Alfred Sohn-Rethel
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Alfred Sohn-Rethel (4 January 1899 – 6 April 1990) was a French-born German
Marxian economist Marxian economics, or the Marxian school of economics, is a heterodox school of political economic thought. Its foundations can be traced back to Karl Marx's critique of political economy. However, unlike critics of political economy, Marxian ec ...
and
philosopher A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...
especially interested in
epistemology Epistemology (; ), or the theory of knowledge, is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Epistemology is considered a major subfield of philosophy, along with other major subfields such as ethics, logic, and metaphysics. Episte ...
. His main intellectual achievement was the publication of ''Intellectual and Manual Labour: A Critique of Epistemology''. He also wrote about the relationship between German industry and
National Socialism Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hit ...
.


Biography

Born in
Neuilly-sur-Seine Neuilly-sur-Seine (; literally 'Neuilly on Seine'), also known simply as Neuilly, is a commune in the department of Hauts-de-Seine in France, just west of Paris. Immediately adjacent to the city, the area is composed of mostly select residentia ...
near Paris, Sohn-Rethel came from a family of painters, his father was painter,
Alfred Sohn-Rethel Alfred Sohn-Rethel (4 January 1899 – 6 April 1990) was a French-born German Marxian economist and philosopher especially interested in epistemology. His main intellectual achievement was the publication of ''Intellectual and Manual Labour: A C ...
(1875–1958) and his mother was Anna Julie, née Michels. His mother was a descendant from the noble
Oppenheim family The Oppenheim family is a German Jewish banking family which founded what was Europe's biggest private bank, Sal. Oppenheim. According to Manager Magazin 2008, the Oppenheim family was among the 30 richest families in Germany, with assets over 8 b ...
and had influential relations with big business. His paternal grandfather was painter,
Karl Rudolf Sohn Karl Friedrich Rudolf Sohn (21 July 1845, Düsseldorf – 29 August 1908, Düsseldorf) was a German portrait painter in the Academic style. Biography His father was the landscape painter, Karl Ferdinand Sohn. After graduating from the , he w ...
and his paternal grandmother was painter and singer,
Else Sohn-Rethel Elisabeth "Else" Johanna Martha Maria Sohn-Rethel (14 March 1853 – 22 January 1933) was a German painter and singer, active in the mid and late 19th-century. Biography Elisabeth Johanna Martha Maria Rethel was born 14 March 1853 in Rome, I ...
. As his family did not want him also to become a painter, he was brought up by his uncle, the steel industrialist Ernst Poensgen. On Christmas 1915, he expressed a wish for a copy of
Karl Marx Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...
''Capital'' as a present. He received one and studied it intensively. Thrown out of home, he participated in the anti-war student protest in his first year at
Heidelberg University } Heidelberg University, officially the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg, (german: Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg; la, Universitas Ruperto Carola Heidelbergensis) is a public research university in Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, ...
in 1917.Alfred Sohn-Rethel, 'Preface', ''Intellectual and Manual Labour'' From 1920 Sohn-Rethel was a friend of the philosopher
Ernst Bloch Ernst Simon Bloch (; July 8, 1885 – August 4, 1977; pseudonyms: Karl Jahraus, Jakob Knerz) was a German Marxist philosopher. Bloch was influenced by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and Karl Marx, as well as by apocalyptic and religious thinkers ...
, and he met
Walter Benjamin Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin (; ; 15 July 1892 – 26 September 1940) was a German Jewish philosopher, cultural critic and essayist. An eclectic thinker, combining elements of German idealism, Romanticism, Western Marxism, and Jewish mys ...
in 1921. He came to live in
Positano Positano (Campanian: ) is a village and ''comune'' on the Amalfi Coast (Province of Salerno), in Campania, Italy, mainly in an enclave in the hills leading down to the coast. Climate The climate of Positano is very mild, of the Mediterranean ...
in 1923–24, and ''Naples: philosophy of the broken'' recorded his fascination with the relaxed Neapolitan attitude to technology. Between 1924 and 1927 he remained in Italy, "mainly in
Capri Capri ( , ; ; ) is an island located in the Tyrrhenian Sea off the Sorrento Peninsula, on the south side of the Gulf of Naples in the Campania region of Italy. The main town of Capri that is located on the island shares the name. It has been ...
, where Benjamin and Bloch were staying", meeting
Adorno Theodor W. Adorno ( , ; born Theodor Ludwig Wiesengrund; 11 September 1903 – 6 August 1969) was a German philosopher, sociologist, psychologist, musicologist, and composer. He was a leading member of the Frankfurt School of critica ...
and Kracauer also at Capri in 1924. Additionally his paternal uncle,
Otto Sohn-Rethel Otto Wilhelm Sohn-Rethel (1877–1949) German Lepidopterology, lepidopterist and a painter of the Düsseldorf school of painting art movement. Sohn-Rethel was a member of the art groups, Sonderbund westdeutscher Kunstfreunde und Künstler, Sonderb ...
lived in
Anacapri Anacapri () is a ''comune'' on the island of Capri, in the Metropolitan City of Naples, Italy. Anacapri is located higher on the island than Capri (about higher on average)http://www.capritourism.com/imgg/download/capri_map_en.pdf —the Anc ...
a city in Capri, whom he visited with. He stayed in contact with different members of the
Frankfurt School The Frankfurt School (german: Frankfurter Schule) is a school of social theory and critical philosophy associated with the Institute for Social Research, at Goethe University Frankfurt in 1929. Founded in the Weimar Republic (1918–1933), dur ...
, to whom his theoretical concerns were close; however, they never established a close working relationship. Sohn-Rethel received his doctorate with the Austrian Marxist
Emil Lederer Emil Lederer (22 July 1882 – 29 May 1939) was a Bohemian-born German economist and sociologist. Purged from his position at Humboldt University of Berlin in 1933 for being Jewish, Lederer fled into exile. He helped establish the "University ...
in 1928.''Von der Analytik des Wirtschaftcns zur Theorie der Volkswirtschaft: Methodologische Untersuchung mit besonderem Bezug auf die Theorie Schumpeters'', 1928. Published 1936. In his thesis he criticized the theory of
marginal utility In economics, utility is the satisfaction or benefit derived by consuming a product. The marginal utility of a Goods (economics), good or Service (economics), service describes how much pleasure or satisfaction is gained by consumers as a result o ...
as a
petitio principii In classical rhetoric and logic, begging the question or assuming the conclusion (Latin: ') is an informal fallacy that occurs when an argument's premises assume the truth of the conclusion, instead of supporting it. For example: * "Green is ...
because it implies the notion of number implicitly. Thanks to Poensgen he found a job as research assistant at the Mitteleuropäischer Wirtschaftstag (MWT). The MWT was a lobbying organization of the leading export industries. From 1931 to 1936 he worked 'in the cave of the lion' and watched and analyzed power politics from a very close distance. At the same time he had contacts with socialist resistance groups like ''Neu beginnen'' or ''Der rote Stosstrupp''. In 1937 he emigrated via
Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...
and
Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
to
England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
. He wrote economic analyses for a circle close to
Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, dur ...
which were used against
Neville Chamberlain Arthur Neville Chamberlain (; 18 March 18699 November 1940) was a British politician of the Conservative Party who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. He is best known for his foreign policy of appeasemen ...
's appeasement policy. For a long time after the Second World War Sohn-Rethel was not really able to continue his theoretical work. He made a living teaching French. He joined the
Communist Party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. A ...
and despite his disillusionment he was a member until 1972. The 1968 movement created a new interest in his work. At the funeral of Adorno he met the editor Unseld who encouraged him to crystallize his ideas in his major work ''Intellectual and manual labor''. In 1978 Sohn-Rethel was appointed Professor for Social Philosophy at Bremen University. He died in
Bremen Bremen (Low German also: ''Breem'' or ''Bräm''), officially the City Municipality of Bremen (german: Stadtgemeinde Bremen, ), is the capital of the German state Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (''Freie Hansestadt Bremen''), a two-city-state consis ...
in 1990.


Work

Sohn-Rethel's lifelong project was the critique of Kantian epistemology through Marx's critique of political economy. Even though individuals exchange commodities in order to gain access to their use-value, the act of exchange is possible only through the abstraction from the use-value that permits to draw an equivalence of value between disparate sensible objects. Only the value of these goods is important. This abstraction is called 'real abstraction' because it is not operated by the consciousness of the property owners, but is nevertheless necessarily presupposed by the real act of exchange. Sohn-Rethel believed this abstraction to be the real basis of formal and abstract thinking. All of Kant's categories such as space, time, quality, substance, accident, movement and so forth are present in the act of exchange. Readers of Marx will not be entirely surprised by such a genealogy, since Marx himself suggested that the ideas of freedom and equality, at least as we know them so far, are rooted in the exchange of commodities. Sohn-Rethel's work on the nature of 'real abstraction' has been amplified and extended by the writers of
Arena (Australian publishing co-operative) Arena is an independent Australian critical and radical publishing cooperative that has been continuously producing writings since its founding in 1963. Established by figures in Australia’s ‘New Left’, Arena is a forum to debate and deve ...
, especially the notion that a post-Marxist social and historical analysis can be founded on the 'real abstraction' principle. An example of using Sohn-Rethel's idea of commodity occurs in Slavoj Zizek's work ''
The Sublime Object of Ideology ''The Sublime Object of Ideology'' is a 1989 book by the Slovenian philosopher and cultural theorist Slavoj Žižek. The work is widely considered his masterpiece. Summary Žižek thematizes the Kantian notion of the sublime in order to liken i ...
''. The second domain where Sohn-Rethel made important contributions was the study of the economic policies that favoured the rise of German fascism, much of which is based on first-hand knowledge gained from his time at the MWT. He insisted on the difference between different factions of capitalists, the more prospering industries close to Brüning and the less successful industries close to the Harzburger Front (Hugenberg, Hitler) namely coal, construction and steel - with the exception of
Krupp The Krupp family (see pronunciation), a prominent 400-year-old German dynasty from Essen, is notable for its production of steel, artillery, ammunition and other armaments. The family business, known as Friedrich Krupp AG (Friedrich Krup ...
. The endorsement of the compromise between industry and big agrarians at the shareholders' meeting of the
IG Farben Interessengemeinschaft Farbenindustrie AG (), commonly known as IG Farben (German for 'IG Dyestuffs'), was a German chemical and pharmaceutical conglomerate (company), conglomerate. Formed in 1925 from a merger of six chemical companies—BASF, ...
in 1932 paved the way for the dictatorship, according to Sohn-Rethel.


Bibliography

*''Intellectual and Manual Labour: A Critique of Epistemology'', Atlantic Highlands, N.J: Humanities Press, 1977
Leiden: Brill, 2020
*''Economy and class structure of German fascism'', London: CSE Books, 1978


References

(https://www.filmportal.de/film/linvitation-au-voyage_569fc9bbaeee4dd281a814c94c9575d1)


External links



*Sohn-Rethel
The Ideal of the Broken Down: On the Neapolitan Approach to Things Technical
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sohn-Rethel, Alfred 1899 births 1990 deaths Continental philosophers German economists German communists German Marxists Marxist theorists Marxian economists French emigrants to Germany