RUDOLF STEINER AND SOCIAL REFORM E-Book

Richard Masters

• Herausgeber: Rudolf Steiner Press
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

How might we improve the way we organize society, so that human beings can live in greater peace, dignity and justice? Against a background of chronic discontent and social conflict around the globe, Richard Masters presents a comprehensive survey of Rudolf Steiner's work on societal reform, sifting through and summarizing the content of dozens of books, lectures and discussions. Rudolf Steiner (1861–1925) is not known today for his social thinking, but he wrote and spoke at length on such issues during and after WWI, engaging with audiences ranging from royalty, politicians and business owners to illiterate, dispossessed factory workers. Central to his ideas was his 'threefold' approach to politics, economics and culture, arguing that their roles should be clarified and the three spheres allowed to thrive independently. Drawing on the full range of source material – including much not yet available in English – the author reveals the continuing relevance of Steiner's work to our contemporary situation. With an emphasis on accessibility, he builds up the subject methodically, studying the main ideas from differing perspectives. He also provides candid reflections on the degree to which Steiner's proposals are still applicable to current policy and practice. Authoritative and yet jargon-free, Rudolf Steiner and Social Reform offers innovative and stimulating ideas for anyone concerned with the state of our world.

Leseprobe

RUDOLF STEINER AND SOCIAL REFORM

Threefolding and other proposals

RICHARD MASTERS

RUDOLF STEINER PRESS

Rudolf Steiner Press

Hillside House, The Square

Forest Row, East Sussex RH18 5ES

www.rudolfsteinerpress.com

Published by Rudolf Steiner Press in 2022

© Richard Masters 2022

This book is copyright under the Berne Convention. All rights reserved. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrical, chemical, mechanical, optical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner. Inquiries should be addressed to the Publishers

The right of Richard Masters to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act, 1988

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 978 1 85584 598 5 eISBN 978 1 85584 632 6

Cover by SI-EM Designs

Typeset by Symbiosys Technologies, Visakhapatnam, India

Printed and bound by 4Edge Ltd., Essex

For those who are suffering who deserve better.

Contents

1Preliminary Remarks

1.1Aim of the book

1.2Format

1.3Why Steiner ?

1.4Limitations of a book on a limitless subject

2What’s the Problem ?

2.1Today

2.2In Steiner’s day

3Pre-threefold Comments

3.11898

3.21905–1908

3.2.1Brotherhood

3.2.2Root causes of societal ills

3.2.3Exploitation

3.2.4Self-interest

3.2.5A fundamental social law

3.2.6Separation of work and income

3.2.7Shared ideals

4The Threefold Social Organism

4.1Public exposure

4.2Shortcomings of other societal constructs, as observed by Steiner

4.2.1Capitalism

4.2.2Socialism

4.2.3The unitary state

4.3Introduction to the threefold approach

4.4Not a fixed programme

4.5Not forever

5The Three Realms—Defined

5.1Not classes or sectors

5.2Definition of Rights Aspect

5.3Definition of Economic Aspect

5.3.1Not Labour

5.3.2Not land or the means of production

5.4Definition of Cultural Aspect

6The Three Realms—Guiding Principles

6.1Relative independence and autonomy

6.2Rights—Égalité—Democracy

6.3Economics—Fraternité—Association

6.4Culture—Liberté—Competition

6.5Guiding principles—a summary

7The Three Realms—Operational Remarks

7.1Three central administrations

7.2An upper senate

7.3Operational Remarks—Rights Realm

7.3.1Funding

7.3.2Democratic process

7.3.3Labour

7.3.4Remuneration—Part 1

7.3.5Social security

7.3.6Taxation

7.3.7Land and the means of production

7.3.8The police and the armed forces

7.4Operational Remarks—Economic Realm

7.4.1Competition or co-operation ?

7.4.2Associations

7.4.3Production according to need

7.4.4Contracts as basis of trading relationships

7.4.5Entrepreneurial abilities

7.4.6Management / workforce relationship

7.4.7Division of labour / specialisation

7.4.8Motivation for work

7.4.9Value

7.4.10Price

7.4.11Fair price

7.4.12Price adjustment by output adjustment

7.4.13Profit / profit maximisation

7.4.14Remuneration—Part 2

7.4.15Savings and loans

7.4.16Cross-subsidy

7.4.17Gift to education

7.4.18Validity of money

7.4.19Three types of money

7.4.20Dying money

7.4.21Nature-based currency

7.4.22Bookkeeping as money

7.5Operational Remarks—Cultural Realm

7.5.1Funding

7.5.2Education

7.5.3The Arts

7.5.4Religion and spiritual teaching

7.5.5The judiciary

7.5.6Stewardship of land and the means of production

8Overlap

8.1How one realm affects another

8.1.1Rights aspect appropriately serving cultural aspect

8.1.2Rights aspect inappropriately influencing cultural aspect

8.1.3Rights aspect appropriately serving economic aspect

8.1.4Rights aspect inappropriately influencing economic aspect

8.1.5Economic aspect appropriately serving rights aspect

8.1.6Economic aspect inappropriately influencing rights aspect

8.1.7Economic aspect appropriately serving cultural aspect

8.1.8Economic aspect inappropriately influencing cultural aspect

8.1.9Cultural aspect appropriately serving rights aspect

8.1.10Cultural aspect inappropriately influencing rights aspect

8.1.11Cultural aspect appropriately serving economic aspect

8.1.12Cultural aspect inappropriately influencing economic aspect

8.2Some obvious institutional examples

8.2.1Example 1—a factory manufacturing roof tiles

8.2.2Example 2—a university

8.2.3Example 3—a police force

8.3Some less obvious institutional examples

8.3.1Example 4—a hospital

8.3.2Example 5—a golf club

8.3.3Example 6—a hunger relief charity

8.3.4Example 7—a bank

8.3.5Example 8—a dinner party at someone’s house

8.3.6Example 9—a Local Authority / County Council

8.3.7Example 10—a newspaper

8.3.8Example 11—a home for adults with learning disabilities

9Related Considerations

9.1More on egoism and altruism

9.2Can an organisation be threefold on its own ?

9.3Economic policy

9.4International dimension

9.4.1Similarities and differences between peoples

9.4.2International conflict

9.4.3The special role of economic activity in international relations

9.4.4A threefold state in isolation

9.4.5The European Union

9.4.6International dimension summarised

9.5Universal Basic Income / Citizen’s Income

10The Threefold Approach Summarised

11Post-threefold Comments

12Relevant to Now ?

12.1Environmental destruction

12.2Housing shortages

12.3Poverty / wealth disparity

12.4Health issues

12.5Selfish foreign policy

12.6Crimes against the person

13Further implementation

14Concluding Remarks

Acknowledgements

Bibliography

1. Preliminary Remarks

1.1Aim of the book

In the face of profound environmental degradation, and with heartbreaking news stories overwhelming us more or less daily, stories of crushing life circumstances tormenting people not only overseas but also closer to home, this book is offered as a contribution to the debate about how society could improve the ways it organises itself, how we might coexist in a more dignified manner.

Rudolf Steiner (1861—1925) is not especially known for his thoughts on public affairs, but he wrote and spoke at some length on the subject over a number of years, and indeed in Germany enjoyed something like fame on account of his writings and campaigning on the topic at the end of the Great War.

In the following pages the attempt is made to bring together the various threads of his suggestions in a structured and accessible way that clarifies what, on the one hand, was in effect his main thesis, and what, on the other, amount to more ancillary suggestions and examples. It is an attempt to distil the essentials from some fifteen English books of source material, plus dozens of lectures untranslated from the German, without inappropriately over-simplifying anything. As well as his writings on the subject, Steiner gave a hundred or so related lectures and discussion evenings across Europe—his audiences ranging from ‘the great and good’ to illiterate, dispossessed factory workers.

The hope is that readers, by the end of the book, will feel they have a reasonable overview and understanding of Steiner’s main observations on the matter without having to read all the primary literature.

Here and there, reflections are also offered on the extent to which his proposals relate—or don’t relate—to current practice.

1.2Format

The book is essentially a guided tour through a collection of Steiner’s more salient observations regarding societal health—observations which are quoted verbatim. The book started out as a collection of these quotes, and as it progressed it continued to seem fitting to retain them. This unabashed regurgitating of passages by Steiner will not please every palate. But in the end I have tried to write a book that I myself would have found helpful when looking to get a foothold into the subject.

Misunderstanding, misinterpreting and even misrepresenting Steiner’s social ideas are easy mistakes to make, and an advantage of the inclusion of so much from ‘the horse’s mouth’ is that it both removes any ambiguity as to what Steiner actually said, as well as greatly reduces the danger of any second-hand misinterpretation. Another advantage of original quotes is that these provide more points of reference for anyone wanting to investigate the original material.

Throughout, quotes by Steiner are in shaded boxes. They are accompanied by a ‘CW’ reference followed, where relevant, by a page number or date.1

I should apologise in advance that these quotations are peppered throughout with the male ‘he / his / him’ etc. which are taken verbatim from the English translations of his works, and which, in turn, are simply a direct translation of the German of the time, not any indication of gender bias on Steiner’s part.2

The book assumes no prior knowledge of Steiner’s works, so anyone well-versed in the subject may find the going a bit repetitive and elementary. Hopefully, though, even they may find it useful at times, since the various topics and sub-topics are presented in a systematic way which should allow easy return to areas of particular interest. It is hoped there will be something here for all readers.

1.3Why Steiner ?

Steiner is better known today as an educationalist and esotericist than as a social reformer. His ‘biodynamic’ agriculture also increasingly catches people’s attention. Amongst other things, this produces award-winning wines, and consistently outperforms both conventional and organic agriculture in long-term soil fertility tests3—something of critical concern when the UN has suggested there may only be sixty harvests left in conventionally-farmed soil.4 Notable, also, is that Steiner predicted future bee colony problems and, long before the outbreak of BSE5, he warned that if you fed meat to cows, they would go mad.6 In 2017 HRH Prince Charles noted: ‘It is truly remarkable that so many of the farming principles and practices highlighted in Steiner’s 1924 agricultural lectures are still so pertinent today. If only the visionary advice he gave had been more widely recognized and adopted, perhaps much of the damage that intensive farming has inflicted on our long-suffering planet … could have been prevented’.7

During Steiner’s life, however, it was for his suggestions concerning public affairs that he was probably most widely known, even though these amounted to under 5% of his mammoth output. The attention these views attracted is outlined briefly in Section 4.1 (‘Public exposure’).

Although Steiner’s first degree was in the sciences and his PhD was in philosophy and mathematics, and although as a 21-year-old graduate he was commissioned to edit Goethe’s scientific writings, a key phenomenon behind Steiner and his work—indeed the key phenomenon, perhaps—is his claim to a wide-ranging clairvoyance that could observe in full, alert, waking consciousness an ‘other’ world, a spiritual world that he asserted had objective reality. This capability was very different from what he referred to as ‘vague mysticism’, for which he had no time. Remarkably, he described the increase in awareness between a normal waking consciousness and a heightened clairvoyance as being equivalent in magnitude to the increase in awareness when one wakes up from a dreaming sleep. A further assertion he made was that everyone has latent faculties which can, over a long period of sustained mental / meditative practice, slowly become more sensitive to the esoteric phenomena he described. This study of spirit based on honed faculties of soul (thinking / feeling / willing) he called anthroposophy or spiritual science.

[People] have lost faith in the strength of spiritual life. They do not believe that there can be any kind of spiritual life able to overcome the remoteness and unreality that has characterised it during the last few centuries.

It is a kind of spiritual life such as this, nevertheless, that is the goal of anthroposophy. The sources it would draw from are the sources of reality itself. Those forces that hold sway in our innermost being are the same forces that are at work in external reality. Scientific thinking cannot penetrate down to these sources when it merely elaborates natural law intellectually out of external experience. Yet the world views that are founded on a more religious basis are no longer in touch with these forces either. They accept the traditions that have been handed down without penetrating to their fountainhead ... The spiritual science of anthroposophy, however, seeks to penetrate to this fountainhead. [ … ] The insights of spiritual science … shape themselves into ideas that are not mere mental concepts, but rather something saturated with the forces of reality. Hence such ideas are able to carry within them the force of reality when they offer themselves as guides to social action. One can well understand that, at first, a spiritual science such as this should meet with mistrust. Such mistrust will not last when people come to recognise the essential difference that exists between this spiritual science and modern natural science, which is assumed today to be the only kind of science possible. If one can struggle through to a recognition of the difference, then one will cease to believe that one must avoid social ideas when one is intent upon the practical work of shaping social reality. One will begin to see, instead, that practical social ideas can be had only from a spiritual life that can find its way to the roots of human nature. One will see clearly that in modern times social events have fallen into disorder because people have tried to master them with thoughts from which reality constantly struggled free. (CW24, pp. 31-32)

… the anthroposophical spiritual movement should not be regarded as something which gives you the opportunity to listen to Sunday afternoon sermons, which caress the soul because they speak of an everlasting life, and so forth; but [it] should be taken as a path which enables us to cope in a real, concrete way with the modern problems of life, the burning problems of the present. (CW188 [ii], 1 February 1919)

Kindle a deeper social feeling, a deeper understanding between one person and another when social matters are being discussed, and you will be discharging in a truly social manner one of the living tasks coming into being through anthroposophical spiritual science. (CW193, p.16)

Whilst the possibility of esoteric phenomena that have objective reality may be inspiring to some, it is appreciated that, to others (possibly, most), claims of such seem eccentric and implausible. Speaking for myself: without the sort of mind and self-discipline required to attain any of the extra-sensory faculties mentioned, I can’t claim to know from direct experience the rightness—or otherwise—of Steiner’s claims. But having read dozens of his books over some 30 years, I am convinced he was a man of integrity.

Whether the other-worldly aspect of Steiner’s work intrigues you or sends you running for the hills, it is problematic either way insofar as the existence of a divine world is difficult to prove or disprove. Archbishop Dr Rowan Williams and arch-atheist Dr Richard Dawkins didn’t manage when they sat down together in 2012!8 So, for reasons of unverifiability, much of what Steiner describes is, perhaps understandably, avoided by academia.

But given that we still seem to be getting an awful lot wrong in public life, even in countries with a good standard of living, an approach from a less conventional quarter seems deserving of consideration. So many burning issues remain to be solved despite (a) politicians, economists and social scientists the world over having chewed on the subject of societal health for centuries, (b) thousands (possibly millions) of degrees—including doctorates—devoted to these and other relevant subjects having been completed, (c) a range of political approaches having been tried, and (d) many thousands of progressive, devoted groupings of ordinary people trying to improve matters by doing things differently / more thoughtfully (and these often achieve wonderful, positive results, as we know). There remains a gnawing undercurrent in society, a lingering malaise, an open wound which badly needs attention—although it should be pointed out at the outset that Steiner does not claim his suggestions are any sort of utopian solution that will fix everything. Yet the on-going relevance of some of them is striking.

His ideas about public life can be considered on their own merits, without reference to anything other-worldly. In this book, references to anything esoteric are almost entirely avoided. Steiner’s observations are taken at face value, and the book proceeds on the basis that his articulating of what he saw as occult realities no more disqualifies his political ideas from consideration than, say, Isaac Newton’s or Marie Curie’s religious views disqualify their scientific works from analysis. His yearning to alleviate human distress is without doubt a laudable goal; readers can make up their own minds whether any of the suggestions he makes might be useful.

1.4Limitations of a book on a limitless subject

… the conditions of human life have grown so complicated that it is extremely difficult to survey them … (CW332a, p. 25)

What can we make of the social question nowadays? If we look squarely at human life as it is today we certainly do not find a clear picture with any obvious solutions. What we see is a huge number of differentiated conditions of life spread across the face of the earth, conditions that have created great gulfs and abysses within humanity between internal human experiences and the external life of commerce and industry. [ … ] Compared with the complicated facts of social, economic life, what we see under the microscope or in the sky through the telescope is exceedingly simple. (CW305(ii), p. 107)

Infinitely more complicated, variable and unstable are the phenomena in economics than in nature—more fluctuating, less capable of being grasped with any defined or hard and fast concepts. (CW340, p. 28)

… in economics [ … ] one is dealing with something alive and changing and one has always to be prepared, therefore, to modify one’s concepts. Economics does not deal with substances, which one can shape, but with living human beings. [ … ] You will readily appreciate … that it is difficult to work in economics. (CW341, p. 182)

As well as acknowledging the extreme complexity of social life, and notwithstanding his claims to unusual insight, Steiner was also at pains to emphasise (a) that any attempt to improve the body social was only ever likely to constitute a partial fix, and (b) that an approach to improving things that might seem desirable and appropriate for the peoples in one part of the world may be less so elsewhere. On many occasions he pointed out it was an improved direction of travel that he was describing, not any detailed solution, and certainly neither a one-size-fits-all nor a once-and-for-all solution. Social forms that may be suitable in one age or place may well not be so in others. This will be covered in more detail later.

No one should cherish the illusion that any social institution could ever create an ‘ideal situation’. What can be attained, however, is a viable, healthy social organism. (CW24, p. 14)

… we must not ask whether human beings have been created by circumstances or circumstances by human beings. It is essential to understand that each is both cause and effect, that everything affects everything else. The foremost question to ask is: ‘What social arrangements will enable people to have the right thoughts on matters of social concern, and what kind of thoughts must exist so that these right social arrangements can arise?’

In practical life people tend to think in terms of doing one thing after another. But this leads nowhere. We can only make progress if we think in circles, but many people do not feel up to doing this ... It is essential to think in circles. Looking at external circumstances we must admit that they have been created by people but also that people are affected by them. And looking at the things people do we must realise that these actions bring about the external circumstances but also that they are sustained by these same external circumstances. To arrive at reality we must skip back and forth in our thoughts, but people do not like doing this. (CW305(ii), p. 153)

Although this book sets out to leave the reader with some idea of Steiner’s take on what can make the social organism healthy, or at the very least, healthier, the occasional references to other authors come nowhere near close to a thorough survey of related literature. Personally, I am only aware of a fraction of all the innovative and painstaking efforts being made by progressive projects and thinkers to alleviate social torment. So, apologies in advance to all those who are already working or campaigning for anything along the lines of what is contained herein, but of whose efforts I am ignorant—efforts which are consequently not referenced as examples.

Where I have referenced current practice, this usually relates to the Anglo-Saxon West; but these references will hopefully find some resonance with readers elsewhere, too, and so have relevance to people in most countries.

1 CW (collected works) reference numbers are synonymous with the German GA (Gesamtausgabe) numbers used by the Rudolf Steiner archive. The works referenced are listed at the back of the book.

2 Steiner was relatively ahead of his time in being un-sexist, as illustrated for example by the fact that the executive council he appointed when he founded the Anthroposophical Society included women, or by the fact that the Christian Community / Movement for Religious Renewal (a Christian denomination set up by clerics who had asked Steiner for advice) accepted women priests at all levels from the outset.

3 See, for example, the findings of 20-year field trials at https:www.fibl.org/en/Switzerland/research/soil-sciences/bw-projekte.dok-trial.html#c29084.

4 Susan Cosier, ‘The world needs topsoil to grow 95% of its food—but it’s rapidly disappearing’, The Guardian, 30 May 2019.

5 Bovine spongiform encephalopathy—or ‘mad cow disease’—when over 4 million head of cattle were slaughtered during the eradication programme and over 200 people died from contracting the variant Kreutzfeldt-Jacob disease.

6 Mark Watts, ‘The birth of BSE’, The Independent, 31 March 1996.

7 HRH Prince Charles addressing the 2017 biodynamic conference, https://youtu.be/MImiGhM92_I.

8 ‘Nature of human beings and the question of their ultimate origin’—debate held at the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford.

2. What’s the Problem ?

As alluded to above, categorising societal problems into causes and effects is not always straightforward. A broken shop window might be a societal problem that one sees as an end result, an effect, a symptom, ‘damage’. Behind this there might be a miscreant who threw a stone, so one might conclude: miscreants are the cause of broken windows. Digging deeper, one might ask: why did the person throw the stone? What were the root causes? Unhappiness with life? Yes, perhaps. And the cause of this? Parents who are drunks? Poor education? Growing up with no beauty in one’s surroundings, e.g. in an area where there are lots of broken windows? And we are back at the beginning again.

This circularity need not always apply, of course. Another end result / symptom / effect / damage might be poor global oxygen levels. The cause of this might be deforestation. The cause of this might be the greed of logging companies, or the corruptability of the government where the trees are felled. But to complete the circle by claiming that the greed of the logging companies or the corruptability of the government was caused by poor levels of oxygen in the air might be taking things a bit far!

2.1Today

It is of course recognised that most of us in the so-called ‘developed world’ have an enormous amount to be thankful for. We have made phenomenal advances to provide for our comfort, health and fulfilment. But as we know, even the most cursory of glances over the fence reveals all manner of issues, issues that betray acute societal dysfunction which can make us, as a species with extraordinary learning, feel repulsion and deepest shame. The most self-absorbed amongst us may be blind to these issues; but for anyone who has taken the trouble to buy a book such as this, it would hardly seem necessary to enumerate the challenges we currently face—the tragic effects, the symptoms, the damage. These are, after all, well-rehearsed. Rather, a number of these disorders are looked at through the course of the book, particularly later—for example in Chapter 12 (‘Relevant to Now?’).

Crucially though, there are strong signs that our problems will proliferate if we do not get our act together: ‘ … the serious impacts of climate change, demographic ageing and population growth kick in around the year 2050. If we can’t create a sustainable global order and restore economic dynamism, the decades after 2050 will be chaos’.9 To this perfect storm one could add things like the ever-growing concentrations of wealth in the hands of an ever-shrinking proportion of the world’s population.

2.2In Steiner’s day

General sociological changes witnessed by the ‘developed world’ since Steiner’s day are touched on in Chapter 12. But as far as social problems go—i.e. end results, symptoms—many of those we have today are of course as nothing compared to a hundred years ago. Environmental destruction may not have been a big concern back then, and the absence of drug-fuelled gang warfare probably meant less knife crime. But the horrors of international conflict were fresh in the minds of all. And, war aside, general poverty and struggle were unsurprisingly both more profound and more widespread. The blue collar working class comprised over 75% of the population10, and had a militancy that, in Germany for example (in Britain too, but to a lesser extent), threatened revolution and clamoured for socialism / communism—something Steiner, like so many others, thought would be a thoroughgoing disaster. However, whilst he considered socialism11 a grave error, his sympathy for those who campaigned for it was unequivocal.

… we must look at the deep, virtually unbridgeable cleft between the working and non-working classes. The civilisation enjoyed by the latter has been highly praised as a sign of progress in modern times. Commonplace technologies now quickly deliver people and thoughts around the globe in ways that would once have been derided as utopian visions. We never tire of glorifying this progress. But today we must also add another perspective: we must ask how this progress came about. It is based entirely on an underlying structure made up of broad masses of humanity, of countless individuals whose work makes possible the culture of the few. Now these masses have grown up; they have come to their senses and are demanding their rightful share. (CW333, p. 3)

… what we call the class struggle of the working class. Underlying this struggle is nothing more or less than the great and justified demand for a humanly worthy existence for all people. (CW333, p. 9)

… all they [the workers] could see was that their work produced the profits that supported upper class lifestyles. That is why the words of the Communist Manifesto resonated so deeply with them and made them conscious of their situation. (CW333, p. 10)

What have the upper classes done in this field? Admittedly they have poked their noses into proletarian misery and created works of art from it … made it into what present-day poets, sculptors and painters have created out of it: art with a social conscience. (CW305, p.38)

And, reflecting on the material hardships that existed during his youth:

It’s enough to make your heart bleed to think about how members of the upper classes gathered to talk about ‘brotherly’ love and all such Christian virtues in rooms heated with coal mined by children as young as nine. In the mid 1800s, these poor children literally never saw daylight on weekdays because they went down into the mines before sunrise and came up only after sundown. Credit for later improvements in these conditions is due to proletarian demands, not to any effort on the part of the upper classes. (CW333, p. 51)

Ring any bells? Today it would perhaps be more relevant to refer, instead of to upper and lower classes, to those in the ‘developed world’ and those in the ‘developing world’—who make our shirts, grow our bananas and assemble our laptops, often living in conditions that have not been experienced where I live possibly since medieval times. Nonetheless, we still have our own profound hardships at home, too: people living in fear and so on; although the scale of these difficulties is perhaps dwarfed when one considers the hardships experienced by the world’s 80 million refugees and others with no safe home to return to.12

Of course, by the time Steiner made these comments, Bismarck and others had already introduced various measures to improve the lot of the lowest in European society (most notably, with health insurance and some pension provision.). But Steiner insisted very much more could be achieved, as we shall see presently.

Apart from the material hardship and exploitation experienced by great swathes of the population, there was also a psychological burden resulting from industrial mechanisation. Decades earlier, Karl Marx (many of whose observations Steiner admired highly) had spoken of the alienation of the worker, of how, by being little more than a cog in a world of mechanised production, the worker had become estranged from the production process, from their product, from other people (e.g. customers), and thus from their humanity. Cut off from one’s creativity one ultimately experiences loss of self. In the Communist Manifesto (1848) we have: ‘Owing to the extensive use of machinery and to division of labour, the work of the proletarians has lost all individual character, and, consequently, all charm for the workman. He becomes an appendage of the machine, and it is only the most simple, most monotonous, and most easily acquired knack, that is required of him’.13 Steiner echoed these concerns:

Men were called away from their old handiwork and placed at machines, crowded together in a factory. The machines at which they stand, the factories in which they are crowded together with their fellows, these, governed only by mechanical laws, have nothing to give a man that has any direct relationship to himself as a man. Out of his old handicraft something flowed to him that gave answer to his query regarding human worth and human dignity. The dead machine gives no answer. Modern industrialism is like a mechanical network spun about the man, in the midst of which he stands; it has nothing to give him that he can joyfully share, as did the work at his old handicraft. (CW332a, p. 10)

The old connection between the workman and his work is no longer possible, but man needs a relationship to his work. It is necessary that he should feel joy in his work, that he should feel a certain devotion to it. The old devotion, the immediate companionship with the thing he has made, exists no longer; yet it must be replaced by something else. (CW332a, p. 70)

What happened is that through modern economic life, which has been permeated by technology, the human being has been separated from his product so that no real love can any longer connect him with what he produces. (CW339)

The peasant was linked with the soil. A trader in his commercial dealings was linked with other human beings. We no longer appreciate properly how one individual valued another when he bought something from him or sold him something he had made himself and which therefore meant something to him. [ … ] Human beings who are now immersed in the world of machines have been wrested from all earlier links. They are no longer bound to the land and the soil; they no longer live in the interplay that existed between one individual and another during the age when trade and the crafts dominated society. (CW305(ii), p. 137)

… division of society has reached its zenith … once we recognise it, we realise the imperative demand of the age: to find and follow the path that leads to reunion. (CW24, p. 49)

The following pages describe the ways in which Steiner suggested these divisions and other societal issues could be addressed.

9 Paul Mason, Postcapitalism: A Guide to Our Future (London: Allen Lane, 2015), p. x.

10 Selina Todd, The Rise and Fall of the Working Class, (UK: John Murray, 2014), Introduction.

11 In the traditional sense of widespread economic planning and state-owned / state-run industry.

12https://www.unhcr.org/uk/figures-at-a-glance.html (accessed 26 June 2021).

13 Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto (London: Penguin Classics, 2015), p. 12.

3. Pre-threefold Comments

Before moving on to Steiner’s main ideas for societal reform, ideas that were disseminated widely at the end of the Great War, and which have come to be known as ‘threefolding’ or ‘social threefolding’, we shall first consider some related comments he made more than a decade earlier.

Prior to 1898 it seems Steiner said little—publicly at least—about the health of the social organism. He had of course had a great deal to say about the human being per se, and at times this would have a direct bearing on social matters.

In his philosophical work The Philosophy of Freedom—published in 1894—he traced, for example, the different levels of motive prompting a person to action. At one end of the spectrum we have basic drives like hunger and so on, drives we have in common with the animal world and which, therefore, he suggests have little to do with our unique self, our (divine) spirit. We submit to these in a more or less un-free way. Further along the spectrum of motives, we have social norms which we may follow simply because it is the done thing. Here again, such actions are not strictly ‘us’. When we are subservient to such things, we may also not be acting out of freedom. Then there is submission to some outer moral authority: we act in a particular way because the Church says so, or the law, or someone we respect. Here too, such actions are perhaps not fully our own. Steiner points out that we can even act out of a kind of un-freedom when we submit to rules that we ourselves have pre-determined prior to the action. We might have decided at some point in the past that doing things in such-and-such a way is best, even perhaps the most morally justifiable. But by acting in this way once again, there might still be something of the automaton in our action. Ultimately Steiner points to a higher state where a person has followed a path of inner development, inner work, to the extent that he or she has awakened what otherwise slumbers, i.e. that part of the human being which he calls the ‘real self’. Here, a person has so refined their being that they no longer act out of compulsion from these external promptings (external, that is, to their unique self), but rather, rising above these, becomes a ‘free individual’ acting out of clear insight, complete freedom from externalities, and a fully independent recognition of the rightfulness of an action and love for the moral consequences that will follow. Steiner asserts that at this point a human being can become properly ‘free’, a true ‘self’, a true individual. He terms this ‘ethical individualism’.

One might wonder how on earth people could live together peacefully if we were all to freely follow our true individuality. In answer to this, Steiner says something that can seem paradoxical:

This objection is indicative of a wrongly understood moralism. This moralism believes that a community of people is possible only when they are all united through a communally established moral order. This moralism does not, in fact, understand the unity of the world of ideas. It does not comprehend that the world of ideas active within me is no other than that within my fellow man. (CW4, p. 153)

The free person lives in the confidence that any other free person belongs with him to one spiritual world and will concur with him in his intentions. (CW4, p. 154)

That is, the person who has freed themselves from compulsions unconnected to their unique self, and instead acts purely out of this unique self, ultimately draws on universally objective ideas, on a universal spirit that is the same universal spirit that others can share in.

The numerous mental / meditative exercises for self-development which Steiner shares also have a bearing on social life inasmuch as they can simply help one to become a more thoughtful citizen.

To any reader concerned that this is going to be a book full of spiritual philosophy: fear not; it isn’t!

3.11898

In July 1898 Steiner writes an article (in three instalments) in Das Magazin fur Literature entitled ‘The Social Question’. This is in response to The Social Question in the Light of Philosophy—a book by philosopher Dr Ludwig Stein that had been published the year before. Steiner commends the author for what he regards as accurate observations of the main aspects of social evolution, but he does not share Stein’s conclusions. The main theme of the article concerns the progression of humanity from primitive times when the social grouping is prominent and the individual is not (nothing is owned by anyone, etc.), to more modern times where the concerns of the individual begin to come to the fore.

What better illustration that there was once a time when it was experienced as right to sacrifice the individual to the interests of the community than that during a certain period of time the Spartans used to cast weak individuals out into the wilderness, where they were left to die so that they would not be a burden to the community. Another confirmation can be found in the fact that it did not occur to philosophers in earlier times, such as Aristotle, to regard slavery as barbaric. To Aristotle, for example, it seems quite natural that a certain sector of humankind has to serve another as slaves. One can only hold such a view if one is mainly concerned about the interests of the totality and not about those of the individual. It can easily be demonstrated that the forms of all social institutions at the beginning of cultural evolution were such that the interests of the individual were sacrificed for the sake of the community. However, it is equally true that in the further course of evolution the individual attempts to assert his needs over against those of the community. If we observe closely, a good deal of human history is encompassed in the self-assertion of the individual over against the communities that arose of necessity at the beginning of cultural evolution and that developed at the expense of the individual.

Common sense compels us to acknowledge that social institutions were necessary and that they could only come about through priority being given to common interests. However, it is equally obvious that it is necessary for the individual to resist the sacrifice of his own particular interests. In this way a situation has come about in the course of time, in which social institutions have taken on forms in which the interests of individuals are given more scope than was the case in earlier times. If one rightly understands the nature of our times one might well say that the most advanced members of our society endeavour to develop social forms in such a way that through the forms of human interaction any restrictions on the individual are reduced to a minimum. The idea that a community could be an end in itself is gradually disappearing, and it is seen more and more as providing for the development of the individual. The state, for example, should be constituted in a way that will give the greatest scope to the unrestricted development of the individual. All general arrangements should be made in such a way that they serve the individual rather than the state as such. J.G. Fichte expressed this tendency in an apparently paradoxical yet pertinent way when he said: ‘It is the task of the state gradually to make itself redundant.’ Underlying this expression is the important truth that initially the individual needs community, for only on the basis of the community can he develop his capacities; however, as soon as these capacities have been developed, the tutelage of the community becomes unbearable to him. He then says to himself: I will constitute the community in such a way that it best serves the development of my individual qualities. (CW30, pp. 29-31)

Steiner cites examples given by Ludwig Stein that bear out this trend, but then observes that Stein fails to go one step further and arrive at what he (Steiner) calls a ‘fundamental sociological law’:

… it seems to me that, having stated all these facts, it would have been the task of the sociological philosopher to proceed to describe the fundamental sociological law governing the development of mankind that follows from the above with logical necessity, and that I would like to express as follows: in the early stages of cultural evolution, mankind tends towards the formation of social units; initially the interests of individuals are sacrificed to the interests of those groupings; the further course of development leads to the emancipation of the individual from the interests of the groupings and to the unrestricted development of the needs and capacities of the individual.

Now the point is to draw the logical conclusions from these historical facts. Which social forms can be the only acceptable ones if all social development is tending towards individualisation? The answer cannot be too difficult. Any state or society that regards itself as an end in itself has to aim for control over the individual, regardless of the way in which such control is exercised, whether it be an absolutist, constitutional or republican manner. As soon as the state no longer considers itself an end in itself, but as a means towards an end, the principle of state control will no longer be emphasized. All arrangements will be made in such a way that the individual receives the greatest scope. The greatest ideal of the state will be not to control anything. It will be a community that wants nothing for itself, everything for the individual. If one wishes to further developments in this direction, one is bound to oppose everything that tends towards a socialization14 of social institutions. Ludwig Stein does not do that. He proceeds from the observation of a certain fact, from which he is not able to deduce the right law, to a conclusion that represents a poor compromise between socialism and individualism, between communism and anarchism … The evidence of sociological observation should have forced Stein to represent anarchistic individualism as the social ideal, but for that Stein was not a courageous enough thinker. He seems to know anarchism only in that completely idiotic form in which it is being propagated by bomb-throwing gangs. (CW30, pp. 32-34)

Thus Steiner describes a simple, historical progression—away from a more or less group consciousness towards ever greater individual expression. And he concludes that political institutions ought to increasingly respect this trend, ought to step back from the controlling of individuals. He then goes on to single out socialist regimes as being particularly poor at observing this need (despite their worthy maxim ‘To each according to his need; from each according to his abilities’).

No socialist or communist form of government or social order is capable of taking adequate account of the natural diversity of human beings. Any organisation that is in any way predetermined in its nature by any principles must of necessity suppress the full and unhindered development of the individual in order to maintain its own integrity as an organism. (CW30, p. 36)

… he who can read the development of mankind rightly can only support a social order that has as its aim the unrestricted, all-round development of individuals, and that abhors the domination of any one person by another. The question that then remains is how each individual is to cope with himself. Each individual will solve this problem for himself if all sorts of communities do not get in the way.

The worst of all forms of government is that propagated by the Social Democrats.15 [ … ] Those who can think know that the realisation of the ideals of social democracy would mean the suppression of all individuality. However, because it is impossible to suppress—for human evolution has set its sight on human individuality once and for all—the victory of social democracy would at the same time be its downfall. (CW30, pp. 37-38)

Read in isolation, these passages might make one wonder whether Steiner then goes on to advocate some sort of laissez-faire, free-for-all neo-liberalism where the weak are simply left to fall by the wayside. But this is very far from the case.

3.21905–1908

Between 1898 and 1905, Steiner writes and lectures extensively on philosophy, religion and esotericism, and is also invited to become General Secretary of the German-speaking section of the Theosophical Society. He holds this position until 1913 when the Society’s leader Annie Besant declares an Indian boy, Krishnamurti, to be the reincarnation of Christ—something Steiner regards as a falsehood.

From 1899 until 1904, he also teaches history and a range of scientific and literary subjects at the Berlin Workers College founded by Marxist, Karl Liebknecht.16 Despite his classes being by far the most popular in the college, he is eventually relieved of his position by the college directors for refusing to toe their Marxist line.

In 1905 (still twelve years before he shares his key ‘threefold’ analysis), Steiner briefly returns to the theme of the social organism in three lectures he gives in Berlin, as well as in an essay for the theosophical magazine Lucifer Gnosis. In these, a number of themes emerge which complement the individualism of which he had spoken seven years earlier.

3.2.1Brotherhood

Having previously brought people’s attention to the gradual emergence, over long epochs, of the human individuality, and having then concluded that any prescriptive political construct (especially Communism) is something that inappropriately hinders this emergence, Steiner relates how this emergence of the human individuality does not imply that human evolution is heading towards a self-centred, ‘me, me, me’ culture. Rather, he considers how vital the role of brotherhood has been as humanity advances.

What has brotherhood achieved for human development? We have only to look at our own ancestors. One could easily gain the impression that it was the hunt and warfare that advanced them, that primarily moulded their character. But when one delves deeper, it will be found that this first impression is not correct, that precisely those early Teutonic tribes prospered most that had developed the principle of brotherhood to an extraordinary degree …

There was a great movement towards freedom throughout Europe in the middle of the Middle Ages. This movement towards freedom grew out of a spirit of the brotherhood of man, and from it arose a general culture, the city culture of the middle Middle Ages. Those who could not endure servitude on the land fled their masters and sought their freedom in the growing cities. People came down from Scotland, France, and Russia; from everywhere they came together and built the free cities. Thus the principle of brotherhood developed and furthered culture to a high degree. Men of similar occupations joined in societies called oath-brotherhoods,17 which later grew into the guilds. These oath-brotherhoods were far more than mere societies of crafts or tradespeople. Born of the practical, everyday life, these associations developed to moral heights. Mutual aid was the fundamental concern of these brotherhoods, and many aspects of life that are of nobody’s concern today were occasions for such support. For example, members of such a brotherhood would help each other in case of illness. Two brothers were appointed to keep daily vigil at the bedside of a sick brother. Members who were ill received food, and the fraternal spirit prevailed even beyond death: the responsibility for burying a brother member in proper fashion was considered a special honour. Finally, the care of widows and orphans was a duty of the oath-brotherhood. You can see from these examples how there grew up an understanding of the moral life of the community that modern man can hardly imagine. (CW54, pp. 3-5)

Steiner goes on to relate how the development of the individual does not hinder ‘brotherliness’—the consideration of others. Instead, it strengthens it and so assists humanity’s healthy development.

In a sense, the words of Rusckerts hold here: when the rose beautifies itself, it also beautifies the garden. If we do not make ourselves capable of helping our fellow men, we shall be poor helpers. If we do not see to it that all our talents are developed, we shall be poor helpers. If we do not see to it that all our talents are developed, we shall have little success in helping our brothers. In order to develop these talents, a certain egoism is necessary, because egoism is connected with initiative. The person who understands how not to be led, how not to be influenced by everything in his surroundings, but who descends into his own, inner being where the sources of strength are to be found will develop into a strong and able person, in whom there will be a greater ability to serve others than in the one who conforms to all kinds of influences that come from his surroundings. (CW54, pp. 7-8)

The people who join with others and who put their strength at the disposal of all are those who will provide the foundation for healthy development in the future. (CW54, pp. 10-11)

In the past—in Greece, Egypt and further back—the sacrificing of the concerns of the individual for the sake of the community may have found expression even in slavery. But here Steiner talks of the individual joining with others out of free choice—community arising between free individuals.

Within the same lecture, he refers to how the Theosophical Society (where he remained General Secretary of its German Branch until 1913), has the principle of brotherhood at its core:

Those of you who have occupied yourselves even a little with the aims of our spiritual-scientific movement know our main principle: to create the heart, the kernel, of a brotherhood based on all-embracing human love that transcends race, sex, profession, religion, and so on. Thus, the Theosophical Society has placed this principle of general brotherhood foremost, made it the most important of its ideals. Of all these cultural endeavours that we need most at present, the society considers this great ethical striving towards brotherhood to be most closely connected with the ultimate aim of human development. (CW54, p. 1)

The following (in fact, from 1912) relates how this ‘all-embracing human love’ can be stimulated:

… if, as anthroposophists, we set ourselves the task of extending our interests more and more and of widening our mental horizon, this will promote the universal brotherhood of mankind. Progress is not gained by the mere preaching of universal love, but by the extension of our interests further and further, so that we come to interest ourselves increasingly in souls with widely different characters, racial and national peculiarities, with widely different temperaments, and holding widely different religious and philosophical views, and approach them with understanding. Right interest, right understanding, calls forth from the soul the right moral action. (CW155)

3.2.2Root causes of societal ills

Steiner acknowledges the self-evident: that much of the misery and suffering in the world is down to the poor conditions in which so many people have to live, and that the wellbeing of these people is improved when the conditions in which they live are improved. And he commends the effective attempts at social policy which address this. He is also particularly complimentary about the efforts of individual social reformers, citing Robert Owen and political theorist Henri de Saint-Simon as notable examples (as, indeed, had Marx half a century earlier).

However, he stresses that improving people’s living conditions in these ways is only a partial fix and doesn’t really get to the root of the problem.

We can agree without hesitation … that much can be achieved with the means that have been suggested by many for the improvement of man’s social condition. One party wants one thing, others something else. To a clear-thinking person, some of the demands which such parties make prove to be devoid of any real substance; on the other hand, some of it certainly contains the making of something really substantial.

Robert Owen, who lived from 1771 to 1858 and who certainly was one of the noblest social reformers, emphasized again and again that the human being is moulded by his environment in which he grows up, that his character is not formed by himself, but by the conditions in which he lives. What is obviously so right in such a statement should not be disputed. But neither should it be treated with a disdainful shrug of the shoulders, even if on the surface it appears to be more or less self-evident. Rather, it should be readily admitted that much in public life can be improved by working according to such ideas. The science of the spirit, therefore, will never prevent anyone from doing anything for human progress which sets out to produce a better lot for the oppressed and suffering classes of humanity.

The science of the spirit must go deeper. Really effective progress cannot be achieved by such means any longer. If we do not admit this we have not recognised how conditions come about in which people live. For inasmuch as the life of man is dependent on these conditions, the latter themselves are brought about by man. Or who has arranged it that one person is poor and another rich? Other people, of course … A thorough knowledge of things teaches us that all evils connected with social life originate in human actions. In this respect it is not the individual human being but the whole of humanity that is the ‘fashioner of individual fortune’. (CW34)

… what needs to be taken up first as the social question, are the souls of today which produce the environment of tomorrow. (CW88, p. 57)

Yes, misery may be caused by poor living conditions; but poor living conditions are caused by people, by thoughts, by the way society organises itself. An obvious point perhaps, but possibly directed at any Communist who preferred to deny the mind had any importance (believing, instead, that surplus value was created solely by the workers, not by ingenuity).

3.2.3Exploitation

Steiner goes on to consider the nature of exploitation, a theme uppermost in the minds of a great many at the time. With damp houses and squalor and families living eight-to-a-room at one end of social life, and landed barons and others enjoying capital at the other, the class struggle was a pressing issue of the day. Indeed, it had been for a long time, and was the widespread soil in which Marxist ideas had taken hold.

… if in our emotions and perceptions we are able to feel a certain pain over the fact that the clothes we have on have been produced for a starvation wage, then we are looking deep into the heart of the question. (CW88, p. 49)

… it is also true that by and large no part of humanity, no caste or class, maliciously causes the suffering of another part … Those who exploit their fellow men would naturally not want the victims of their exploitation to suffer. We would make considerable progress if people not only found this self-evident, but also adapted their feelings to it. (CW34)

A person who maintains a home in grand style, who can travel first class on the railway, may easily appear on the surface to be an oppressor. And a person who wears a threadbare coat and who travels fourth class will appear to be the oppressed. But one does not have to be an incompassionate individual nor a reactionary in order to understand the following clearly. Nobody is oppressed or exploited because I wear a particular coat, but only because I pay the man who made the coat for me too little. The poor worker who has acquired his inferior coat for little money is, in relation to his fellow human beings in this respect, in exactly the same position as the rich man who had a better coat made. Whether I am poor or rich, I exploit if I acquire things for which insufficient payment is made. Actually today nobody ought to call someone else an oppressor; he ought first to look at himself. If he does this carefully he will soon discover the ‘oppressor’ in himself. Is the work which you have to deliver to the well-to-do delivered only to them at the price of bad wages? No, the person who sits next to you and complains about oppression enjoys the work of your hands on exactly the same conditions as the well-to-do whom you have both turned against …

Thinking things over in this way makes it clear that the concepts ‘rich’ and ‘exploiter’ must be completely separated. It depends on individual ability or on the ability of our forefathers, or on quite different things, whether we are now rich or poor. The fact that we exploit the work of others has absolutely nothing to do with these things. At least not directly. But it is very much connected with something else. And that is, that our social situation and environment are built upon personal self-interest. We have to think very clearly for otherwise we shall arrive at a quite wrong idea of what is said. If I acquire a coat today it appears quite natural, according to the conditions which exist, that I acquire it as cheaply as possible. This means: I have only myself in mind. Here, however, we touch the point of view that governs our whole life. Of course, it is easy to raise an objection. We can say: do not the socially-minded parties and personalities try to do something about this evil? Is there not an effort to protect ‘work’? Do not working classes and their representatives demand higher wages and shorter working hours? It has already been said above that the present-day view can have absolutely nothing against such demands and measures. Nor is there any intention here for agitating for one or the other of the existing party demands. From the present point of view, we are not concerned with taking sides on particular points, ‘for’ or ‘against’. This, in the first place, lies quite outside the approach of the science of spirit.

However many improvements are introduced to protect a particular class of worker, and that would certainly contribute much to the raising of conditions of one or the other group of people, the actual nature of exploitation will not be mitigated. For this depends on a person acquiring the products of another person’s work from the point of view of self-interest … (CW34)

A poor person can exploit another just as a rich person can. Wealth as such is not a cause of the exploitation (although it may, indeed, be the result). Rather, Steiner points out, exploitation lies in self-interest. Whilst, again, this may be self-evident, it is nonetheless helpful to have it stated. It is probably also true to say that whilst ‘by and large no part of humanity’ wishes to exploit (as Steiner states) there are—surely nowadays—far too many exploiting corporate leaders who would appear to know full well what they are doing, be that pushing their pharmaceuticals onto a largely unsuspecting public when other drugs would be more effective and cheaper,18 or pushing their baby milk onto impoverished African mothers whose children would be greatly better-off if breastfed, or whatever.19

3.2.4Self-interest

Following the great success of his New Lanark project, where Robert Owen made sure all the workers in his mills had decent living conditions, and where he integrated wasters and drunkards from Glasgow with those who could act as good examples, Robert Owen went on to buy a village in Indiana, USA and attempted to set up something similar, inviting all and sundry to join him. The project failed after two years, however, following strife and disagreement, not least because a number of the members were, quite simply, work-shy.

Through this experience, Owen was able to be completely cured of the belief that all human misery comes about through bad ‘conditions’ in which people live, and that the goodness of human nature would come to life of itself if these conditions were improved. He was forced to the conviction that good conditions can be maintained only if the human beings who live in them are naturally inclined to maintain them, and when they do this with enthusiasm … We have to advance from merely a belief in the goodness of human nature that deceived Owen, to a real knowledge of man … (CW34)

Again, the point that is perhaps obvious: misery is born not just of external conditions but also of human attitudes and behaviour.