Emil Lederer, Replik (1912)

Emil Lederer’s Replik is a polemical journal reply defending his criticism of Dr. Kleinwächter’s book on urban ground rent. It moves from a rejection of alleged personal motives to a substantive assessment of conceptual accuracy and theoretical originality. Its central claim is that agreement with established economic doctrine does not suffice for a scholarly contribution: a theoretical work must advance understanding rather than merely repeat its premises.

Lederer first rejects Kleinwächter’s insinuations that wounded vanity, anonymity, or hostility toward the Austrian school motivated the review. He had not known Kleinwächter before receiving the book, and more extensive acknowledgment of his own housing research would not have altered his judgment. His use of a cipher followed an editorial arrangement, not an attempt to evade responsibility. He also explicitly locates his theoretical work within the tradition supposedly under attack:

Auch ich komme von der österreichischen Schule; was ich an Theoretischem publiziert habe, fußt auf ihr; die Andeutung Kleinwächters in dieser Richtung ist also ganz sinnlos.

English translation: I too come from the Austrian School; what I have published by way of theory rests upon it; Kleinwächter's insinuation in this direction is therefore quite senseless.

This affiliation frames the substantive dispute as criticism from within a shared intellectual tradition. Lederer does not demand exhaustive discussion of every predecessor; he demands that a book claiming foundational significance surpass existing literature, open another route, or extend established knowledge. Rehearsing marginal-utility theory at length burdens readers who already understand the premises on which a specialized study of rent rests.

Wenn dies nicht der Fall ist — und das hatte ich behauptet, nicht die «Unrichtigkeit» seiner Erörterungen —, dann war eben alles überflüssig.

English translation: If this is not the case — and that is what I had asserted, not the "incorrectness" of his discussions —, then everything was simply superfluous.

The distinction between correctness and contribution governs the reply. Yet Lederer also identifies a specific conceptual error in Kleinwächter’s treatment of Sax’s definition of need. Sax includes a desire for satisfaction within the psychological experience of need; Kleinwächter, Lederer argues, mistakes that desire for actual conduct directed toward satisfaction.

Sax meint, ein Bedürfnis sei nur gegeben, wenn in diesem psychischen Komplex auch das Begehren nach Befriedigung vorkomme; Kleinwächter mißversteht ihn dahin: ein Bedürfnis liege vor, wenn das Subjekt des Bedürfnisses in der Richtung des Bedürfnisses handle.

English translation: Sax holds that a need is given only if the craving for satisfaction also occurs within this psychic complex; Kleinwächter misunderstands him to mean: a need is present if the subject of the need acts in the direction of the need.

Distinguishing psychological desire from action invalidates Kleinwächter’s objection that Sax’s definition would make people helplessly pursue every need. An experienced desire need not produce an attempt to satisfy it. This passage gives the reply a precise analytical focus beyond its dispute over reviewing standards.

Lederer then addresses the more consequential charge that he overlooked an original theory of ground rent. He identifies Kleinwächter’s account as a paraphrase of Böhm-Bawerk’s imputation rule for nonreplaceable productive goods: rent is the residual return after the shares attributable to replaceable inputs have been deducted. Applying this rule to land does not establish originality, since Böhm-Bawerk had already done so. Nor, Lederer argues, does Kleinwächter develop the unresolved problems or add new insights through his treatment of monopoly-like market conditions, interconnected housing submarkets, or land value.

The discussion of building taxation makes the objection concrete. Kleinwächter treats the tax as confiscation of part of ground rent; Lederer asks what happens where rent is absent or insufficient, as at the urban periphery. Earlier debate, particularly the Vienna building-tax inquiry of 1903, had already drawn attention to this difficulty. The problem is therefore both inadequate engagement with prior work and failure to test a general formula against conditions that complicate it.

Eine Weiterführung dieses Gedankens aber findet sich bei Kleinwächter nicht.

English translation: A further development of this thought, however, is not to be found in Kleinwächter.

The conclusion returns to the tone of the original review. Lederer acknowledges its force but attributes it to intellectual frustration rather than personal animosity. His objection is not plagiarism—he expressly disavows that accusation—but the expansive reproduction of acknowledged ideas without further insight. The reply’s broader significance lies in this demanding conception of theoretical scholarship: fidelity to a school’s doctrines is no substitute for conceptual discrimination, engagement with unresolved cases, and a demonstrable advance in knowledge.