The Renewal of the Social Organism
GA 24
3. Marxism and the Threefold Social Order
[ 1 ] It will be impossible to free ourselves from the snares of social confusion in which Europe is caught if particular social demands continue to be advocated with the lack of clarity that currently distorts them. Such a demand, one that exists in wide circles, is expressed by Friedrich Engels in his book The Evolution of Socialism from Utopia to Science: “The management of goods and control of the means of production takes the place of the governing of persons.” The view in which this sentence originates forms the creed of many leaders of the proletariat and the mass of the working classes themselves. From a certain perspective, this is correct. The human relationships that gave rise to the modern national state have formed administrative bodies that regulated not only things and modes of production, but also the human beings engaged in them. The management of things and modes of production constitutes economics. In modern times, the economic life has assumed forms such that it has become imperative that its administration no longer govern persons. Marx and Engels perceived this. They directed their attention to the way in which capital and labor power work within the economic cycle. They felt that modern humanity was striving to outgrow the form these workings had assumed, for it is a form in which capital has become a means of exerting power over human labor. Capital not only serves as a means for the management of things and the control of production; it lays down the guidelines for the governing of human beings. Thus Marx and Engels concluded that this governance of persons must be removed from the cycle of economic processes. They were right: modern life does not permit people to be regarded merely as appendages of things and processes of production, or to be managed as part of their management.
[ 2 ] However, Marx and Engels believed that the matter could be settled simply by eliminating governance of persons from the economic process and allowing the new, purified economic management, having disentangled itself from the state, to carry on. They did not see that in the old governing there resided something that regulated human relations—relations that cannot remain unregulated and that also do not regulate themselves when they no longer are regulated by the demands of economic life in the old fashion. Neither did they see that within capital was the source of the forces that managed goods and controlled branches of production. It is by way of capital that the human spirit directs economic life. Yet in managing goods and controlling branches of production one still does nothing to nurture the human spirit, which is created ever anew, and must continually bring new impulses to the economy if economic life is not to dry up and degenerate completely.
[ 3 ] What Marx and Engels saw was right—the control of the economy must contain nothing that implies rule over persons themselves, and that the capital that serves the economy must never rule the human spirit directing its course. However, the fatal flaw was that Marx and Engels believed both the human relations previously governed and the direction of the economy by the human spirit would still be able to go on of themselves when they no longer proceeded from the administration of the economy.
[ 4 ] The purification of economic life—its restriction to the management of goods and control of the processes of production—is possible only if there exists besides this economic life something that replaces the previous form of administration and something else again that makes the human spirit the actual controller of the economy. This demand is met by the idea of the threefold social order. The administration of the spiritual and cultural life, placed on its own footing, will supply the economic life with the human spiritual impulses that can fructify it ever and again, so long as this administration keeps within its own province and controls only goods and lines of production. The sphere of rights, separated from the cultural and economic systems of the social organism, will govern human relations to the extent that democracy allows one mature human being to govern another, while the power that one man gets over another through force of greater individual abilities or through economic means will have no say whatever in this governance.
[ 5 ] Marx and Engels were right to demand a new economic order—right, but one-sided. They did not perceive that economic life can only become free when a free sphere of rights and free cultivation of the spirit are allowed to arise along-side it. The forms future economic life must assume can be seen only by those who are clear in their minds that the capitalist-economic orientation must give way to a distinctly spiritual one, and that the governance of human relations through economic power gives way to one that is distinctly human. The demand for an economic life that controls only goods and production can never be fulfilled if advocated only by itself. Anyone who persists in such advocacy is claiming to be able to create an economic life that has cast off what was until now a necessity of its existence, yet is nevertheless supposed to continue to exist.
[ 6 ] Living in quite different circumstances (but out of a profound experience of life) Goethe wrote two thoughts that are fully applicable to many modern social demands. The first is: “An inadequate truth works for some time; then, instead of complete enlightenment, suddenly a dazzling falsity steps in. The world is satisfied and centuries are duped.” The second is: “Generalizations and enormous arrogance are ever paving the way to horrible disasters.” Indeed, Marxism untutored by recent events is an “inadequate truth” that nevertheless works on in the proletarian world view. Since the catastrophe of the Great War, in the face of the true demands of the times, it has become a “dazzling falsity” that must be prevented from “duping centuries.” The attempt to prevent it will find favor with anyone who perceives what disaster the proletarian classes are rushing into with their “inadequate truth.” This “inadequate truth” has indeed yielded “generalizations” whose supporters show no small amount of arrogance in rejecting as utopian everything that attempts to replace their utopian generalizations with realities of life.
Marxismus und Dreigliederung
[ 1 ] Es ist unmöglich, aus den sozialen Wirrnissen, in denen Europa steckt, herauszukommen, wenn noch lange gewisse soziale Forderungen, die erhoben werden, in der Unklarheit bleiben, durch die sie gegenwärtig entstellt werden. Als eine solche Forderung lebt in weiten Kreisen diejenige, welche Friedrich Engels in seinem Buche «Die Entwickelung des Sozialismus von der Utopie zur Wissenschaft» mit den Worten ausgesprochen hat: «An die Stelle der Regierung über Personen trin die Verwaltung von Sachen und die Leitung von Produktionsprozessen.» Zahlreiche Führer des Proletariats und mit ihnen die proletarischen Massen selbst bekennen sich zu der Anschauung, welcher dieser Ausspruch entstammt. Sie ist von einem gewissen Gesichtspunkt aus richtig. Die Menschenzusammenhänge, aus denen die modernen Staaten sich entwickelt haben, haben Verwaltungen gebildet, von denen nicht nur Sachen und Produktionsprozesse geregelt, sondern auch die in den Produktionszweigen und mit den Sachen beschäftigten Menschen regiert werden. Die Verwaltung von Sachen und Produktionszweigen umfaßt das Wirtschaftsleben. Dieses hat in der neueren Zeit Formen angenommen, die notwendig machen, daß seine Verwaltung nicht mehr die Regierung der Menschen mitbesorgen kann. Das erkannten Marx und Engels. Sie wandten ihre Aufmerksamkeit darauf, wie im Wirtschaftskreislauf das Kapital und die menschliche Arbeitskraft wirksam sind. Sie empfanden, daß das Leben der neueren Menschheit über die Art, welche diese Wirksamkeit angenommen hat, hinausstrebt. Denn diese Art ist so, daß das Kapital zur Grundlage der Macht über die menschliche Arbeitskraft geworden ist. Es dient nicht nur der Verwaltung von Sachen und der Leitung von Produktionsprozessen; es gibt die Richtschnur ab für die Regierung von Menschen. Daraus schlossen Marx und Engels, daß man aus dem Wirtschaftskreislauf die Regierung über Menschen entfernen müsse. Sie schlossen recht. Denn das neuere Leben gestattet nicht, daß die Menschen nur als Anhängsel der Sachen und Produktionsprozesse betrachtet und mit deren Verwaltung mitverwaltet werden.
[ 2 ] Aber Marx und Engels glaubten, daß die Sache einfach damit abgetan sei, daß man aus dem Wirtschaftsprozeß das Regieren über Menschen herauswirft und die neue aus dem Staat sich entwickelnde gereinigte Wirtschaftsverwaltung fortbestehen lasse. Sie sahen nicht, daß in dem Regieren etwas lag, das Verhältnisse der Menschen zueinander regelt, die nicht ungeregelt bleiben können, und die sich auch nicht von selbst regeln, wenn sie nicht mehr aus den Forderungen des Wirtschaftslebens in der alten Art geregelt werden. Sie sahen auch nicht, daß in dem Kapital die Quelle lag, aus der die Kräfte flossen zur Verwaltung der Sachen und Leitung der Produktionszweige. Auf dem Umwege durch das Kapital leitet der Menschengeist das Wirtschaftsleben. Indem man Sachen verwaltet und Produktionszweige leitet, pflegt man noch nicht den Menschengeist, der aus immer neuer Daseinsschöpfung hervorgeht, und der dem Wirtschaftsleben auch immer neue Kräfte zuführen muß, wenn es nicht erst erstarren und dann völlig verkommen soll.
[ 3 ] Richtig ist, was Marx und Engels gesehen haben: daß die Verwaltung des Wirtschaftskreislaufes nichts enthalten darf, was eine Regierung über Menschen bedeutet, und daß dem Kapital, das diesem Kreislauf dient, nicht die Macht zukommen darf über den Menschengeist, der ihm die Wege weist. Aber verhängnisvoll geworden ist, daß sie glaubten, beides, die durch das Regieren geregelten Verhältnisse der Menschen zueinander und die Leitung des Wirtschaftslebens durch den Menschengeist, werde dann von selbst da sein können, wenn es nicht mehr von der Wirtschaftsverwaltung ausgeht.
[ 4 ] Die Reinigung des Wirtschaftslebens, das heißt seine Beschränkung auf die Verwaltung von Sachen und die Leitung von Produktionsprozessen, ist nur möglich, wenn neben dem Wirtschaftsleben etwas besteht, das an die Stelle des alten Regierens tritt und etwas anderes, das den Menschengeist zum wirklichen Leiter des Wirtschaftskreislaufes macht. Dieser Forderung wird die Idee des dreigliedrigen sozialen Organismus gerecht. Die auf sich selbst gestellte Verwaltung des Geisteslebens wird dem Wirtschaftsleben die menschlichen Geisteskräfte zuführen, die es fortschreitend neu befruchten können, wenn sie auf ihrem eigenen Boden bloß Sachen verwaltet und Produktionszweige regelt. Und das von dem Geistes- und Wirtschaftsgebiet abgesonderte Rechtsglied des sozialen Organismus wird die Beziehungen der Menschen so regeln, wie sie demokratisch der mündig gewordene Mensch dem mündig gewordenen Menschen gegenüber regeln kann, ohne daß bei dieser Regelung die Macht mitspricht, die der eine Mensch über den anderen durch stärkere individuelle Kräfte oder durch wirtschaftliche Grundlagen haben kann.
[ 5 ] Marx' und Engels Gesichtspunkt war mit Bezug auf die Forderung einer Neugestaltung des Wirtschaftslebens richtig; aber einseitig. Sie sahen nicht, daß das Wirtschaftsleben nur dadurch frei werden kann, wenn sich neben dasselbe ein freies Rechtsleben und eine freie Geistespflege stellen. Welche Formen das Wirtschaftsleben der Zukunft annehmen muß, das kann allein derjenige sehen, der sich klar darüber ist, daß die wirtschaftlich-kapitalistische Orientierung in die unmittelbar geistige, die aus der Wirtschaftsmacht erfolgende Regelung der Menschenbeziehungen in die unmittelbar menschliche übergehen muß. Die Forderung eines Wirtschaftslebens, in dem nur Sachen verwaltet und Produktionsprozesse geleitet werden, kann nie erfüllt werden, wenn sie allein für sich erhoben wird. Wer sie dennoch erhebt, der will ein Wirtschaftsleben schaffen, das von sich auswirft, was es bisher als eine Daseinsnotwendigkeit in sich getragen hat, und das dennoch bestehen soll.
[ 6 ] Aus anderen Lebensgrundlagen, aber aus gründlicher Erfahrung heraus hat Goethe zwei Sätze geprägt, die aber vollgültig für viele soziale Forderungen unserer Zeit sind. Der eine ist: «Ein unzulängliches Wahre wirkt eine Zeitlang fort; statt völliger Aufklärung aber tritt auf einmal ein blendendes Falsche herein; das genügt der Welt und so sind Jahrhunderte betört.» Der andere ist: «Allgemeine Begriffe und großer Dünkel sind immer auf dem Wege, entsetzliches Unglück anzurichten.» Wahrhaftig, der nicht von unseren Zeitverhältnissen belehrte Marxismus ist ein «unzulängliches Wahre», das trotz seiner Unzulänglichkeit in der proletarischen Weltanschauung wirkt; aber nach der Weltkriegskatastrophe wird es gegenüber den wahren Zeitforderungen ein «blendendes Falsches», das verhindert werden muß, «Jahrhunderte zu betören». Diesem Streben nach Verhinderung wird derjenige zuneigen, der erkennt, in welches Unglück das Proletariat durch sein «unzulängliches Wahres» rennt. Aus diesem «unzulänglichen Wahren» sind wirklich «allgemeine Begriffe» geworden, deren Träger aus einem wahrlich nicht kleinen Dünkel alles als Utopie ablehnen, was bemüht ist, an die Stelle ihrer utopischen Allgemeinheiten Wirklichkeiten des Lebens zu setzen.
Marxism and tripartism
[ 1 ] It is impossible to get out of the social turmoil in which Europe finds itself if certain social demands that are raised remain unclear for a long time, as they are currently distorted. One such demand is widely held to be that which Friedrich Engels expressed in his book "The Development of Socialism from Utopia to Science" with the words: "The administration of things and the management of production processes take the place of the government of persons." Numerous leaders of the proletariat, and with them the proletarian masses themselves, profess the view from which this statement originated. It is correct from a certain point of view. The human contexts from which modern states have developed have formed administrations which not only regulate things and production processes, but also govern the people employed in the branches of production and with the things. The administration of things and branches of production comprises economic life. In modern times this has assumed forms which make it necessary that its administration can no longer be concerned with the government of men. Marx and Engels recognized this. They turned their attention to how capital and human labor are active in the economic cycle. They felt that the life of modern mankind was striving to transcend the mode which this activity had assumed. For this mode is such that capital has become the basis of power over human labor. It serves not only for the administration of things and the management of production processes; it provides the guideline for the government of men. From this Marx and Engels concluded that the government over people must be removed from the economic cycle. They were right. For modern life does not permit people to be regarded merely as appendages of things and production processes and to be administered along with them.
[ 2 ] But Marx and Engels believed that the matter was simply settled by throwing out of the economic process the governing of men and allowing the new purified economic administration developing out of the state to continue. They did not see that there was something in government that regulates the relations of men to each other, which cannot remain unregulated, nor can they regulate themselves if they are no longer regulated in the old way by the demands of economic life. Nor did they see that in capital lay the source from which the forces flowed for the administration of things and the management of branches of production. The human spirit directs economic life in a roundabout way through capital. By managing things and directing branches of production, one does not yet cultivate the human spirit, which emerges from ever new creation of existence and which must also constantly supply economic life with new forces if it is not first to solidify and then completely degenerate.
[ 3 ] What Marx and Engels saw is correct: that the administration of the economic cycle must not contain anything that signifies a government over people, and that capital, which serves this cycle, must not be given power over the human spirit that shows it the way. But it has become fatal that they believed that both, the relations of men to each other regulated by government and the guidance of economic life by the human spirit, would then be able to exist by themselves when it no longer emanates from economic administration.
[ 4 ] The purification of economic life, that is, its limitation to the administration of things and the management of production processes, is only possible if something exists alongside economic life that takes the place of the old governing and something else that makes the human spirit the real leader of the economic cycle. The idea of the tripartite social organism meets this requirement. The administration of spiritual life, left to itself, will supply economic life with the human spiritual forces that can progressively fertilize it anew, if it merely administers things and regulates branches of production on its own ground. And the legal element of the social organism, separated from the spiritual and economic sphere, will regulate the relations of men in such a way as can be regulated democratically by man who has come of age towards man who has come of age, without the power which one man may have over another through stronger individual powers or through economic foundations having any part in this regulation.
[ 5 ] Marx and Engels' point of view was correct with regard to the demand for a reorganization of economic life, but one-sided. They did not see that economic life can only become free if it is accompanied by a free legal life and a free cultivation of the mind. What forms the economic life of the future must take can only be seen by those who realize that the economic-capitalist orientation must pass over into the directly spiritual, the regulation of human relations resulting from economic power into the directly human. The demand for an economic life in which only things are managed and production processes are directed can never be fulfilled if it is raised for itself alone. Whoever nevertheless raises it wants to create an economic life that throws out of itself what it has hitherto carried within itself as a necessity of existence, and which should nevertheless exist.
[ 6 ] From other foundations of life, but from thorough experience, Goethe coined two sentences that are fully valid for many social demands of our time. One is: "An inadequate truth continues for a time; but instead of complete enlightenment, a dazzling falsehood suddenly enters; that is enough for the world, and so centuries are beguiled." The other is: "General notions and great conceit are always on the way to causing terrible misfortune." It is true that Marxism, which has not been taught by the conditions of our times, is an "inadequate truth" which, despite its inadequacy, is effective in the proletarian world view; but after the catastrophe of the world war it becomes a "blinding falsehood" in the face of the true demands of the times, which must be prevented from "beguiling centuries". Those who recognize the misfortune into which the proletariat is running through its "inadequate truth" will tend towards this striving for prevention. This "inadequate truth" has really become "general concepts" whose bearers, out of a truly not small conceit, reject everything as utopia that endeavors to replace their utopian generalities with realities of life.