Alfred von Martin
Alfred von Martin was a German historian and sociologist and one of the last representatives of the founding years of German sociology to teach and publish in the Federal Republic of Germany. His diagnoses of the times are based on historical sociology and cultural sociology. Alfred von Martin published scholarly texts over a period of seventy years. Von Martin was first educated on the family estate by a private tutor, Dr. A. Schlemm, an expert in classical languages and antiquity. He transferred to the humanistic Gymnasium in Görlitz for a few years before taking his final examinations. Von Martin studied history and numerous related subjects at the universities of Freiburg, Heidelberg, Leipzig, Berlin, Florence, and Rome, graduating with a doctorate from the University of Freiburg in 1912.
Life
German Empire
Alfred von Martin's father, Friedrich Martin, was a partner with Hermann Fölsch in the company "Fölsch & Martin", running saltpetre works in Taltal and having an office in Hamburg. His maternal grandfather, the landowner Otto Roestel, was also active in the saltpetre industry. After Alfred von Martin's birth, Friedrich Martin acquired a manor in Rothenburg an der Neisse. According to the Genealogical Handbook of the Nobility, he promptly established a fideicommissum for the estate in the vicinity of Rothenburg Castle. Alfred von Martin was ennobled in 1907. The estate in Upper Lusatia was subsequently taken over by his younger brother Hans von Martin.Extensive real estate holdings provided Alfred von Martin with financial security throughout his life. He was educated by a private tutor on the estate until he entered grammar school. After graduating from high school in Görlitz, he studied law and political science at the universities of Breslau, Lausanne, Tübingen, and Munich. He completed his first degree in 1906 with a doctorate in law. He then studied history at the universities of Freiburg, Heidelberg, Leipzig, Berlin, Florence, and Rome. He completed his studies in 1913 with a doctorate. While serving as a reserve lieutenant during World War I, von Martin completed his habilitation in medieval and modern history at the University of Frankfurt am Main in 1915.
Weimar Republic and Third Reich
After the war, he was appointed associate professor at the University of Frankfurt am Main. He taught history at the University of Munich from 1924. In 1931, he moved to the University of Göttingen as an honorary professor and became director of the newly established "Sociological Seminar".In 1932, due to political circumstances, he took a permanent leave of absence from the university, retired to Munich, and went into the so-called inner emigration to become an independent scholar. In his own words, he was not prepared to "continue lecturing after the abolition of the freedom to teach, especially since the teaching job was one without material compensation. Had it been otherwise, I would never have lectured against my convictions, but I might have sought out subjects that were as 'harmless' as possible; however, I had no reason to engage in such evasions".
He spent the next few years studying the Renaissance and Jacob Burckhardt. Even before 1933, his interpretation of Machiavelli characterized the "faith of the leader" as decadent, with a clear contemporary reference:
"Machiavelli himself does not believe in the appointed savior... He warms himself to the type of the adventurous, daring lansquenet... This doctor's diagnosis is not wrong, but his etiology is one-eyed. No longer in possession of a sound conception of what health means, he prescribes the fascist poison as a cure for the sick age: pure political actionism - outside of a genuine order of values".His book Nietzsche und Burckhardt was a clear statement against the Nazi regime, leading to violent attacks against him in the Nazi press. The first edition of his book Religion in the Life and Thought of Jacob Burckhardt was confiscated by the Gestapo, and he may have escaped arrest only by chance. He communicated with members of the White Rose resistance group, and Hans Scholl visited him several times in the spring of 1942.
After World War II
In 1945, von Martin returned to publishing and sought a position as a university lecturer. World War II had caused him to lose all his real estate holdings, the source of his previous financial independence. He was no longer able to get established in academic sociology, even though he had become an honorary member of the German Sociological Association.Dirk Kaesler characterizes von Martin as follows:
"In keeping with his skeptical attitude, he remained more of a loner at the university after 1945. A consistent theme in his late work was the tension between society and individual freedom."He was denied permission to return to the University of Göttingen. It was alleged that he was an unreliable colleague and that he had "disappointed the faculty" by resigning. However, he lectured as an outsider in his discipline, first as an assistant professor at the Technical University of Munich, then as an associate professor, and finally as a full professor emeritus at the University of Munich. There he held the newly created chair of sociology until Emerich K. Francis took over after a long period of educational controversy in Bavarian politics.
During this time, he wrote the first systematic description of sociology in the Federal Republic of Germany. After retiring from academic teaching at the age of 78, he produced a comprehensive work despite his age.
Rainer Lepsius wrote about Alfred von Martin in an obituary:
"He consciously placed himself at the service of the values he knew, skeptical of all power and contemptuous of the techniques and tactics of conformity, preferring personal independence to institutional influence."
Sociological work
Sociology of the middle classes (entrepreneurs and intellectuals)
Much of von Martins' sociological work can be read as a preparation for his planned, but never realized, Sociology of the bourgeoisie. Based on his main work, Sociology of the Renaissance, his historic-sociological analyses of the era describe the bourgeoisie as the main actor in the dynamics of capitalist development. In his view, the Renaissance marked the transition from the static and contemplative way of life of the Middle Ages to the activity of the modern economic man. Von Martin also saw the modern Western bourgeoisie as consisting of two types, the entrepreneur and the intellectual. He attributed to both the same characteristics that did not exist in the Middle Ages: individuality and rationality.The emergence of the bureaucratic state and large corporations reshaped the original type of citizen in terms of his actions and behavior. According to von Martin, World War I marked the final turning point toward a "post-bourgeois society". The post-bourgeois individual had become dependent to the detriment of his individuality and this was reflected in the pursuit of advancement within organizations, in conformism, and in consumerism. The "cultural intelligentsia" also declined in importance and became a purely technical intelligentsia and officialdom.
Criticism of contemporary sociology
This trend toward objectification gained momentum after the World War II and also affected sociology's understanding of science. Alfred von Martin emphasized that:"Contrary to all those scientific tendencies that - partly collectivist, partly Americanizing in character - strive for a sociology in which the human being "does not exist" or at least only as a given object of quasi-technical social manipulation, the broad factual current that tends in this direction is, as a problem complex of contemporary sociology, a particularly weighty topic. But it is precisely today's crisis-ridden threat to the values of personality that can be seen as a reason to see the social in terms of the human. However, sociology as a science has nothing to do with worldview: "functionalism", but also "social roles", are a certain worldview, even if one does not know it and would deny it."
Analysis of the class society
In addition to the sociology of the bourgeoisie - and especially the sociology of intellectuals - von Martin was also concerned with the analysis of social class after 1945. In contrast to Helmut Schelsky, he denied the existence of a leveled bourgeois society.In addition to the sociology of the Bürgertums - and especially the sociology of intellectuals - von Martin was also concerned with the analysis of social class after 1945. In contrast to Helmut Schelsky, he denied the existence of a leveled bourgeois society. Although contemporary society had undergone considerable changes compared to 19th century capitalism, he argued that this was not the case:
"The essential moments of class antagonism still exist: the division between those who plan and order "above" and those who obey and execute "below," and the latent conflict of interests with the relationship of domination."
Dealing with National Socialism
summarizes von Martin's diagnosis of National Socialism in five sentences:- The National Socialist dictatorship was only possible because it was widely accepted by the population;
- this acceptance was only possible because of a lack of awareness of values;
- the lack of awareness of values was the result of a mental confusion among the German intelligentsia, which spread to the entire German people;
- the intellectual confusion was caused by Hegel, Nietzsche and Spengler;
- a disposition to extreme political outbursts was ingrained in the German national character.