rechtsleben ergeben können, der die Gesundheit des sozialen Organismus so untergräbt, wie sie untergraben werden kann, wenn die Staatsorganisation selbst Zweige des Wirtschaftslebens versorgt, und wenn in derselben die Vertreter des Wirtschaftslebens aus dessen Interessen heraus Gesetze beschließen.
[ 26 ] Ein typisches Beispiel von Verschmelzung des Wirtschaftslebens mit dem Rechtsleben bot Österreich mit der Verfassung, die es sich in den sechziger Jahren des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts gegeben hat. Die Vertreter des Reichsrates dieses Ländergebietes wurden aus den vier Zweigen des Wirtschaftslebens heraus gewählt, aus der Gemeinschaft der Großgrundbesitzer, der Handelskammern, der Städte, Märkte und Industrialorte und der Landgemeinden. Man sieht, daß für diese Zusammensetzung der Staatsvertretung an gar nichts anderes in erster Linie gedacht wurde, als daß aus der Geltendmachung der wirtschaftlichen Verhältnisse sich das Rechtsleben ergeben werde. Gewiß ist, daß zu dem gegenwärtigen Zerfall Österreichs die auseinandertreibenden Kräfte seiner Nationalitäten bedeutsam mitgewirkt haben. Allein als ebenso gewiß kann es gelten, daß eine Rechtsorganisation, die neben der wirtschaftlichen ihre Tätigkeit hätte entfalten können, aus dem Rechtsbewußtsein heraus eine Gestaltung des sozialen Organismus würde entwickelt haben, in der ein Zusammenleben der Völker möglich geworden wäre.
[ 27 ] Der gegenwärtig am öffentlichen Leben interessierte Mensch lenkt gewöhnlich seinen Blick auf Dinge, die erst in zweiter Linie für dieses Leben in Betracht kommen. Er tut dieses, weil ihn seine Denkgewohnheit dazu bringt, den sozialen Organismus als ein einheitliches Gebilde aufzufassen. Für ein solches Gebilde aber kann sich kein ihm entsprechender Wahlmodus finden. Denn bei jedem Wahlmodus müssen sich im Vertretungskörper die wirtschaftlichen Interessen und die Impulse des Rechtslebens stören. Und was aus der Störung für das soziale Leben fließt, muß zu Erschütterungen des Gesellschaftsorganismus führen. Obenan als notwendige Zielsetzung des öffentlichen Lebens muß gegenwärtig das Hinarbeiten auf eine durchgreifende Trennung des Wirtschaftslebens und der Rechtsorganisation stehen. Indem man sich in diese Trennung hineinlebt, werden die sich trennenden Organisationen aus ihren eigenen Grundlagen heraus die besten Arten für die Wahlen ihrer Gesetzgeber und Verwalter finden. In dem, was gegenwärtig zur Entscheidung drängt, kommen Fragen des Wahlmodus, wenn sie auch als solche von fundamentaler Bedeutung sind, doch erst in zweiter Linie in Betracht. Wo die alten Verhältnisse noch vorhanden sind, wäre aus diesen heraus auf die angedeutete Gliederung hinzuarbeiten. Wo das Alte sich bereits aufgelöst hat, oder in der Auflösung begriffen ist, müßten Einzelpersonen und Bündnisse zwischen Personen die Initiative zu einer Neugestaltung versuchen, die sich in der gekennzeichneten Richtung bewegt. Von heute zu morgen eine Umwandlung des öffentlichen Lebens herbeiführen zu wollen, das sehen auch vernünftige Sozialisten als Schwarmgeisterei an. Solche erwarten die von ihnen gemeinte Gesundung durch eine allmähliche, sachgemäße Umwandlung. Daß aber die geschichtlichen Entwickelungskräfte der Menschheit gegenwärtig ein vernünftiges Wollen nach der Richtung einer sozialen Neuordnung notwendig machen, das können jedem Unbefangenen weithinleuchtende Tatsachen lehren.
[ 28 ] Wer für «praktisch durchführbar» nur dasjenige hält, an das er sich aus engem Lebensgesichtskreis heraus gewöhnt hat, der wird das hier Angedeutete für «unpraktisch» halten. Kann er sich nicht bekehren, und behält er auf irgendeinem Lebensgebiete Einfluß, dann wird er nicht zur Gesundung, sondern zur weiteren Erkrankung des sozialen Organismus wirken, wie Leute seiner Gesinnung an der Herbeiführung der gegenwärtigen Zustände gewirkt haben.
[ 29 ] Die Bestrebung, mit der führende Kreise der Menschheit begonnen haben und die zur Überleitung gewisser Wirtschaftszweige (Post, Eisenbahnen und so weiter) in das Staatsleben geführt hat, muß der entgegengesetzten weichen: der Herauslösung alles Wirtschaftens aus dem Gebiete des politischen Staatswesens. Denker, welche mit ihrem Wollen glauben, sich in der Richtung nach einem gesunden sozialen Organismus zu befinden, ziehen die äußerste Folgerung der Verstaatlichungsbestrebungen dieser bisher leitenden Kreise. Sie wollen die Vergesellschaftung aller Mittel des Wirtschaftslebens, insofern diese Produktionsmittel sind. Eine gesunde Entwickelung wird dem wirtschaftlichen Leben seine Selbständigkeit geben und dem politischen Staate die Fähigkeit, durch die Rechtsordnung auf den Wirtschaftskörper so zu wirken, daß der einzelne Mensch seine Eingliederung in den sozialen Organismus nicht im Widerspruche mit seinem Rechtsbewußtsein empfindet.
[ 30 ] Man kann durchschauen, wie die hier vorgebrachten Gedanken im wirklichen Leben der Menschheit begründet sind, wenn man den Blick auf die Arbeit lenkt, welche der Mensch für den sozialen Organismus durch seine körperliche Arbeitskraft verrichtet. Innerhalb der kapitalistischen Wirtschaftsform hat sich diese Arbeit dem sozialen Organismus so eingegliedert, daß sie durch den Arbeitgeber wie eine Ware dem Arbeitnehmer abgekauft wird. Ein Tausch wird eingegangen zwischen Geld (als Repräsentant der Waren) und Arbeit. Aber ein solcher Tausch kann sich in Wirklichkeit gar nicht vollziehen. Er scheint sich nur zu vollziehen.3Es ist durchaus möglich, dass im Leben Vorgänge nicht nur in einem falschen Sinne erklärt werden, sondern dass sie sich in einem falschen Sinne vollziehen. Geld und Arbeit sind keine austauschbaren Werte, sondern nur Geld und Arbeitserzeugnis. Gebe ich daher Geld für Arbeit, so tue ich etwas Falsches. Ich schaffe einen Scheinvorgang. Denn im Wirklichkeit kann ich nur Geld für Arbeitserzeugnis geben. In Wirklichkeit nimmt der Arbeitgeber von dem Arbeiter Waren entgegen, die nur entstehen können, wenn der Arbeiter seine Arbeitskraft für die Entstehung hingibt. Aus dem Gegenwert dieser Waren erhält der Arbeiter einen Anteil, der Arbeitgeber den andern. Die Produktion der Waren erfolgt durch das Zusammenwirken des Arbeitgebers und Arbeitnehmers. Das Produkt des gemeinsamen Wirkens geht erst in den Kreislauf des Wirtschaftslebens über. Zur Herstellung des Produktes ist ein Rechtsverhältnis zwischen Arbeiter und Unternehmer notwendig. Dieses kann aber durch die kapitalistische Wirtschaftsart in ein solches verwandelt werden, welches durch die wirtschaftliche Übermacht des Arbeitgebers über den Arbeiter bedingt ist. Im gesunden sozialen Organismus muß zutage treten, daß die Arbeit nicht bezahlt werden kann. Denn diese kann nicht im Vergleich mit einer Ware einen wirtschaftlichen Wert erhalten. Einen solchen hat erst die durch Arbeit hervorgebrachte Ware im Vergleich mit andern Waren. Die Art, wie, und das Maß, in dem ein Mensch für den Bestand des sozialen Organismus zu arbeiten hat, müssen aus seiner Fähigkeit heraus und aus den Bedingungen eines menschenwürdigen Daseins geregelt werden. Das kann nur geschehen, wenn diese Regelung von dem politischen Staate aus in Unabhängigkeit von den Verwaltungen des Wirtschaftslebens geschieht.
[ 31 ] Durch eine solche Regelung wird der Ware eine Wertunterlage geschaffen, die sich vergleichen läßt mit der andern, die in den Naturbedingungen besteht. Wie der Wert einer Ware gegenüber einer andern dadurch wächst, daß die Gewinnung der Rohprodukte für dieselbe schwieriger ist als für die andere, so muß der Warenwert davon abhängig werden, welche Art und welches Maß von Arbeit zum Hervorbringen der Ware nach der Rechtsordnung aufgebracht werden dürfen.4Ein solches Verhältnis der Arbeit zur Rechtsordung wird die im Wirtschaftsleben tätigen Assoziationen nötigen, mit dem, was «rechtens ist», als mit einer Voraussetzung zu rechnen. Soch wird dadurch erreicht, dass die Wirtschftsorganisation vom Menschen, nicht der Mensch von der Wirtschaftsordnung abhängig ist.
[ 32 ] Das Wirtschaftsleben wird auf diese Weise von zwei Seiten her seinen notwendigen Bedingungen unterworfen: von Seite der Naturgrundlage, welche die Menschheit hinnehmen muß, wie sie ihr gegeben ist, und von Seite der Rechtsgrundlage, die aus dem Rechtsbewußtsein heraus auf dem Boden des vom Wirtschaftsleben unabhängigen politischen Staates geschaffen werden soll.
[ 33 ] Es ist leicht einzusehen, daß durch eine solche Führung des sozialen Organismus der wirtschaftliche Wohlstand sinken und steigen wird je nach dem Maß von Arbeit, das aus dem Rechtsbewußtsein heraus aufgewendet wird. Allein eine solche Abhängigkeit des volkswirtschaftlichen Wohlstandes ist im gesunden sozialen Organismus notwendig. Sie allein kann verhindern, daß der Mensch durch das Wirtschaftsleben so verbraucht werde, daß er sein Dasein nicht mehr als menschenwürdig empfinden kann. Und auf dem Vorhandensein der Empfindung eines menschenunwürdigen Daseins beruhen in Wahrheit alle Erschütterungen im sozialen Organismus.
[ 34 ] Eine Möglichkeit, den volkswirtschaftlichen Wohlstand von der Rechtsseite her nicht allzu stark zu vermindern, besteht in einer ähnlichen Art, wie eine solche zur Aufbesserung der Naturgrundlage. Man kann einen wenig ertragreichen Boden durch technische Mittel ertragreicher machen; man kann, veranlaßt durch die allzu starke Verminderung des Wohlstandes, die Art und das Maß der Arbeit ändern. Aber diese Änderung soll nicht aus dem Kreislauf des Wirtschaftslebens unmittelbar erfolgen, sondern aus der Einsicht, die sich auf dem Boden des vom Wirtschaftsleben unabhängigen Rechtslebens entwickelt.
[ 35 ] In alles, was durch das Wirtschaftsleben und das Rechtsbewußtsein in der Organisation des sozialen Lebens hervorgebracht wird, wirkt hinein, was aus einer dritten Quelle stammt: aus den individuellen Fähigkeiten des einzelnen Menschen. Dieses Gebiet umfaßt alles von den höchsten geistigen Leistungen bis zu dem, was in Menschenwerke einfließt durch die bessere oder weniger gute körperliche Eignung des Menschen für Leistungen, die dem sozialen Organismus dienen. Was aus dieser Quelle stammt, muß in den gesunden sozialen Organismus auf ganz andere Art einfließen, als dasjenige, was im Warenaustausch lebt, und was aus dem Staatsleben fließen kann. Es gibt keine andere Möglichkeit, diese Aufnahme in gesunder Art zu bewirken, als sie von der freien Empfänglichkeit der Menschen und von den Impulsen, die aus den individuellen Fähigkeiten selbst kommen, abhängig sein zu lassen. Werden die durch solche Fähigkeiten erstehenden Menschenleistungen vorn Wirtschaftsleben oder von der Staatsorganisation künstlich beeinflußt, so wird ihnen die wahre Grundlage ihres eigenen Lebens zum größten Teile entzogen. Diese Grundlage kann nur in der Kraft bestehen, welche die Menschenleistungen aus sich selbst entwickeln müssen. Wird die Entgegennahme solcher Leistungen vom Wirtschaftsleben unmittelbar bedingt, oder vom Staate organisiert, so wird die freie Empfänglichkeit für sie gelähmt. Sie ist aber allein geeignet, sie in gesunder Form in den sozialen Organismus einfließen zu lassen. Für das Geistesleben, mit dem auch die Entwickelung der anderen individuellen Fähigkeiten im Menschenleben durch unübersehbar viele Fäden zusammenhängt, ergibt sich nur eine gesunde Entwickelungsmöglichkeit, wenn es in der Hervorbringung auf seine eigenen Impulse gestellt ist, und wenn es in verständnisvollem Zusammenhange mit den Menschen steht, die seine Leistungen empfangen.
[ 36 ] Worauf hier als auf die gesunden Entwickelungsbedingungen des Geisteslebens gedeutet wird, das wird gegenwärtig nicht durchschaut, weil der rechte Blick dafür getrübt ist durch die Verschmelzung eines großen Teiles dieses Lebens mit dem politischen Staatsleben. Diese Verschmelzung hat sich im Laufe der letzten Jahrhunderte ergeben und man hat sich in sie hineingewöhnt. Man spricht ja wohl von «Freiheit der Wissenschaft und des Lehrens». Aber man betrachtet es als selbstverständlich, daß der politische Staat die «freie Wissenschaft» und das «freie Lehren» verwaltet. Man entwickelt keine Empfindung dafür, wie dieser Staat dadurch das Geistesleben von seinen staatlichen Bedürfnissen abhängig macht. Man denkt, der Staat schafft die Stellen, an denen gelehrt wird; dann können diejenigen, welche diese Stellen einnehmen, das Geistesleben « frei» entfalten. Man beachtet, indem man sich an eine solche Meinung gewöhnt, nicht, wie eng verbunden der Inhalt des geistigen Lebens ist mit dem innersten Wesen des Menschen, in dem er sich entfaltet. Wie diese Entfaltung nur dann eine freie sein kann, wenn sie durch keine andern Impulse in den sozialen Organismus hineingestellt ist als allein durch solche, die aus dem Geistesleben selbst kommen. Durch die Verschmelzung mit dem Staatsleben hat eben nicht nur die Verwaltung der Wissenschaft und des Teiles des Geisteslebens, der mit ihr zusammenhängt, in den letzten Jahrhunderten das Gepräge erhalten, sondern auch der Inhalt selbst. Gewiß, was in Mathematik oder Physik produziert wird, kann nicht unmittelbar vom Staate beeinflußt werden. Aber man denke an die Geschichte, an die andern Kulturwissenschaften. Sind sie nicht ein Spiegelbild dessen geworden, was sich aus dem Zusammenhang ihrer Träger mit dem Staatsleben ergeben hat, aus den Bedürfnissen dieses Lebens heraus? Gerade durch diesen ihnen aufgeprägten Charakter haben die gegenwärtigen wissenschaftlich orientierten, das Geistesleben beherrschenden Vorstellungen auf das Proletariat als Ideologie gewirkt. Dieses bemerkte, wie ein gewisser Charakter den Menschengedanken aufgeprägt wird durch die Bedürfnisse des Staatslebens, in welchem den Interessen der leitenden Klassen entsprochen wird. Ein Spiegelbild der materiellen Interessen und Interessenkämpfe sah der proletarisch Denkende. Das erzeugte in ihm die Empfindung, alles Geistesleben sei Ideologie, sei Spiegelung der ökonomischen Organisation.
[ 37 ] Eine solche, das geistige Leben des Menschen verödende Anschauung hört auf, wenn die Empfindung entstehen kann: Im geistigen Gebiet waltet eine über das materielle Außenleben hinausgehende Wirklichkeit, die ihren Inhalt in sich selber trägt. Es ist unmöglich, daß eine solche Empfindung ersteht, wenn das Geistesleben nicht aus seinen eigenen Impulsen heraus sich innerhalb des sozialen Organismus frei entfaltet und verwaltet. Nur solche Träger des Geisteslebens, die innerhalb einer derartigen Entfaltung und Verwaltung stehen, haben die Kraft, diesem Leben das ihm gebührende Gewicht im sozialen Organismus zu verschaffen. Kunst, Wissenschaft, Weltanschauung und alles, was damit zusammenhängt, bedarf einer solchen selbständigen Stellung in der menschlichen Gesellschaft. Denn im geistigen Leben hängt alles zusammen. Die Freiheit des einen kann nicht ohne die Freiheit des andern gedeihen Wenn auch Mathematik und Physik in ihrem Inhalt nicht von den Bedürfnissen des Staates unmittelbar zu beeinflussen sind: Was man von ihnen entwickelt, wie die Menschen über ihren Wert denken, welche Wirkung ihre Pflege auf das ganze übrige Geistesleben haben kann, und vieles andere wird durch diese Bedürfnisse bedingt, wenn der Staat Zweige des Geisteslebens verwaltet. Es ist ein anderes, wenn der die niederste Schulstufe versorgende Lehrer den Impulsen des Staatslebens folgt; ein anderes, wenn er diese Impulse erhält aus einem Geistesleben heraus, das auf sich selbst gestellt ist. Die Sozialdemokratie hat auch auf diesem Gebiete nur die Erbschaft aus den Denkgewohnheiten und Gepflogenheiten der leitenden Kreise übernommen. Sie betrachtet es als ihr Ideal, das geistige Leben in den auf das Wirtschaftsleben gebauten Gesellschaftskörper einzubeziehen. Sie könnte, wenn sie dieses von ihr gesetzte Ziel erreichte, damit den Weg nur fortsetzen, auf dem das Geistesleben seine Entwertung gefunden hat. Sie hat eine richtige Empfindung einseitig entwickelt mit ihrer Forderung: Religion müsse Privatsache sein. Denn im gesunden sozialen Organismus muß alles Geistesleben dem Staate und der Wirtschaft gegenüber in dem hier angedeuteten Sinn «Privatsache» sein. Aber die Sozialdemokratie geht bei der Überweisung der Religion auf das Privatgebiet nicht von der Meinung aus, daß einem geistigen Gute dadurch eine Stellung innerhalb des sozialen Organismus geschaffen werde, durch die es zu einer wünschenswerteren, höheren Entwickelung kommen werde als unter dem Einfluß des Staates. Sie ist der Meinung, daß der soziale Organismus durch seine Mittel nur pflegen dürfe, was ihm Lebensbedürfnis ist. Und ein solches sei das religiöse Geistesgut nicht. In dieser Art, einseitig aus dem öffentlichen Leben herausgestellt, kann ein Zweig des Geisteslebens nicht gedeihen, wenn das andere Geistesgut gefesselt ist. Das religiöse Leben der neueren Menschheit wird in Verbindung mit allem befreiten Geistesleben seine für diese Menschheit seelentragende Kraft entwickeln.
[ 38 ] Nicht nur die Hervorbringung, sondern auch die Aufnahme dieses Geisteslebens durch die Menschheit muß auf dem freien Seelenbedürfnis beruhen. Lehrer, Künstler und so weiter, die in ihrer sozialen Stellung nur im unmittelbaren Zusammenhange sind mit einer Gesetzgebung und Verwaltung, die aus dem Geistesleben selbst sich ergeben und die nur von dessen Impulsen getragen sind, werden durch die Art ihres Wirkens die Empfänglichkeit für ihre Leistungen entwickeln können bei Menschen, welche durch den aus sich wirkenden politischen Staat davor behütet werden, nur dem Zwang zur Arbeit zu unterliegen, sondern denen das Recht auch die Muße gibt, welche das Verständnis für geistige Güter weckt. Den Menschen, die sich «Lebenspraktiker» dünken, mag bei solchen Gedanken der Glaube aufsteigen: Die Menschen werden ihre Mußezeit vertrinken, und man werde in den Analphabetismus zurückfallen, wenn der Staat für solche Muße sorgt, und wenn der Besuch der Schule in das freie Verständnis der Menschen gestellt ist. Möchten solche «Pessimisten» doch abwarten, was wird, wenn die Welt nicht mehr unter ihrem Einfluß steht. Dieser ist nur allzu oft von einem gewissen Gefühle bestimmt, das ihnen leise zuflüstert, wie sie ihre Muße verwenden, und was sie nötig hatten, um sich ein wenig «Bildung» anzueignen. Mit der zündenden Kraft, die ein wirklich auf sich selbst gestelltes Geistesleben im sozialen Organismus hat, können sie ja nicht rechnen, denn das gefesselte, das sie kennen, hat auf sie nie eine solch zündende Kraft ausüben können.
[ 39 ] Sowohl der politische Staat wie das Wirtschaftsleben werden den Zufluß aus dem Geistesleben, den sie brauchen, von dem sich selbst verwaltenden geistigen Organismus erhalten. Auch die praktische Bildung für das Wirtschaftsleben wird durch das freie Zusammenwirken desselben mit dem Geistesorganismus ihre volle Kraft erst entfalten können. Entsprechend vorgebildete Menschen werden die Erfahrungen, die sie im Wirtschaftsgebiet machen können, durch die Kraft, die ihnen aus dem befreiten Geistesgut kommt, beleben. Menschen mit einer aus dem Wirtschaftsleben gewonnenen Erfahrung werden den Übergang finden in die Geistesorganisation und in derselben befruchtend wirken auf dasjenige, was so befruchtet werden muß.
[ 40 ] Auf dem Gebiete des politischen Staates werden sich die notwendigen gesunden Ansichten durch eine solche freie Wirkung des Geistesgutes bilden. Der handwerklich Arbeitende wird durch den Einfluß eines solchen Geistesgutes eine ihn befriedigende Empfindung von der Stellung seiner Arbeit im sozialen Organismus sich aneignen können. Er wird zu der Einsicht kommen, wie ohne die Leitung, welche die handwerkliche Arbeit zweckentsprechend organisiert, der soziale Organismus ihn nicht tragen kann. Er wird das Gefühl von der Zusammengehörigkeit seiner Arbeit mit den organisierenden Kräften, die aus der Entwickelung individueller menschlicher Fähigkeiten stammen, in sich aufnehmen können. Er wird auf dem Boden des politischen Staates die Rechte ausbilden, welche ihm den Anteil sichern an dem Ertrage der Waren, die er erzeugt; und er wird in freier Weise dem ihm zukommenden Geistesgut denjenigen Anteil gönnen, der dessen Entstehung ermöglicht. Auf dem Gebiet des Geisteslebens wird die Möglichkeit entstehen, daß dessen Hervorbringer von den Erträgnissen ihrer Leistungen auch leben. Was jemand für sich im Gebiete des Geisteslebens treibt, wird seine engste Privatsache bleiben; was jemand für den sozialen Organismus zu leisten vermag, wird mit der freien Entschädigung derer rechnen können, denen das Geistesgut Bedürfnis ist. Wer durch solche Entschädigung innerhalb der Geistesorganisation das nicht finden kann, was er braucht, wird übergehen müssen zum Gebiet des politischen Staates oder des Wirtschaftslebens.
[ 41 ] In das Wirtschaftsleben fließen ein die aus dem geistigen Leben stammenden technischen Ideen. Sie stammen aus dem geistigen Leben, auch wenn sie unmittelbar von Angehörigen des Staats- oder Wirtschaftsgebietes kommen. Daher kommen alle die organisatorischen Ideen und Kräfte, welche das wirtschaftliche und staatliche Leben befruchten. Die Entschädigung für diesen Zufluß in die beiden sozialen Gebiete wird entweder auch durch das freie Verständnis derer zustande kommen, die auf diesen Zufluß angewiesen sind, oder sie wird durch Rechte ihre Regelung finden, welche im Gebiete des politischen Staates ausgebildet werden. Was dieser politische Staat selber für seine Erhaltung fordert, das wird aufgebracht werden durch das Steuerrecht. Dieses wird durch eine Harmonisierung der Forderungen des Rechtsbewußtseins mit denen des Wirtschaftslebens sich ausbilden.
[ 42 ] Neben dem politischen und dem Wirtschaftsgebiet muß im gesunden sozialen Organismus das auf sich selbst gestellte Geistesgebiet wirken. Nach der Dreigliederung dieses Organismus weist die Richtung der Entwickelungskräfte der neueren Menschheit. Solange das gesellschaftliche Leben im wesentlichen durch die Instinktkräfte eines großen Teiles der Menschheit sich führen ließ, trat der Drang nach dieser entschiedenen Gliederung nicht auf. In einer gewissen Dumpfheit des sozialen Lebens wirkte zusammen, was im Grunde immer aus drei Quellen stammte. Die neuere Zeit fordert ein bewußtes Sichhineinstellen des Menschen in den Gesellschaftsorganismus. Dieses Bewußtsein kann dem Verhalten und dem ganzen Leben der Menschen nur dann eine gesunde Gestaltung geben, wenn es von drei Seiten her orientiert ist. Nach dieser Orientierung strebt in den unbewußten Tiefen des Seelischen die moderne Menschheit; und was sich als soziale Bewegung auslebt, ist nur der getrübte Abglanz dieses Strebens.
[ 43 ] Aus andern Grundlagen heraus, als die sind, in denen wir heute leben, tauchte aus tiefen Untergründen der menschlichen Natur heraus am Ende des 1$. Jahrhunderts der Ruf nach einer Neugestaltung des sozialen menschlichen Organismus. Da hörte man wie eine Devise dieser Neuorganisation die drei Worte: Brüderlichkeit, Gleichheit, Freiheit. Nun wohl, derjenige, der sich mit vorurteilslosem Sinn und mit einem gesunden Menschheitsempfinden einläßt auf die Wirklichkeit der menschlichen Entwickelung, der kann natürlich nicht anders, als Verständnis haben für alles, worauf diese Worte deuten. Dennoch, es gab scharfsinnige Denker, welche im Laufe des 19. Jahrhunderts sich Mühe gegeben haben, zu zeigen, wie es unmöglich ist, in einem einheitlichen sozialen Organismus diese Ideen von Brüderlichkeit, Gleichheit, Freiheit zu verwirklichen. Solche glaubten zu erkennen, daß sich diese drei Impulse, wenn sie sich verwirklichen sollen, im sozialen Organismus widersprechen müssen. Scharfsinnig ist nachgewiesen worden zum Beispiel, wie unmöglich es ist, wenn der Impuls der Gleichheit sich verwirklicht, daß dann auch die in jedem Menschenwesen notwendig begründete Freiheit zur Geltung komme. Und man kann gar nicht anders als zustimmen denen, die diesen Widerspruch finden; und doch muß man zugleich aus einem allgemein menschlichen Empfinden heraus mit jedem dieser drei Ideale Sympathie haben!
[ 44 ] Dies Widerspruchsvolle besteht aus dem Grunde, weil die wahre soziale Bedeutung dieser drei Ideale erst zutage tritt durch das Durchschauen der notwendigen Dreigliederung des sozialen Organismus. Die drei Glieder sollen nicht in einer abstrakten, theoretischen Reichstags- oder sonstigen Einheit zusammengefügt und zentralisiert sein. Sie sollen lebendige Wirklichkeit sein. Ein jedes der drei sozialen Glieder soll in sich zentralisiert sein; und durch ihr lebendiges Nebeneinander- und Zusammenwirken kann erst die Einheit des sozialen Gesamtorganismus entstehen. Im wirklichen Leben wirkt eben das scheinbar Widerspruchsvolle zu einer Einheit zusammen. Daher wird man zu einer Erfassung des Lebens des sozialen Organismus kommen, wenn man imstande ist, die wirklichkeitsgemäße Gestaltung dieses sozialen Organismus mit Bezug auf Brüderlichkeit, Gleichheit und Freiheit zu durchschauen. Dann wird man erkennen, daß das Zusammenwirken der Menschen im Wirtschaftsleben auf derjenigen Brüderlichkeit ruhen muß, die aus den Assoziationen heraus ersteht. In dem zweiten Gliede, in dem System des öffentlichen Rechts, wo man es zu tun hat mit dem rein menschlichen Verhältnis von Person zu Person, hat man zu erstreben die Verwirklichung der Idee der Gleichheit. Und auf dem geistigen Gebiete, das in relativer Selbständigkeit im sozialen Organismus steht, hat man es zu tun mit der Verwirklichung des Impulses der Freiheit. So angesehen, zeigen diese drei Ideale ihren Wirklichkeitswert. Sie können sich nicht in einem chaotischen sozialen Leben realisieren, sondern nur in dem gesunden dreigliedrigen sozialen Organismus. Nicht ein abstrakt zentralisiertes Sozialgebilde kann durcheinander die Ideale der Freiheit, Gleichheit und Brüderlichkeit verwirklichen, sondern jedes der drei Glieder des sozialen Organismus kann aus einem dieser Impulse seine Kraft schöpfen. Und es wird dann in fruchtbarer Art mit den andern Gliedern zusammenwirken können.
[ 45 ] Diejenigen Menschen, welche am Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts die Forderung nach Verwirklichung der drei Ideen von Freiheit, Gleichheit und Brüderlichkeit erhoben haben, und auch diejenigen, welche sie später wiederholt haben, sie konnten dunkel empfinden, wohin die Entwickelungskräfte der neueren Menschheit weisen. Aber sie haben damit zugleich nicht den Glauben an den Einheitsstaat überwunden. Für diesen bedeuten ihre Ideen etwas Widerspruchsvolles. Sie bekannten sich zu dem Widersprechenden, weil in den unterbewußten Tiefen ihres Seelenlebens der Drang nach der Dreigliederung des sozialen Organismus wirkte, in dem die Dreiheit ihrer Ideen erst zu einer höheren Einheit werden kann. Die Entwickelungskräfte, die in dem Werden der neueren Menschheit nach dieser Dreigliederung hindrängen, zum bewußten sozialen Wollen zu machen, das fordern die deutlich sprechenden sozialen Tatsachen der Gegenwart.
II. the realistic attempts to solve the social questions and necessities demanded by life
[ 1 ] The characteristic feature that has led to the particular form of the social question in recent times can be expressed by saying: economic life, supported by technology, modern capitalism, have acted with a certain natural self-evidence and have brought modern society into a certain inner order. In addition to the claiming of human attention for that which technology and capitalism have brought, attention has been diverted to other branches, other areas of the social organism. These must just as necessarily be given the right effectiveness by human consciousness if the social organism is to be healthy.
[ 2 ] I may perhaps start from a comparison in order to clearly state what is to be characterized here as the driving impulse of a comprehensive, all-round observation of the social question. But it should be noted that this comparison means nothing other than a comparison. Such a comparison can support human understanding in order to bring it in precisely the direction that is necessary in order to form ideas about the health of the social organism. Whoever has to look at the most complicated natural organism, the human organism, from the point of view adopted here, must direct his attention to the fact that the whole essence of this human organism has three systems working side by side, each of which acts with a certain independence. These three systems working side by side can be characterized as follows. In the human natural organism, the system that includes nervous life and sensory life acts as one area. It could also be called the head organism after the most important member of the organism, where nervous and sensory life are to a certain extent centralized.
[ 3 ] The second member of the human organization that must be recognized if we want to gain a real understanding of it is what I would like to call the rhythmic system. It consists of respiration, blood circulation, of everything that expresses itself in rhythmic processes of the human organism.
[ 4 ] The third system to be recognized is everything that is connected as organs and activities with the actual metabolism.
[ 5 ] These three systems contain everything that, when organized in a healthy way, maintains the overall process of the human organism. 1The division meant here is not one according to spatially delimitable body members, but one according to activities (functions) of the organism "head organism" can only be used if one is aware that the nervous-sensory life is primarily centralized in the head. However, rhythmic and metabolic activity is of course also present in the head. Nevertheless, the three types of activity are strictly separated according to their essence.
[ 6 ] I have attempted to characterize this threefold structure of the human natural organism, at least initially in sketch form, in my book "Von Seelenrätseln" (Of Riddles of the Soul), in full agreement with everything that scientific research can already say today. I am aware that in the very near future biology, physiology, the whole of natural science in relation to the human being will push towards such a view of the human organism which will see through how these three members - head system, circulatory system or thoracic system and metabolic system - maintain the overall process in the human organism by the fact that they work in a certain independence, that there is no absolute centralization of the human organism, that each of these systems also has a special, independent relationship to the outside world. The head system through the senses, the circulatory system or rhythmic system through respiration, and the metabolic system through the organs of nutrition and movement.
[ 7 ] With regard to scientific methods, we have not yet quite reached the point where what I have indicated here, what I have sought to utilize for the natural sciences from the background of the humanities, can be generally recognized within scientific circles to the extent that may appear desirable for the advancement of knowledge. This means, however, that our habits of thought, our whole way of conceiving the world, is not yet fully adequate to what, for example, presents itself in the human organism as the inner essence of natural action. One could well say: Well, natural science can wait, it will gradually move towards its ideals, it will come to recognize such a way of looking at the world as its own. But with regard to the observation and especially the workings of the social organism, one cannot wait. There must be at least an instinctive realization in every human soul - for every human soul participates in the working of the social organism - of what is necessary for this social organism. A healthy thinking and feeling, a healthy will and desire with regard to the shaping of the social organism can only develop if one is clear, even if it is more or less merely instinctive, that this social organism, if it is to be healthy, must be just as tripartite as the natural organism.
[ 8 ] Since Schäffle wrote his book on the structure of the social organism, attempts have been made to find analogies between the organization of a natural being - let us say the organization of man - and human society as such. They wanted to find out what the cell is in the social organism, what cell structures are, what tissues are and so on! Only recently a book was published by Meray, "World Mutation", in which certain scientific facts and scientific laws are simply transferred to - as one thinks - the human social organism. What is meant here has absolutely nothing to do with all these things, with all these analogies. And whoever thinks that such a game of analogies between the natural organism and the social organism is being played in these considerations will only prove that he has not penetrated into the spirit of what is meant here. For the aim here is not to transplant some truth suitable for natural scientific facts to the social organism; but the completely different one, that human thinking, human feeling, learns to feel what is possible in the observation of the natural organism and can then apply this way of feeling to the social organism. If one simply transfers what one believes one has learned from the natural organism to the social organism, as often happens, one only shows that one does not want to acquire the ability to look at the social organism just as independently, just as for oneself, to research its own laws, as one needs to do in order to understand the natural organism. At the moment when one really confronts the natural organism objectively, as the natural scientist confronts the natural organism, confronts the social organism in its independence, in order to perceive its own laws, at this moment every analogy game ceases in the face of the seriousness of observation.
[ 9 ] One could also think that the description given here is based on the belief that the social organism should be "constructed" from a gray theory modeled on natural science. However, this is as far removed as possible from what is being discussed here. We are pointing to something quite different. The present historical crisis of humanity demands that certain perceptions arise in each individual human being, that the stimulus for these perceptions be given by the educational and school system in the same way as that for learning the four kinds of arithmetic. What has hitherto produced the old forms of the social organism without conscious absorption into the life of the human soul will no longer be effective in the future. It is one of the impulses of development that want to enter human life anew from the present that the sensations indicated are demanded of the individual in the same way as a certain school education has long been demanded. That one must learn to feel in a healthy way how the forces of the social organism should work, so that it proves itself viable, is demanded of man from the present. One will have to acquire a feeling that it is unhealthy, anti-social, not to want to place oneself in this organism with such feelings.
[ 10 ] Today one can hear talk of "socialization" as what is needed for the time being. This socialization will not be a process of healing, but a process of curing the social organism, perhaps even a process of destruction, unless at least the instinctive realization of the necessity of the triple structure of the social organism enters into human hearts and souls. This social organism must, if it is to function healthily, develop three such members in accordance with the law.
[ 11 ] One of these members is economic life. Here we shall begin with its consideration, because it has quite obviously formed itself into human society through modern technology and modern capitalism, dominating all other life. This economic life must be an independent member in its own right within the social organism, as relatively independent as the nervous-sensory system is relatively independent in the human organism. This economic life has to do with everything that is commodity production, commodity circulation, commodity consumption.
[ 12 ] The second member of the social organism is the life of public law, the actual political life. It includes that which, in the sense of the old constitutional state, could be described as the actual life of the state. While economic life has to do with everything that man needs from nature and from his own production, with goods, the circulation of goods and the consumption of goods, this second element of the social organism can only have to do with everything that relates to the relationship of man to man from a purely human background. It is essential for the knowledge of the members of the social organism that one knows what difference there is between the system of public law, which can only have to do with the relation of man to man from human foundations, and the economic system, which has to do only with commodity production, commodity circulation, commodity consumption. One must distinguish this in life by feeling, so that as a consequence of this feeling, economic life is separated from legal life, just as in the human natural organism the activity of the lungs for processing the external air is separated from the processes in the nervous-sensory life.
[ 13 ] The third link in the social organism, which must also stand independently alongside the other two links, is that which relates to spiritual life. One could say even more precisely, because perhaps the term "spiritual culture" or everything that relates to the spiritual life is not quite accurate, everything that is based on the natural endowment of the individual human being that must enter the social organism on the basis of this natural endowment, both the spiritual and the physical endowment of the individual human being. The first system, the economic system, has to do with everything that must be there so that man can regulate his material relationship to the outside world The second system has to do with what must be there in the social organism because of the relationship of man to man The third system has to do with everything that must sprout forth and be incorporated into the social organism out of the single human individuality.
[ 14 ] As true as it is that modern technology and modern capitalism have actually shaped our social life in recent times, it is equally necessary that the wounds that have necessarily been inflicted on human society from this side be healed by bringing man and human community life into a correct relationship with the three members of this social organism. Economic life has simply by itself assumed quite definite forms in modern times. It has introduced itself into human life in a particularly powerful way through its one-sided effectiveness. The other two elements of social life have not yet been able to integrate themselves into the social organism with the same naturalness and according to their own laws. For them it is necessary that man, out of the sentiments indicated above, undertakes the social organization, each in his own place, in the place where he happens to be. For in the sense of those attempts to solve the social questions that are meant here, each individual person has his social task in the present and in the near future.
[ 15 ] That which is the first member of the social organism, economic life, rests first of all on the basis of nature, just as the individual human being rests on the endowment of his spiritual and physical organism with regard to what he can become for himself through learning, through education, through life. This natural basis simply imprints its imprint on economic life and thus on the entire social organism. But this natural basis is there without being able to be affected in an original way by any social organization, by any socialization. It must be taken as a basis for the life of the social organism in the same way that the education of man must be based on the talents he has in the various fields, on his natural physical and mental abilities. Every socialization, every attempt to give an economic form to human coexistence, must take into account the natural basis. For all circulation of goods and also all human labor and also all spiritual life is based, as a first elementary originality, on that which chains man to a certain part of nature. One must think about the connection of the social organism with the natural basis, just as one must think about the relationship of the individual to his talents in relation to learning. This can be made clear in extreme cases. One need only consider, for example, that in certain regions of the earth where the banana is an obvious foodstuff for people, the labor that must be expended in order to bring the banana from its place of origin to a destination and to make it a means of consumption comes into consideration for human coexistence. If one compares the human labor that must be expended to make the banana fit for consumption by human society with the labor that must be expended, say in our regions of Central Europe, to make wheat fit for consumption, the labor required for the banana is, on a small scale, three hundred times less than for wheat.
[ 16 ] To be sure, this is an extreme case. But such differences with regard to the necessary amount of labor in relation to the natural basis are also there among the branches of production represented in any social organism of Europe - not in this radical difference as with bananas and wheat, but they are there as differences. Thus it is in the economic organism that man's relationship to the natural basis of his economic activity determines the amount of labor he must bring into the economic process. And one need only compare, for example: in Germany, in regions of medium productivity, the yield of wheat culture is such that seven to eight times the amount sown is brought in by the harvest; in Chile the twelvefold comes in, in Northern Mexico the seventeenfold, in Peru the twentyfold. (Compare Jentsch, Volkswirtschaftslehre, p.64.)
[ 17 ] This whole interrelated being, which runs in processes that begin with the relationship of man to nature, which continue in all that man has to do to transform the products of nature and bring them to the point where they can be consumed, all these processes and only these encompass its economic element for a healthy social organism. This stands within the social organism like the head system, from which the individual talents are conditioned, stands within the human organism as a whole. But just as this head system is dependent on the lung-heart system, so the economic system is dependent on human work performance. Just as the head cannot independently regulate breathing, the human work system should not be regulated by the forces at work in economic life itself.
[ 18 ] Man stands in economic life through his interests. These have their basis in his mental and spiritual needs. How these interests can be met in the most appropriate way within a social organism, so that the individual can satisfy his interests through this organism in the best possible way, and can also place himself in the economy in the most advantageous way: this question must be solved practically in the institutions of the economic body. This can only be achieved if interests can really assert themselves freely and if the will and the possibility arise to do what is necessary to satisfy them. The emergence of interests lies outside the circle that circumscribes economic life. They are formed with the development of the spiritual and natural human being. That institutions exist to satisfy them is the task of economic life. These institutions can have to do with nothing else but the production and exchange of commodities, that is, of goods which derive their value from human need. The commodity has its value through the person who consumes it. Because the commodity receives its value through the consumer, it stands in the social organism in a quite different way from other things which have value for man as a member of this organism. We should take an impartial view of economic life, in the sphere of which the production, exchange and consumption of commodities belong. One will not notice the essential difference, which exists between the relation of man to man, in that one produces goods for the other, and that which must be based on a legal relation. From this consideration one will arrive at the practical demand that in the social organism the legal life must be kept entirely separate from the economic life. The activities which men have to develop within the institutions which serve the production and exchange of commodities cannot directly give rise to the best possible impulses for the legal relations which must exist among men. Within the economic institutions, man turns to man because the one serves the interest of the other; fundamentally different from this is the relationship that one man has to the other within legal life.
[ 19 ] One could now believe that this distinction demanded by life would already be satisfied if, within the institutions that serve economic life, provision were also made for the rights that must exist in the relationships between the people involved in this economic life. - Such a belief is not rooted in the reality of life. Man can only properly experience the legal relationship which must exist between himself and other men, if he experiences this relationship not in the economic sphere, but on ground entirely separate from it. Therefore, in a healthy social organism, a life must unfold alongside the economic life and in independence, in which the rights that exist from man to man arise and are administered. Legal life, however, is that of the actual political sphere, the state. If men carry into the legislation and administration of the constitutional state those interests which they must serve in their economic life, then the rights which arise will only be the expression of these economic interests. If the constitutional state is itself an economist, it loses the ability to regulate people's legal lives. For its measures and institutions will have to serve the human need for goods; they will thus be pushed away from the impulses that are directed towards legal life.
[ 20 ] The healthy social organism requires, as a second member next to the economic body, the independent political life of the state. In the independent economic body, men will, through the forces of economic life, arrive at institutions which serve the production and exchange of goods in the best possible way. In the political body politic, such institutions will come into being which will orient the mutual relations between men and groups of men in such a way that man's consciousness of justice is satisfied.
[ 21 ] The point of view from which the marked demand for the complete separation of the constitutional state from the economic sphere is made here is one that is inherent in real human life. Such a point of view is not adopted by those who want to combine legal life and economic life. People in economic life naturally have a consciousness of law; but they will only from this and not from economic interests legislate and administer in the sense of law, if they have to judge it in the constitutional state, which as such has no part in economic life. Such a constitutional state has its own legislative and administrative body, both of which are structured according to the principles that arise from the legal consciousness of modern times. It will be built on the impulses in the consciousness of mankind which are at present called democratic impulses. The economic area will form its legislative and administrative bodies out of the impulses of economic life. The necessary intercourse between the heads of the legal and economic body will take place approximately as it does at present between the governments of sovereign territories. Through this division, what develops in one body will be able to exert the necessary effect on what develops in the other. This effect is hindered by the fact that one territory wants to develop in itself what is to flow to it from the other.
[ 22 ] Just as economic life is on the one hand subject to the conditions of the natural basis (climate, geographical nature of the area, availability of natural resources and so on), so on the other hand it is dependent on the legal relationships which the state creates between the economic people and groups of people. This defines the limits of what the activity of economic life can and should encompass. Just as nature creates preconditions that lie outside the economic sphere and which the economic man must accept as something given, on which he can first build his economy, so everything that establishes a legal relationship from man to man in the economic sphere should be regulated in the healthy social organism by the rule of law, which, like the natural basis, unfolds as something independently opposite economic life.
[ 23 ] In the social organism that has emerged in the historical development of mankind to date and that has become what gives the social movement its character through the machine age and the modern capitalist economic form, economic life encompasses more than it should in a healthy social organism. At the present time, in the economic cycle, in which only goods are supposed to move, human labor power also moves, and rights also move. At present, in the economic body based on the division of labor, not only goods can be exchanged for goods, but also goods for labor and goods for rights through the same economic process. (I call a commodity any thing which, through human activity, has become what it is at any place to which it is brought by man and which is put to use. Even if this designation may seem offensive or insufficient to some teachers of economics, it can serve well for an understanding of what should belong to economic life.2It is not important in an explanation that is made in the service of life to give definitions that originate from a theory, but ideas that visualize what plays a vital role in reality. "Commodity", used in the above sense, points to something that man experiences; every other concept of "commodity" leaves something out or adds something, so that the concept does not coincide with the processes of life in their true reality.) If someone acquires a plot of land by purchase, this must be regarded as an exchange of the land for commodities, for which the purchase money is to be regarded as a representative. The property itself, however, does not function as a commodity in economic life. It exists in the social organism through the right which man has to its use. This right is something essentially different from the relation in which the producer of a commodity stands to it. It is inherent in the latter relation that it does not extend to the quite different relation of man to man, which is established by the fact that someone is entitled to the exclusive use of a piece of land. The owner makes other people who are employed by him to work on this property for their livelihood, or who have to live on it, dependent on him. By mutually exchanging real goods which are produced or consumed, a dependence does not arise which operates in the same way between man and man.
[ 24 ] Those who see through such a fact of life impartially will realize that it must find its expression in the institutions of the healthy social organism. As long as commodities are exchanged for commodities in economic life, the value of these commodities remains independent of the legal relationship between persons and groups of persons. As soon as goods are exchanged for rights, the legal relationship itself is affected. It is not the exchange as such that is important. This is the necessary element of life in the present social organism, which rests on the division of labor; but it is a question of the right itself being turned into a commodity by the exchange of the right for the commodity, when the right arises within economic life. This is only prevented by the existence in the social organism, on the one hand, of institutions which aim only to bring about the circulation of commodities in the most expedient manner; and, on the other hand, of those which regulate the rights of producing, trading, and consuming persons living in the exchange of commodities. These rights do not differ in their nature from other rights, which must exist in the relation of person to person, quite independent of the exchange of commodities. If I harm or promote my fellow human being through the sale of a good, this belongs to the same area of social life as harm or promotion through an activity or omission that is not directly expressed in an exchange of goods.
[ 25 ] The effects of legal institutions flow together with those of purely economic activity in the life of the individual. In a healthy social organism they must come from two different directions. In the economic organization, the necessary points of view for the leading personalities must be provided by the education for a branch of industry and the familiarity with it gained from experience in it. In the legal organization, what is demanded by the legal consciousness as a relationship between individuals or groups of people is realized through law and administration. The economic organization will allow people with the same professional or consumer interests or with similar needs in other respects to unite in cooperatives, which will bring about the overall economy through mutual exchange. This organization will be built on an associative basis and on the relationship of associations. These associations will develop a purely economic activity. The legal basis on which they operate will be provided by the legal organization. If such economic associations can assert their economic interests in the representative and administrative bodies of the economic organization, then they will not develop the urge to penetrate the legislative or administrative leadership of the constitutional state (for example, as a farmers' union, as a party of industrialists, as an economically oriented social democracy) in order to achieve what they are unable to achieve within economic life. And if the constitutional state does not participate in any branch of the economy, then it will only create institutions that stem from the legal consciousness of the people who belong to it. Even if, as is natural, the same persons who are active in economic life sit in the representation of the constitutional state, the division into economic and legal life will not result in an influence of economic life on legal life that undermines the health of the social organism as much as it can be undermined if the state organization itself provides for branches of economic life and if the representatives of economic life pass laws in it out of its interests.
[ 26 ] A typical example of the fusion of economic life with legal life was provided by Austria with the constitution it adopted in the sixties of the nineteenth century. The representatives of the Imperial Council of this territory were elected from the four branches of economic life, from the community of large landowners, the chambers of commerce, the cities, markets and industrial towns and the rural communities. It can be seen that nothing else was primarily thought of for this composition of state representation than that legal life would result from the assertion of economic conditions. It is certain that the divisive forces of its nationalities have contributed significantly to the present disintegration of Austria. But it is equally certain that a legal organization, which could have developed its activities alongside the economic one, would have developed out of legal consciousness a form of social organization in which the coexistence of peoples would have become possible.
[ 27 ] The man who is presently interested in public life usually directs his attention to things which are only secondarily relevant to that life. He does this because his habit of thought leads him to regard the social organism as a unified entity. For such an entity, however, no appropriate mode of choice can be found. For in every mode of election the economic interests and the impulses of legal life must interfere with each other in the representative body. And what flows from the disturbance for social life must lead to upheavals in the social organism. At present, working towards a thoroughgoing separation of economic life and legal organization must be at the top of the list as a necessary objective of public life. By living into this separation, the separating organizations will find from their own foundations the best ways of electing their legislators and administrators. In what is at present pressing for decision, questions of the mode of election, though of fundamental importance as such, come into consideration only secondarily. Where the old relationships are still in place, we would have to work towards the structure outlined above. Where the old has already disintegrated or is in the process of disintegration, individuals and alliances between individuals would have to try to take the initiative for a reorganization that moves in the direction indicated. To want to bring about a transformation of public life from one day to the next is something that even sensible socialists regard as swarming. Such people expect the recovery they mean through a gradual, appropriate transformation. But that the historical developmental forces of mankind currently necessitate a reasonable will in the direction of a social reorganization can be taught to every unbiased person by far more illuminating facts.
[ 28 ] Whoever regards as "practically feasible" only that to which he has become accustomed from a narrow view of life will regard what is indicated here as "impractical". If he cannot convert himself, and if he retains influence in any area of life, then he will not work for the recovery, but for the further illness of the social organism, just as people of his attitude have worked to bring about the present conditions.
[ 29 ] The endeavor with which leading circles of mankind have begun and which has led to the transfer of certain branches of the economy (post office, railroads and so on) into state life must give way to the opposite: the separation of all economic activity from the sphere of political government. Thinkers who believe that they are moving in the direction of a healthy social organism draw the ultimate conclusion from the nationalization efforts of these hitherto leading circles. They want the socialization of all means of economic life, insofar as these are means of production. A healthy development will give economic life its independence and the political state the ability to influence the economic body through the legal system in such a way that the individual does not feel his integration into the social organism to be in conflict with his sense of justice.
[ 30 ] One can see how the ideas put forward here are founded in the real life of mankind if one directs one's attention to the work which man performs for the social organism through his physical labor. Within the capitalist economic form, this labor has been incorporated into the social organism in such a way that it is bought by the employer from the employee like a commodity. An exchange is made between money (as the representative of commodities) and labor. But such an exchange cannot in reality take place. It only appears to take place.3It is quite possible that in life processes are not only explained in a false sense, but that they take place in a false sense. Money and work are not interchangeable values, but only money and the product of work. If I therefore give money for work, I am doing something wrong. I am creating an illusory process. For in reality I can only give money for the product of labor. In reality, the employer receives goods from the worker that can only be produced if the worker gives his labor power for their production. From the equivalent value of these goods, the worker receives one share and the employer the other. The production of goods takes place through the cooperation of the employer and employee. The product of their joint work first enters the cycle of economic life. A legal relationship between worker and entrepreneur is necessary for the production of the product. But this can be transformed by the capitalist mode of economy into one which is conditioned by the economic superiority of the employer over the worker. In a healthy social organism it must become evident that labor cannot be paid. For it cannot be given an economic value in comparison with a commodity. Only the commodity produced by labor has such a value in comparison with other commodities. The way in which, and the extent to which, a person has to work for the existence of the social organism must be regulated by his ability and by the conditions of a humane existence. This can only happen if this regulation is carried out by the political state independently of the administrations of economic life.
[ 31 ] Through such regulation, a basis of value is created for the commodity which can be compared with the other, which exists in the conditions of nature. As the value of one commodity increases in comparison with another by the fact that the extraction of the raw products is more difficult for the one than for the other, so the value of the commodity must become dependent on the kind and amount of labor that may be applied to the production of the commodity according to the legal system. 4Such a relation of labor to the legal order will compel the associations active in economic life to reckon with what is "right" as a presupposition. Soch is achieved by the fact that the economic organization is dependent on man, not man on the economic order.
[ 32 ] In this way, economic life is subjected to its necessary conditions from two sides: from the side of the natural basis, which humanity must accept as it is given to it, and from the side of the legal basis, which should be created out of legal consciousness on the ground of the political state, which is independent of economic life.
[ 33 ] It is easy to see that through such a management of the social organism the economic prosperity will fall and rise according to the amount of work that is expended out of legal consciousness. Only such a dependence of economic prosperity is necessary in a healthy social organism. It alone can prevent man from being so consumed by economic life that he can no longer feel his existence to be worthy of man. And in truth, all upheavals in the social organism are based on the existence of the feeling of an existence unworthy of human beings.
[ 34 ] One possibility of not reducing the prosperity of the national economy too much from the legal point of view is similar to that of improving the natural basis. One can make a less productive soil more productive by technical means; one can, prompted by the excessive reduction of prosperity, change the nature and measure of labor. But this change should not come directly from the cycle of economic life, but from the insight that develops on the basis of legal life, which is independent of economic life.
[ 35 ] Everything that is produced by economic life and legal consciousness in the organization of social life is influenced by a third source: the individual faculties of the individual human being. This field includes everything from the highest intellectual achievements to that which flows into human works through the better or lesser physical aptitude of the human being for achievements that serve the social organism. What comes from this source must flow into the healthy social organism in a quite different way from that which lives in the exchange of goods and that which can flow from state life. There is no other way to bring about this absorption in a healthy way than to make it dependent on the free receptivity of human beings and on the impulses that come from the individual faculties themselves. If the human achievements arising from such abilities are artificially influenced by economic life or by the organization of the state, the true basis of their own life is for the most part taken away from them. This basis can only consist in the power which human achievements must develop from within themselves. If the receipt of such services is directly conditioned by economic life, or organized by the state, the free receptivity for them is paralysed. It is, however, the only way to allow them to flow into the social organism in a healthy form. For the spiritual life, with which the development of the other individual faculties in human life is also connected by an immense number of threads, there is only a healthy possibility of development if it is left to its own impulses in its production and if it is in an understanding relationship with the people who receive its achievements.
[ 36 ] What is being pointed to here as the healthy conditions for the development of spiritual life is not seen through at present, because the right view of it is clouded by the fusion of a large part of this life with political state life. This fusion has developed over the last few centuries and people have become accustomed to it. One speaks of "freedom of science and teaching". But it is taken for granted that the political state administers "free science" and "free teaching". No feeling is developed for the way in which this state makes intellectual life dependent on the needs of the state. One thinks that the state creates the places where teaching takes place; then those who occupy these places can develop intellectual life "freely". In becoming accustomed to such an opinion, one does not take into account how closely the content of spiritual life is connected with the innermost being of man in which it unfolds. How this unfolding can only be a free one if it is placed in the social organism by no other impulses than those which come from the spiritual life itself. It is not only the administration of science and that part of intellectual life which is connected with it that has been characterized in recent centuries by its fusion with state life, but also the content itself. Certainly, what is produced in mathematics or physics cannot be directly influenced by the state. But think of history, of the other cultural sciences. Have they not become a reflection of what has arisen from the connection of their bearers with state life, from the needs of this life? It is precisely because of this imprinted character that the current scientifically oriented ideas that dominate intellectual life have had an effect on the proletariat as an ideology. The latter noticed how a certain character is imprinted on human ideas by the needs of state life, in which the interests of the ruling classes are met. The proletarian thinker saw a reflection of material interests and struggles for interests. This gave him the impression that all intellectual life was ideology, a reflection of economic organization.
[ 37 ] Such a view, which desolates the spiritual life of man, ceases when sentiment can arise: In the spiritual realm there reigns a reality which transcends the material external life and which carries its content within itself. It is impossible for such a feeling to arise if the spiritual life does not develop and administer itself freely within the social organism out of its own impulses. Only those bearers of spiritual life who stand within such a development and administration have the power to give this life the weight it deserves in the social organism. Art, science, ideology and all that is connected with them require such an independent position in human society. For in spiritual life everything is connected. The freedom of the one cannot flourish without the freedom of the other, even if the content of mathematics and physics cannot be directly influenced by the needs of the state: What is developed of them, what people think of their value, what effect their cultivation may have on the whole of the rest of intellectual life, and many other things are conditioned by these needs when the state administers branches of intellectual life. It is another thing when the teacher who looks after the lowest school level follows the impulses of state life; it is another when he receives these impulses from an intellectual life that is left to its own devices. In this field, too, Social Democracy has only inherited the habits of thought and customs of the leading circles. It regards it as its ideal to incorporate spiritual life into the social body built on economic life. If it were to achieve the goal it has set itself, it could only continue on the path along which intellectual life has been devalued. It has unilaterally developed a correct sentiment with its demand that religion must be a private matter. For in a healthy social organism, all spiritual life must be a "private matter" vis-à-vis the state and the economy in the sense indicated here. But in relegating religion to the private sphere, Social Democracy does not proceed from the opinion that a spiritual good will thereby be given a position within the social organism through which it will achieve a more desirable, higher development than under the influence of the state. It is of the opinion that the social organism may only cultivate by its means what is its vital need. And religious spiritual goods are not such a need. In this way, unilaterally removed from public life, one branch of spiritual life cannot flourish if the other spiritual good is shackled. The religious life of the newer humanity will develop its soul-bearing power for this humanity in connection with all liberated spiritual life.
[ 38 ] Not only the production, but also the reception of this spiritual life by humanity must be based on the free need of the soul. Teachers, artists and so on, who in their social position are only in direct connection with a legislation and administration which arise from the spiritual life itself and which are only carried by its impulses, will, by the nature of their work, be able to develop the receptivity for their achievements in people who are protected by the political state, which acts out of itself, from being subject only to the compulsion to work, but to whom the law also gives the leisure which awakens the understanding for spiritual goods. People who think of themselves as "practitioners of life" may believe such thoughts: People will drink away their leisure time and people will fall back into illiteracy if the state provides such leisure, and if attending school is left to people's free understanding. Let such "pessimists" wait and see what happens when the world is no longer under their influence. This is all too often determined by a certain feeling that quietly whispers to them how they use their leisure time and what they needed to acquire a little "education". They cannot count on the igniting force that a truly self-reliant spiritual life has in the social organism, because the shackled one they know has never been able to exert such an igniting force on them.
[ 39 ] Both the political state and economic life will receive the influx from spiritual life that they need from the self-governing spiritual organism. Practical education for economic life, too, will only be able to develop its full power through the free interaction of the latter with the spiritual organism. Suitably educated people will enliven the experiences they can make in the economic sphere through the power that comes to them from the liberated spiritual material. People with experience gained from economic life will find the transition into the spiritual organization and have a fertilizing effect on that which must be fertilized in this way.
[ 40 ] In the field of the political state, the necessary healthy views will be formed through such a free effect of the spiritual good. Through the influence of such spiritual goods, the manual worker will be able to acquire a satisfactory perception of the position of his work in the social organism. He will come to understand how the social organism cannot support him without the leadership that organizes the work of the craftsman according to its purpose. He will be able to assimilate the feeling that his work belongs together with the organizing forces that stem from the development of individual human abilities. On the soil of the political state he will form the rights which will secure him a share in the proceeds of the commodities which he produces; and he will freely grant that share to the intellectual property which belongs to him which will make its production possible. In the field of intellectual life the possibility will arise that its producers will also live from the proceeds of their achievements. What someone does for himself in the field of spiritual life will remain his most intimate private matter; what someone is able to accomplish for the social organism will be able to count on the free compensation of those for whom the spiritual good is a need. Whoever cannot find what he needs through such compensation within the intellectual organization will have to pass over to the realm of the political state or economic life.
[ 41 ] The technical ideas originating in the spiritual life flow into economic life. They originate from the spiritual life, even if they come directly from members of the state or economic area. Hence come all the organizational ideas and forces which fertilize economic and state life. The compensation for this influx into the two social spheres will either also come about through the free understanding of those who are dependent on this influx, or it will find its regulation through rights which are developed in the sphere of the political state. What this political state itself requires for its maintenance will be provided by the right of taxation. This will develop through a harmonization of the demands of legal consciousness with those of economic life.
[ 42 ] In addition to the political and economic realms, the spiritual realm, which is set upon itself, must work in the healthy social organism. The direction of the developmental forces of modern humanity points to the threefold structure of this organism. As long as social life was essentially guided by the instinctive forces of a large part of mankind, the urge for this decisive organization did not arise. In a certain dullness of social life there acted together what in principle always came from three sources. Modern times demand a conscious integration of man into the social organism. This consciousness can only give a healthy form to the behavior and the whole life of man if it is oriented from three sides. Modern humanity strives for this orientation in the unconscious depths of the soul; and what lives itself out as a social movement is only the clouded reflection of this striving.
[ 43 ] From other foundations than those in which we live today, the call for a reorganization of human nature emerged from deep undergrounds at the end of the 1st century. Century the call for a reorganization of the social human organism emerged. The three words fraternity, equality and liberty were heard as the motto of this reorganization. Now, of course, anyone with an unprejudiced mind and a healthy sense of humanity, who is open to the reality of human development, cannot help but understand everything that these words point to. Nevertheless, there were perceptive thinkers who, in the course of the 19th century, took pains to show how it is impossible to realize these ideas of brotherhood, equality and freedom in a unified social organism. They believed they recognized that these three impulses, if they were to be realized, must contradict each other in the social organism. It has been astutely demonstrated, for example, how impossible it is, if the impulse of equality is realized, that the freedom necessarily founded in every human being will then also come to fruition. And one cannot but agree with those who find this contradiction; and yet, at the same time, one must sympathize with each of these three ideals out of a general human feeling!
[ 44 ] This contradiction exists for the reason that the true social meaning of these three ideals only comes to light by seeing through the necessary threefold structure of the social organism. The three links should not be combined and centralized in an abstract, theoretical Reichstag or other unity. They should be a living reality. Each of the three social links should be centralized in itself; and it is only through their living coexistence and interaction that the unity of the overall social organism can emerge. In real life, what appears to be contradictory works together to form a unity. Therefore, one will arrive at a grasp of the life of the social organism if one is able to see through the real organization of this social organism with reference to brotherhood, equality and freedom. Then one will recognize that the cooperation of men in economic life must rest on that fraternity which arises out of associations. In the second link, in the system of public law, where one has to do with the purely human relationship of person to person, one has to strive for the realization of the idea of equality. And in the spiritual sphere, which stands in relative independence in the social organism, one has to do with the realization of the impulse of freedom. Viewed in this way, these three ideals show their real value. They cannot be realized in a chaotic social life, but only in a healthy tripartite social organism. Not an abstract, centralized social structure can realize the ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity, but each of the three members of the social organism can draw its strength from one of these impulses. And it will then be able to work together with the other members in a fruitful way.
[ 45 ] Those people who at the end of the 18th century raised the demand for the realization of the three ideas of liberty, equality and fraternity, and also those who repeated them later, could darkly sense where the forces of development of modern humanity were pointing. But at the same time they did not overcome their belief in the unitary state. For them, their ideas meant something contradictory. They embraced the contradictory because in the subconscious depths of their souls the urge for the tripartite organization of the social organism was at work, in which the trinity of their ideas can only become a higher unity. The clearly speaking social facts of the present demand that the forces of development, which in the development of modern humanity urge towards this threefold structure, be turned into a conscious social will.