Ludwig Stein, born on 12 November 1859 in Erdö-Benye (Hungary), died on 13 July 1930 in Salzburg, went to Berlin and Halle an der Saale in order to study philosophy with Eduard Zeller and Wilhelm Dilthey.
As an eminent representative of the Jewish community he also became a rabbi. In 1886, he was called a lecturer at the “Eidgenössisches Polytechnikum” and at the same time at the University of Zurich. Between 1891 and 1910 he was a professor of philosophy at the University of Berne with a strong inclination to sociology. In 1893 he obtained Swiss citizenship in his new hometown of Zurich. Walter Rathenau, Leo Trotsky and Rosa Luxemburg were counted among his students. In 1909 he organized the 7th congress of sociology in Berne, in the name of the Institut International de Sociologie. Back in Berlin he was the chief editor of the “Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie” as well as of the “Archiv für systematische Philosophie und Soziologie”.
Although a pacifist and a member of the Committee of the international Bureau for Peace, Ludwig Stein was thoroughly bourgeois in his mind. He therefore criticised not only socialist ideas, but also conservative politics. He, for example, argued against the theories of Friedrich Nietzsche. Greater influence, however, may have been his activities as a publicist writing in numerous journals and papers.
Selected Works of the Author
Ludwig Stein: Die sociale Frage im Lichte der Philosophie – Vorlesungen über Socialphilosophie und ihre Geschichte, Stuttgart: Ferdinand Enke, 1897; Idem: Wesen und Aufgabe der Sociologie – Eine Kritik der organischen Methode in der Sociologie, in: Archiv für systematische Philosophie, vol. 4, Berlin: Georg Reimer, 1898, 38 pp.; Idem: An der Wende des Jahrhunderts – Versuch einer Kulturphilosophie, Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr 1899; Idem: Der soziale Optimismus, Jena: Hermann Costenoble, 1905; Idem: Die Anfänge der menschlichen Kultur – Eine Einführung in die Soziologie, Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1906; Idem: Philosophische Strömungen der Gegenwart, Stuttgart: Ferdinand Enke, 1908; Idem: Dualismus oder Monismus? – Eine Untersuchung über die doppelte Wahrheit, Berlin: Reichl, 1909; Idem: Die Juden in der neueren Philosophie, Berlin, M. Poppelauer: 1919; Idem: Einführung in die Soziologie, München: Rösl, 1921; Idem (Ed.): Archiv für die Geschichte der Philosophie; Idem (Ed.): Archiv für systematische Philosophie und Soziologie.