Criticism of capitalism

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Graffiti "Destroy Capitalism!" On a factory wall

Criticism of capitalism refers to views and theories that criticize in principle or in individual aspects the economic order that has expanded with industrialization and is based on private property , market economy , capital accumulation , dependent wage labor and the individual pursuit of profit .

Hardly any different than capitalism itself, the history of the criticism of capitalism goes back to the 19th century. The criticism is expressed on individual elements of capitalism such as money and interest economy , private ownership of the means of production and profit maximization as well as the consequences ascribed to them such as exploitation and impoverishment of the working class.

Practical criticism of capitalism can express itself in the establishment of cooperatively organized companies and banks or alternative economic sectors as well as in the partial or full takeover of individual economic segments by actors who pursue tasks and goals that are less individual profit than the common good.

Machine striker

According to Edward P. Thompson , the so-called “ machine storms ” can be assigned to currents critical of capitalism. With the change in the world of work as a result of industrialization , there were labor movements, especially in England ( Luddism ), but also in other European countries, the aim of which was to preserve their livelihoods. This included, among other things, the destruction of machines as well as the merger of organized interest groups, in the Anglo-Saxon area the "Guilds" as forerunners of the modern trade unions. According to Eric Hobsbawm , the machine storm did not document the hostility of the early industrial workers towards machines as such, but rather represented a rebellion against the manufacturers who used the machines for more intensive exploitation and discipline of the workers.

Early socialism

The socialist criticism of capitalism is originally based on alienation through the industrial revolution . Even the utopian socialists like Charles Fourier criticized capitalism and designed utopian counter-models.

Fourier's opponent Robert Owen, on the other hand, is considered the founder of the cooperative system and tried to find practical solutions for more humane working conditions and forms of coexistence, for example in the commune (New) Harmony founded by the Württemberg pietist Johann Georg Rapp .

Marxist-inspired criticism of capitalism

Karl Marx (1875)

Marx and Engels

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels describe capitalist society as a society of misery , exploitation and alienation . The Communist Party's manifesto of 1848 sees globalization , internationalization and urbanization as positive. But it contains the fundamental call to replace capitalism with socialism or communism in order to remedy the alleged abuses.

In his early writings, Marx particularly emphasizes the aspect of alienation. In capitalism, a wage worker without ownership of the means of production cannot freely dispose of his labor power , but must use it according to the specifications of the capitalist for whom he works. The workers no longer experience the goods he produces as his own, but as foreign ones; he could not recognize himself in the results of his own work. Capitalism is a subtle form of bondage based on an apparent freedom . Formally, all members of capitalist society are free and equal in law, but de facto wage workers can only choose to whom they sell their labor. In capitalism, work is not a possibility of self-realization , but by its nature forced labor .

In his later work, especially in his main work Das Kapital , Marx emphasized above all the exploitative character of capitalism. The capitalist increases his capital through the exploitation of foreign labor, since he only compensates the wage laborer for a part of the value created by the worker. On the other hand, the capitalist reaps a large part of the value created by the worker as surplus value from which he derives his profit . Instead of improving his situation with the advance of industry, the worker becomes a pauper in such a way that there is general impoverishment . The Marxist crisis theory assumes that a capitalist economy periodically from crises is haunted.

Neo-Marxism and the New Left

The critical theory of the Frankfurt School , whose most important representatives include Max Horkheimer , Theodor W. Adorno and Herbert Marcuse , developed a new approach to a critique of capitalism ( neo-Marxism ). Critical Theory had a major influence on the international student movement of 1968. This took position against both capitalism and real socialism . In the aftermath of the student movement in the 1970s in the Federal Republic of Germany, the complex, so-called New Left emerged . This movement is - among others such as B. Christian and conservative - one of the roots of the party Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen . Sometimes the terrorist organization RAF , which tried to overcome capitalism through a revolutionary liberation struggle, is also counted among the New Left. Their violent actions were directed against "representatives of the capitalist West German system". Further socialist currents of this time were the so-called K groups , which were oriented towards Stalinism , Trotskyism or Maoism .

Value criticism

Criticism of value is a Marxist current which, based on the analysis of the role of “value” in capitalism, which determines society, tries to critically describe the social conditions and developments of developed capitalist states. The aim of the criticism is the existence of the form of value itself, the transformation of concrete use into an abstract medium that - further developed into "capital" - determines production, consumption and almost all areas of life. This utilization is only realized through social action, but it gives this goal and form. In contrast to the reading they criticized as “labor movement Marxism”, they interpret Marx's critique of the economy to the effect that Marx criticizes the economic category “value” itself, not just the distribution of (surplus) value or its “unjust” appropriation by the capitalists.

Most value critics advocate a breakdown theory, which they take from Marx's book “Outlines for Criticism of Political Economy”: since only labor creates value and thus surplus value, but the capitalist mode of production becomes more and more productive work superfluous due to the limitless increase in labor productivity do, capitalism undermines its own conditions of existence. This can be compensated for by expanding production. From a certain point, which is historically located in the emergence of microelectronics in the early 1970s, more productive jobs would continuously be destroyed than new jobs would be created in new sectors. The resulting increasing problems in the “utilization of value”, i.e. the creation of surplus value, could be concealed for a while by (public or private) loans (“virtual capital”), which could only simulate economic growth. At some point the resulting financial bubbles would have to burst. The 2008/2009 financial crisis is interpreted in this way. Important representatives of this direction are Robert Kurz , Moishe Postone , Franz Schandl and Eske Bockelmann .

IWW poster from 1911

Unions and Syndicalism

The union approaches of the criticism of capitalism refer as a rule to the socialist analysis of social conditions. However, from a trade union perspective, the conclusions and demands are more focused on a reformist implementation of a just society. In the welfare state model, this includes the consensus principle , according to which employers' associations and trade unions should enter into a social partnership as negotiating partners in the negotiation of collective agreements in accordance with the collective bargaining agreement and thus aim to take responsibility for a peaceful, amicable settlement in cases of conflict. This approach aims primarily at a pragmatic, realistic balance of interests.

The approaches of syndicalist and socialist trade unionists that are critical of capitalism stand against this model of social partnership . Syndicalism propagates the appropriation of the means of production by the trade unions, which then organize the administration in place of political representatives. Such currents, for example, had sufficient strength to implement revolutionary social changes in the Spanish Civil War .

In many countries, trade unions also act as economic actors themselves. a. in the United States, unionized pension funds are also important economic factors in their investment policies.

Criticism of capitalism with an ecological focus

Since the emergence of the environmental movement , capitalism (or industrialism equated with it ) has also been criticized from an ecological perspective. Within this framework, especially the maximization of profit and the need for economic growth in the criticism because it is a conflict is seen between economic development and ecological stability. In the generation balance sheet published by the Berlin Institute in 2006, the question “Who teaches capitalism sustainability?” Says : “So far there has been no convincing answer to this question, at best various models, all of which are flawed. Current capitalism is based on a culture that converts invested capital into profit, generating new capital from it, which generates further profits and additional capital with increasing productivity. This capitalism has a catch - it does not work without growth. It only knows the accumulation of wealth that is made up of itself himself multiplied. He knows no going back through shrinking. "

The ecofeminist sociologist Maria Mies , on the other hand, describes capitalism as a patriarchal construct. Capitalism leads to colonization , which figuratively affects women as well as nature as a whole. This was rejected, among others, by Camille Paglia , according to which amoral, aggressive, pornographic elements and unequal relations of domination are fundamental to human art, sexuality and civilization.

The co-founder of the parties Die Grünen and Ökologische Linke Jutta Ditfurth advocates in her book Entspannt in die Barbarei (1996) the thesis that “the capitalist mode of production with its profit logic and its compulsory exploitation” is also “the root of the exploitation [...] of nature”. The social question is therefore “inseparable from the ecological challenges”.

The political and social scientist Athanasios Karathanassis, who teaches at the universities of Hanover and Hildesheim, criticizes in his books Destruction of Nature and Capitalist Growth (2003) and Capitalist Nature Relations (2015) the consumption of capitalist economies as destructive to nature and analyzes the causes of capitalist dealings with nature.

The Marxist-oriented political scientist Elmar Altvater criticizes capitalism and the economic growth that goes with it as unsustainable . Altvater considers the global maximum oil production to be a sign of the end of capitalism.

Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker sees the ecological problems of capitalism primarily in the impatience and short-term nature of the return calculation. It would not do justice to the time that ecology needs. "The cutting down of an irretrievable forest appears in books as a gain, in nature as a loss."

Christian / Jewish criticism of capitalism

The Christian, especially Catholic, social doctrine, for example by the Jesuit Oswald von Nell-Breuning, endeavors to provide an overarching perspective on the whole range of people living together. In doing so, limits are set on capitalism by a social ethic which - in addition to theological requirements - includes the principles of personality , the common good , solidarity and subsidiarity . In the case of the Roman Catholic Church, there are also the papal instructional letters, the so-called social encyclicals , which also address social issues centrally and also issue statements critical of capitalism.

Practical effects can be found in the establishment and operation of Christian trade unions, craft and social associations ( KAB , Kolping Society ) and organizations and institutions for welfare ( Caritas ) and development aid ( Misereor ). Within the church, a radical anti-capitalist theology of liberation could not prevail, but shaped aspects of social doctrine as in the option for the poor .

The Protestant social ethics in the sense of Calvinism , quietism and pietism influenced individualistic. The Protestant theologian and SPD MP Christoph Blumhardt (1842–1919) is one of the founders of religious socialism as a (church) politically influential direction in Germany. Critical aspects of capitalism can be found in joint statements on social and political questions of the Protestant churches and also form the basis of the activities of the Protestant social and development associations such as Diakonie and Bread for the World .

Important theorists of communism and critics of capitalism had Christian and Jewish roots. Such was Wilhelm Weitling , the German first theorist of communism applies, a breakfast socialist with Christian beliefs. Friedrich Engels came from an environment characterized by pietism even in its radical forms. Among other things, Engels referred to the lack of property in the early Christian communities. Karl Marx's mentor Moses Hess gave a lecture in early communist utopias and messianistic expectations of salvation on Christian / Jewish ideas of socially critical prophets like Amos .

The idea of ​​the kibbutz was a cooperative settlement of equal members, in which daily life should be organized collectively. This can also be related to socialism and the thoughts of Karl Marx.

Postmodern

Capitalism survey of the BBC in 2009: How do the people of different countries rate the sustainability of capitalism? Partly clear criticism.

The postmodern approaches break with the orthodox critique of capitalism as an economic system and generalize it to a general critique of power relations.

After the disappointing experiences with real socialism , currents of a postmodern philosophy ( deconstructivism and poststructuralism ) emerged as a result of the 1968 movement . Philosophers such as Gilles Deleuze , Jacques Derrida and Jean Baudrillard took a critical look at capitalism as well as the classic socialist and communist approaches. Not infrequently they criticized communism, especially dogmatic Marxist-Leninist currents, and also developed new perspectives.

Michel Foucault criticizes capitalism on the one hand as a disciplinary society that limits freedom and exercises violence ( Panopticon ), on the other hand with his concept of " bio-politics ", in which the subject and his living conditions are subjected to the interests of the rulers: "For capitalist society it is the Biopolitics that count above all, the biological, somatic, physical ” . Jacques Derrida says that the talk of the end of history spread by liberals cannot hide the fact that in the “ capitalist world order ” there is millions of suffering and terrible misery for many people. It is therefore necessary to reread Marx, to criticize it anew and, as a legacy, to develop Marxism from scratch.

Jean Baudrillard, on the other hand, generally opposes positivist historical utopias (e.g. fascism, communism), but he criticizes global capitalism as a form of “ immense violence ” which creates “ more victims than beneficiaries ” and therefore has to be civilized because otherwise under capitalism “ all non-monetary value would be canceled ”. “ The abolition of all rules, more precisely: the reduction of all rules to the law of the market, is the opposite of freedom - namely its illusion. Such old-fashioned and aristocratic values ​​as dignity, honor, challenge and sacrifice no longer count in it. “According to Baudrillard's criticism of capitalism, which is influenced by Ferdinand de Saussure's theory of language , the apparatus of signifiers of capitalism and its media reality are distancing themselves from the truth and thus enable extensive manipulation and seduction of the consumer. In capitalism, a space " permanent simulation of reality " is formed, which leads to hyperreality .

These approaches were discussed within an academic minority, less in political parties, partly because of their theoretical complexity, partly because of their open break with conventional approaches to criticism of capitalism. More recent approaches in this direction can be found e.g. B. Richard Sennett , Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt .

According to Paglia, "nature, not society [...] is our greatest oppressor" and the economic system should not be confused with the gender conflict and other power relations. However, human ( Apollonian ) culture is required to oppose and counteract the chthonic reality of nature and its "cruelty of biology and geology".

Criticism of globalization

→ Main article: Criticism of globalization

With the increasing globalization of the flow of goods and finance after the collapse of the Eastern Bloc, the critical voices are forming in diverse globalization-critical movements and networks. You state, for example, in the forced striving for competitiveness between states, a " beggar-thy-neighbor policy " that is worthy of criticism .

Anarchist criticism of capitalism

The anarchism assumes that with capitalism rule is connected by men over men, the basis of which they reject it in principle. In their eyes, capitalism needs a wealth and power imbalance within society in order to function.

Supporters of communist anarchism demand a complete break with capitalism and the abolition of money . Direct remuneration is to be replaced by free access to the joint work product. Peter Kropotkin , one of the foremost theorists of communist anarchism, opposes economic value in general; be it money, work or goods. He sees private property as a reason for oppression and exploitation and instead proposes comprehensive collectivization . Individualistic anarchists define capitalism as a market economy in which privileged groups enrich themselves with the help of state interventions at the expense of the rest of society and thereby attain wealth. Under capitalism, groups of those who had great influence on the state would, with the help of the state, create framework conditions that would provide them with economic gain. The costs resulting from the framework created and the costs of maintaining the framework would be largely passed on to other members of the company. Every evil of capitalism is thus produced by state intervention. The damaging partnership between the state and large companies is criticized, whereby the state intervenes on behalf of influential companies or organizations (e.g. in the military industry, in banking and insurance or in the pharmaceutical sector) and related privileges and monopolies , including money , Land, customs and patent monopolies .

In May 2016, the organized home Bartleby , Center for Career refusal, mainly in Vienna capitalism Tribunal which asked the question, "Is capitalism a crime," the Tribunal would also ascertain on the basis of specific case studies and accusations, "done what never in economics may". The announcement of the judgments and a Vienna declaration are announced for November 2016 .

Free economy criticism of capitalism

The theory of free economy founded by Silvio Gesell defines capitalism as a system in which there is the possibility of obtaining a work-free income ( capital income ) at the expense of the extra work of others simply by owning money or land . In this respect, Gesell initially pursued thoughts similar to those of Karl Marx. According to Gesell, a major problem of capitalism is that unneeded money can be “withheld” (ie taken out of circulation ) by its owner at will without being disadvantaged. According to the theory of the free economy, the return falls with increasing capital resources. An investment whose return is below the liquidity premium of money is not worthwhile, and long-term investments would be avoided ( liquidity trap ). In the 20th century there were only a few practical attempts at a free money economy or in so-called exchange rings for Gesell's ideas . Some of them can still be found today in the concepts of housing associations . With the onset of the global economic crisis in 2007 , the idea of circulating money was taken up again in various places. ECB -Direktoriumsmitglied Benoît Cœuré held on March 9, 2014 the Money Market Contact Group of the ECB talk Life below zero: Learning about negative interest rates (life below zero: About negative interest to learn). In it he explained that the idea of ​​negative interest or the "taxation of money" goes back to Silvio Gesell, who was called by John Maynard Keynes "a strange, wrongly overlooked prophet".

Anthroposophical criticism of capitalism

The anthroposophy founded by Rudolf Steiner had an influence on alternative, non-capitalist economic and lifestyles. Anthroposophical concepts of society such as Steiner's social threefolding called for the increasing inclusion of companies in collective self-administration as well as a stronger orientation of society towards artistic, aesthetic rather than capitalist guidelines. However, an explicit criticism of capitalism has only recently emerged, for example through the social sculpture by Joseph Beuys . Similar approaches can be found here as in ecological criticism. The taz wrote in 2001: "This is what the expanded concept of art wanted: Get out of the niche, plant 7,000 oaks and pump honey into politics!"

In addition to a number of anthroposophically influenced "alternative" organizations and business associations - for example in the school system with Waldorf schools and in agriculture with the biodynamic economy - the anthroposophical GLS community bank - at times also the eco bank - represents an important economic basis for the alternative movement.

National Socialist and later right-wing extremist criticism of capitalism

Gottfried Feder , an economic theorist and politician of the DAP and NSDAP , demanded in 1919 "under the slogan breaking interest bondage, the nationalization of banks and the abolition of interest". Feder made a distinction between “creating” capital (commercial and agricultural capital) and “collecting” capital (trading and finance capital). The creative capital serves the people and the fatherland , while the raging capital, which he primarily associated with Judaism , pursues purely selfish goals. The group around Otto Strasser's criticism of capitalism continued . Strasser considered National Socialism above all “the great antithesis of international capitalism, which implements the idea of ​​socialism as the common economy of a nation, vandalized by Marxism, in favor of this nation and breaks that system of the rule of money over labor.” . a. the nationalization of industry and banks as well as Germany's close ties to the Soviet Union . During the Röhm putsch , central representatives of this anti-capitalist current within the NSDAP were eliminated and from then on no longer played a role in its politics. In fact, in the “Third Reich” there were close links between the political rulers and large-scale private industry, of which IG Farben is only the best-known example. Some elements of nationalist criticism of capitalism such as the conspiracy theory of the USA as a nation ruled by the “Jewish East Coast ” were also used across the board, also by right-wing extremists in the USA (for example in the American Nazi Party ).

Since Udo Voigt took office as chairman of the right-wing extremist National Democratic Party of Germany in 1996, it has developed into an aggressive anti-capitalist force and increasingly opened up to neo-Nazi positions. Attempts to combine a critique of capitalism with right-wing elements ( cross-front approaches ) are being made primarily in Russia, for example by the prominent writer Eduard Weniaminowitsch Limonov .

See also

literature

Primary literature

Marx and Engels

Marxist-inspired criticism of capitalism

Value criticism

Postmodern

National Socialism

  • Otto Strasser : Building German Socialism . Wolfgang Richard Lindner Verlag, Leipzig 1932.

Catholicism

Islam

Criticism of capitalism with an ecological focus

  • Elmar Altvater : The end of capitalism as we know it - A radical criticism of capitalism . 7th edition. Westphalian steam boat, 2007, ISBN 978-3-89691-627-3 .
  • Jutta Ditfurth : Relaxed into barbarism: esotericism, (eco) fascism and biocentrism . Concrete literature, 2002, ISBN 3-89458-148-4 .
  • Athanasios Karathanassis: Destruction of Nature and Capitalist Growth. Ecosystems in the context of economic developments . Publishing house for the study of the labor movement, Hamburg 2003, ISBN 3-89965-018-2 .
  • Maria Mies : Patriarchy and Capital . Rotpunktverlag, Zurich 1996, ISBN 3-85869-050-3 .

Keynesian and liberal criticism of neoliberalism

Feminist criticism of capitalism

Secondary literature

  • Johannes Berger : Analysis of Capitalism and Criticism of Capitalism . In: Andrea Maurer (ed.): Handbook of economic sociology . VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden 2008, ISBN 978-3-531-15259-2 .
  • Albrecht Langner (Ed.): Catholicism, conservative criticism of capitalism and early socialism until 1850 . Schöningh, Munich 1975.
  • Werner Plumpe : Economic column. The economic cycles of the criticism of capitalism. In: Mercury. German magazine for European thinking. No. 757, 6th year, June 2012, pp. 523-530.
  • Peter Schallmayer: Criticism of Capitalism. Theory and practice with Marx, Nietzsche, Mann, Müntefering and in the grasshopper debate . Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2009, ISBN 978-3-8260-4070-2 .
  • Jan Ross: purgatory of the market . In: The time . No. 30/2005 (with links to other articles from the weekly newspaper's "Capitalism series")

Critique of Capitalism

Web links

Commons : Critique of Capitalism  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Edward P. Thompson : The Origin of the English Working Class . Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1987, ISBN 3-518-02687-9 .
  2. ↑ Eric Hobsbawm: The Machine Breakers. In: ders .: Laboring Men . London 1964, pp. 5-22.
  3. ↑ IG Metall Department Economy - Technology - Environment: Pension Fund in the USA - Company Pension through Shareholder Value? (PDF; 142 kB) May 2001.
  4. ↑ Volker Hauff , Günther Bachmann, Berlin Institute for Population and Development and Ecologic, Institute for International and European Environmental Policy (ed.): Bottom line - inheritance and inheritance for the Germany of tomorrow, a generation balance . oekom, Munich 2006, ISBN 3-86581-041-1 .
  5. ^ Maria Mies , Vandana Shiva : Ecofeminism . Zed Books, London 1993, pp. 298 .
  6. ↑ a b c Camille Paglia: The masks of sexuality. From the American by Margit Bergner, Ulrich Enderwitz and Monika Noll. Byblos Verlag, Berlin 1993, ISBN 3-929029-06-5 , p. 17.
  7. ↑ Jutta Ditfurth : Relaxed into barbarism . concrete literature publishing house, 1996, p. 157 .
  8. ^ Athanasios Karathanassis: Capitalist Nature Relations. Causes of Destruction of Nature - Justifications for a Post-Growth Economy . 2015, ISBN 978-3-89965-623-7 .
  9. ↑ Elmar Altvater : The end of capitalism as we know it. A radical criticism of capitalism . Westphalian steam boat, Münster 2007, ISBN 3-89691-627-0 .
  10. ↑ see e-mail text in discussion: Criticism of capitalism # Criticism of capitalism with an ecological focus - draft from September 24, 2008
  11. ↑ With Marx into the desert. In: The time. 50/2009, p. 102.
  12. ↑ fr-online.de Capitalism survey of the BBC in 2009 Article in the Frankfurter Rundschau from November 9th, 2009.
  13. ↑ Gabriel Kuhn : Tier-Werden, Schwarz-Werden, Frau-Werden Unrast-Verlag 2005 see B. Chap. III, 3,9, ISBN 3-89771-441-8 , p. 168 ff.
  14. ↑ Michel Foucault: Writings Volume III. Frankfurt am Main 2003, p. 275. See also: History of Governmentality II . The birth of biopolitics, Frankfurt am Main 2004. quoted. n. Joachim Bischoff & Christoph Lieber: The rule of capital and the multitude on Linksnet , accessed August 18, 2008.
  15. ↑ Jacques Derrida : Marx's Ghosts . Suhrkamp, ​​2004, ISBN 3-518-29259-5 .
  16. ^ Stefan Steinberg: Obituary for Jean Baudrillard, Stefan Steinberg , on wsws.org, April 21, 2007.
  17. ↑ Michael Hardt, Antonio Negri: Empire. The new worldorder. Campus book 2002, ISBN 3-593-36994-X .
  18. ↑ An Anarchist FAQ. A.3.2 Are there different types of social anarchism?
  19. ↑ Max Nettlau : Anarchists and Social Revolutionaries. The historical development of anarchism in the years 1880–1886 . Asy-Verlag, Berlin 1931, p. 7.
  20. ^ Peter Kropotkin: The Conquest of Bread . Putnam 1907, p. 202.
  21. ^ Kevin A. Carson: Studies in Mutualist Political Economy . Ark, Fayetteville 2004 (Chapters 4 & 5).
  22. ^ Jack Schwartzman, Hanson, Ingalls and Tucker: Nineteenth-Century American Anarchists . In: American Journal of Economics and Sociology . Vol. 62, No. 5 , 2003, p. 325 .
  23. ↑ Bartleby House, Alix Fassmann , Anselm Lenz , Hendrik Sodenkamp (eds.): Das Kapitalismustribunal. On the Revolution of Economic Rights (The Red Book). Translated by Corinna Popp, Viktor Kucharski, Anselm Lenz. Haus Bartleby eV, Passagen Verlag, Vienna 2016, ISBN 978-3-7092-0220-3 , p. 55 f.
  24. ↑ Explained in detail in: The new doctrine of money and interest. Physiokratischer Verlag, Berlin / Leipzig 1911, and The natural economic order through free land and free money. Self-published, Les Hauts Geneveys 1916.
  25. ^ DIE WELT (January 21, 2014): The war for the secure money of the future ; Accessed January 21, 2014.
  26. ^ Benoît Cœuré: Life below zero: Learning about negative interest rates. September 9, 2014, accessed September 13, 2014 .
  27. ↑ understanding politics, living art: joseph beuys on the eightieth in: taz , 12 May 2001
  28. ↑ Christoph Strawe: Marxism and Anthroposophy . Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1986, ISBN 3-608-91407-2 .
  29. ↑ Gottfried Feder. Tabular curriculum vitae in the LeMO ( DHM and HdG )
  30. ^ "Revolutionary National Socialists": "The Socialists Are Leaving the NSDAP". In: NS archive. June 4, 1930, Retrieved March 21, 2008 .
  31. ↑ Eckhard Jesse : The right-wing extremist National Democratic Party of Germany before and after the 2005 Bundestag election. In: Oskar Niedermayer (Ed.): The parties after the 2005 Bundestag election . VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften , 2008, ISBN 978-3-531-15245-5 , p. 203.