The Rudolf Steiner Archive

106. Socialization and Works Councils

[ 1 ] The local Association of Intellectual Workers has made it one of its goals to educate the broadest possible audience about important intellectual movements of both the past and the present. For this reason, on July 31, it organized a lecture evening at the Saalbau, which was very well attended and at which Dr. Rudolf Steiner spoke on “Socialization and Works Councils.” Steiner has caused a great stir not only in Stuttgart but also in other parts of the state and the Reich with his thoroughly new and original ideas and thoughts. One can sense this about him the moment he takes the stage: he possesses a strong will and a fervent urge in his heart to help—to help alleviate the distress into which Germany has fallen. He believes that the ideas of Marx and Engels would have been suitable for reshaping our political and economic life before the catastrophe, but that today the situation is different, and a new, somewhat different solution must be found. In his remarks, he therefore examined the social question in its threefold form—as an intellectual, legal, and economic issue—and argued that the call for socialization had arisen not only from economic life but also from intellectual and legal life: The worker wants to participate in the culture of the minority, a culture that this minority has claimed for itself and which is on its way to becoming a culture of luxury. Furthermore, the worker no longer wishes, in the future, for his labor power to be regarded as a commodity with which he must engage in trade governed by supply and demand. Steiner therefore proposes separating the three areas outlined above from the state’s existing social life and establishing each of the three areas—economic life, legal life (or political life in the narrower sense), and intellectual life (or cultural life in the narrower sense)—as independent spheres. Socialism should then prevail in economic life, democracy (full equality for all) in state or legal life, and individual values (the unique talents of the individual) should come to the fore in spiritual life. With an impassioned call to act before it is too late, Dr. Steiner concluded his remarks, which were imbued with the deepest feeling; behind them, as was clearly evident, stood a strong, mature personality, fully devoted to his task and possessing the strongest individual character. And it was this personality, above all, that—as far as one could tell—made such a strong impression on the audience that a spontaneous, resounding round of applause rewarded the speaker, even though one had—and could not help but have—the impression that what had been presented could not yet have been fully grasped or understood by everyone. Two men from Stuttgart, Messrs. Molt and Hahn, participated in the discussion, fully in line with the speaker’s views. Following a forceful closing statement by Dr. Steiner, the chair, Rector Kimmich, adjourned the meeting, which had taken an extremely stimulating course. Afterward, a detailed discussion on works councils took place in the adjoining room of the “Rössle.” We have heard that further steps are to be taken to resolve the issue.