Hans Peter kurz
Mini-Workshop: History of Mathematics in Germany, 1920 - 1960 119
As the flutter research projects show, direct war relevant research was conducted
by the NLL. In addition, research projects that were not obviously connected with
military research reduced the workload at the AVA and thereby made additional
resources available for military research. In return, this scientific collaboration
caused a remarkable increase in staff, budget and income from external research
orders for the NLL. With reference to the German research contracts and their
war importance, employees of the NLL could be protected from recruitment as
forced labourers to the German Reich.
References
[1] Greidanus, J. H., van der Vooren, A.I. (1943): Berechnung der Flatterschwingungen
beschrieben in den Versuchsberichten Nr. 934/13 und 933/29 der AVA, 17 October 1942,
Deutsches Museum (Archiv), ZLDI, NLL V.1284.
[2] Schmaltz, Florian: Aerodynamic Research at the Nationaal Luchtvaartlaboratorium (NLL)
in Amsterdam under German Occupation during World War II, Ad Maas and Hans Hooi-
jmaijers (eds.), Scientific Research in World War II: What Scientists Did in the War, New
York, NY 2009 , pp. 146–182.
[3] Van der Neut, Arie: Versuche an einem Außenfl¨gel einfacher Konstruktion zur Bestim-
u
mung der Versteiffestigkeit in ihrer Abh¨ngigkeit vom Verdrehmoment. NLL Bericht S.259,
a
31 August 1942, Zentrales Archiv des Deutschen Luft- und Raumfahrtzentrums G¨ttingen,
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GOAR 363.
“Certainly not by Logic!” Hans Peter, the Image of Mathematics, and
the Self-Examination of Economics during the 1930ies
Andrea Albrecht
Within the History of Mathematics in Germany from 1920 to 1960 the econo-
mist and statistician Hans Peter (1898-1959)[1, 2, 3, 4] is a hybrid, multifaceted
figure in at least three ways: First, Peter’s work is interdisciplinary and provides
insights into important fields of mathematical applications. He was not a profes-
sional mathematician, but having studied mathematics, philosophy and econom-
ics during his university education in the 1920ies, he imported mathematical and
econometric methods (statistical methods, systems of differential equations, the
method of mathematical modelling of, for example, economic cycles) to economics
and thus helped develop it into a modern discipline with a broad repertoire of
elaborated theories and effective applications. Second, Peter’s writings transcend
the economic and the mathematical realm by linking both with cultural and ide-
ological questions. In this respect, his case is an example for the interference of
the (internal) development of science and its (internally and externally influenced)
“image” [5, 6]. Third, Peter also put his economic and mathematical skills to
practical use. After the beginning of World War II he became a member of the
“Arbeitswissenschaftliche Institut” of the “Deutsche Arbeitsfront”, an influential
but often underestimated brain-trust of the Third Reich administration, which
worked out important parts of the National Socialists’ social policies and their so-
called “Generalplan Ost”. Working for this institution from 1940 to 1944, Peter
established statistical and mathematical methods as key technologies of economic
120 Oberwolfach Report 03/2010
rationalization and planning [3, 7], a fact that also raises questions about the
relation between scientific theory and political practice.
Hence, using Hans Peter’s career as an example we gain insight into the premises,
conditions, and implications of the production and legitimization of economic
knowledge under the totalitarian rule of National Socialism – and beyond, since
Peter’s career did not end with the war. Without resorting to a constructivist
approach towards the history of economics [8] the case study tries to show how
the political transformations influenced the images of ecomomics (and vice versa)
and allowed some German economists to make the transition through the historic
ruptures of 1933 and 1945.
Here, I can only give a rough outline of one concrete aspect: Peter was involved
in a highly controversial debate on the suitability or unsuitability of mathematical
methods for economics. The discussion was instigated by Hans Frank, at that time
president of the “Akademie f¨ r Deutsches Recht” and a confidant of Hitler, who,
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in 1934, called on the economists to end their theoretical discords and to bethink
themselves of the essence of ‘Germaness’ [9]. According to most of the national
socialist ideologues the German “Volkswirtschaft” could not be properly described
by abstract mathematical models, so the economists obediently started to discuss
the “elimination of the exact theory of economics” alleging that “the majority of
economists who still commit themselves to the exact theory are in opposition to
the new German spirit of science.” [10] In an article published in 1935 in the
economic journal Finanzarchiv and a few succeeding articles Klaus Wilhelm Rath
led an attack on Hans Peter, accusing him of an un-German, Jewish approach
to economic research and arguing that Peter’s “formalistic methodology” which
“ego-maniacally overrides life” must be overcome. Rath insisted that the validity
of theoretical propositions were affected by transformations of the real world, but
“certainly not by logic”, because logic itself was, like mathematics, a method of
liberal thinking.[11]
Knowing that he could also count on strong allies, that for example the Nazis
Theodor Vahlen and Dietrich Klagges believed in the necessity and usefulness of
mathematical methods in the economics [12], Peter responded to Rath’s pam-
phlet with a brave and scathing criticism in which he demonstrated that Rath’s
statements suffered from a number of philosophical and methodological shortcom-
ings. He countered Rath’s anti-mathematical and anti-theoretical resentments and
pleaded for a strict separation of a value-free and rational theory of economics on
the one hand and a normative approach to economy on the other hand, with only
the latter being subject to ideological loyalty. [13]
After the debate had escalated into a many-voiced controversy on the status and
cogency of mathematical knowledge, on the distinction between objectivity and
truth, and on the relation of scientific models and reality, Rath appeared to pre-
vail over Peter. In 1938 Rath became professor of economics in G¨ttingen where
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he started to bring the faculty of economics into accordance with the political
order, while Peter, as a consequence of his recalcitrant behavior, lost his position
in T¨bingen and had to abandon his academic career [2, 4]. But the situation
u
Mini-Workshop: History of Mathematics in Germany, 1920 - 1960 121
changed soon enough: Striving for a rationalized and efficient war economy the
Nazis recognized the relevance of mathematics in non-mathematical fields of re-
search and practice, and started to make use of Peter and his formerly denounced
theoretical knowledge [3]. Working for the “Deutsche Arbeitsfront”, Peter contin-
ued his research on the theory of economic cycles, but was now also eager to prove
that his theoretical knowledge concurred with the political and economic aims of
the National Socialists [14]. In contrast to his earlier statements he now insisted
that the economic theoretician has to take the political norms into account: “The
decision to realize the ‘Volksgemeinschaft’ defines the condition of the theoretical
question.” [15]
After the war, Peter could resume his endeavor to develop effective tools for
the organization of a planned economy [16]. Although he had been part of the
technocratic and functional elites of the National Socialist system, he was granted
the status of a “victim” of National Socialism and became a protagonist of post
war German economics [1]. He pursued his work in a position at the University
of T¨bingen and as an advisor to economic institutions and politicians of the
u
young Federal Republic. This continuity might be the major reason why he,
revisiting the Wandlungen in der Wirtschaftsauffassung (1949) during the past
decade, could envision the system of National Socialism as a grotesque play that
is over now, without mentioning his personal participation: “From time to time
we fought against each other in an ugly way. [...] The play became a grotesque
entirely when half-educated ‘politicians’, who seized the power apparatus of the
state, entertained themselves with the idea that shallowness serves the state and
simultaneously declared everything they could not understand as seditious. As
soon as this episode is overcome, the foolishness needs only to be noted; the
scientific development might be slowed down by such silliness but the core of
science cannot be touched.” [17]
References
[1] “Hans Peter”, in: 200 Jahre Wirtschafts- und Staatswissenschaften an der Eberhard-Karls-
Universitaet Tuebingen. Leben und Werk der Professoren, ed. H. Marcon, H. Strecker,
Stuttgart (2004), 509–515.
[2] K.-R. Brintzinger, Die National¨konomie an den Universit¨ten Freiburg, Heidelberg und
o a
T¨bingen 1918-1945, Frankfurt am Main et al. (1996).
u
[3] K. H. Roth, Zur biographischen Typologie der Mitarbeiter des Arbeitswissenschaftlichen
Instituts der Deutschen Arbeitsfront, Sozialstrategien der Deutschen Arbeitsfront, ed. Ham-
burger Stiftung fuer Sozialgeschichte des 20. Jahrhunderts, M¨nchen at al. (1992), 9–15.
u
[4] H. Janssen, National¨konomie und Nationalsozialismus: Die deutsche Volkswirtschaftslehre
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in den dreissiger Jahren, 2nd. ed., Marburg (2000).
[5] Y. Elkana, Anthropologie der Erkenntnis, Frankfurt am Main 1989.
[6] S. Shapin, The Scientific Life. A Moral History of a Late Modern Vocation, University of
Chicago Press 2008.
[7] K. H. Roth, Das Arbeitswissenschaftliche Institut der Deutschen Arbeitsfront und die Ost-
planung, Der “Generalplan Ost”. Hauptlinien der nationalsozialistischen Planungs- und Ver-
nichtungspolitik, ed. Mechthild R¨ssler/Sabine Schleiermacher, Berlin (1993), 215–225.
o
[8] Y. P. Yonay, When Black Boxes Clash: Competing Ideas of What Science Is in Economics,
1924-39, Social Studies of Science, 24/1 (1994), 39–80.
122 Oberwolfach Report 03/2010
[9] H. Frank, Der Nationalsozialismus und die Wissenschaft der Wirtschaftslehre, Schmollers
Jahrbuch 58/6 (1934), 641–650.
[10] A. Predoehl, Gesamte Staatswissenschaft und exakte Wirtschaftstheorie, Zeitschrift f¨r die
u
gesamte Staatswissenschaft 95 (1935), 102–115.
[11] K. W. Rath, Die Aufgabe einer Selbstbesinnung der Finanzwissenschaft, Finanzarchiv, N.F.
3 (1935), 1–76.
[12] D. Klagges, Geleitwort zur ersten Tagung der Gemeinschaft von F¨rderen der mathematis-
o
chen Wirtschafts- und Sozialforschung, Archiv f¨r mathematische Wirtschafts- und Sozial-
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forschung 2 (1936), 48–55.
[13] H. Peter, Zur Selbstbesinnung in den wirtschaftlichen Staatswissenschaften. Erkenntniskri-
tische Bemerkungen, Finanzarchiv, N.F. 3 (1935), 267–321.
[14] H. Peter, Kritische Bilanz der nationalsozialistischen Sozialpolitik (1943), Sozialstrategien
der Deutschen Arbeitsfront, ed. Hamburger Stiftung f¨r Sozialgeschichte des 20. Jahrhun-
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derts, Tl. B, Abt. 2: Denkschriften, Gutachten und Ver¨ffentlichungen, M. Hepp u. K. H.
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Roth, M¨nchen 1988.
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¨
[15] H. Peter, Uber exakte Forschungsmethoden in den Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften,
Finanzarchiv N.F. 10 (1944), 288–313.
[16] W. Abelshauser, Freiheitlicher Sozialismus oder soziale Marktwirtschaft: Die Gutachterta-
gung uber Grundfragen der Wirtschaftsplanung und Wirtschaftslenkung am 21. und 22.
¨
Juni 1946, Vierteljahrshefte f¨r Zeitgeschichte, 24/4 (1976), 415–449.
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[17] H. Peter, Wandlungen in der Wirtschaftsauffassung, Finanzarchiv N.F. 11, 1949, 170–194.
The statistician Siegfried Koller
Norbert Schappacher
Elaborating somewhat on [1] and [2], Siegfried Koller’s first career was sketched,
which led him from a thesis under Felix Bernstein in G¨ttingen, via a second Ph.D.
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in Medicine at Gießen, and thanks to politically well-tuned publications, to a pro-
fessorship at Berlin University and directorship of a newly founded biostatistical
institute. But the Berlin appointment took place only shortly before the end of
WW II. (After a number of years in prison, Koller’s second career then made him
a very influential statistician of the Federal Republic of Germany.)
There were various reasons for recalling this career in the context of the mini-
workshop: (1) It illustrates very well the general pattern of “science and politics as
resources for one another” (to quote Mitchell Ash’s well-known and apposite for-
mula). (2) It shows the complexity of a hybrid discipline: After the emigration of
all experts of mathematical statistics in influential academic positions, Koller went
through the medical network in order to consolidate his career, thus changing also,
for instance, the journals in which he tried to publish. (3) Pauline Mazumdar’s
thesis about different styles in genetic research in the 1930s (Mendelian algebra
like in Felix Bernstein’s research on blood groups, vs. pedigree models as practised
by Ernst R¨ din) remains open to further research; the works by Koller and Kranz
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are situated at the borderline of both models.
References
[1] S. Oehler-Klein, N. Schappacher, Siegfried Koller und die neuen Herausforderungen der
Statistik im Nationalsozialismus. In: Die Medizinische Fakult¨t der Universit¨t Gießen im
a a