The archive.

Can a cooperative succeed commercially without reproducing labour’s subordination to capital? In this joint review of three books by Ugo Rabbeno, Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen tests cooperative ideals against consumer societies, workers’ enterprises and Italian agricultural associations. He admires Rabbeno’s institutional research but disputes the categorical separation of cooperation from speculation: even a cooperative must anticipate uncertain markets when buying materials and equipment. The distinction, he argues, lies in whose interests such decisions serve. His qualified optimism also leaves more room than Rabbeno’s for profit-sharing to develop into worker ownership and management. The review makes visible a demanding measure of cooperative achievement—not simply survival or higher earnings, but the preservation of equal standing between labour and capital within a functioning enterprise.

A useful bibliography can still leave significant scholarship out of view. In this brief 1893 review, Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen welcomes Wilhelm Stieda’s Socialpolitik lecture outline as a convenient reference tool—perhaps more useful to writers than to teachers. Its compactness makes disputed questions of classification relatively unimportant to him; its omissions do not escape scrutiny. Schullern singles out the neglect of rapidly growing Italian research, naming Emilio Cossa, Riccardo Dalla Volta, Ugo Rabbeno, and Emilio Nazzani. The notice offers a precise glimpse of his bibliographical standards: practical usefulness deserves recognition, but scholarly coverage must reach beyond the literature an outline already accommodates.

An occupational label can conceal as much as it records: an employer and a wage worker may share a trade, while a woman’s supplementary earnings may obscure her household position. Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen’s report on Vienna’s statistical seminar in the winter semester of 1892/93 documents how participants under Inama-Sternegg confronted these difficulties. Its distinctive interest lies in the testing of classifications against actual records: death registrations that do not match census categories, insurance payrolls that conceal individual wages, and marriage tables that suggest occupational continuity between families. Reporting several contributors rather than advancing a single thesis, Schullern preserves both their methodological cautions and interpretations that sometimes outrun them. Readers can examine how apparently straightforward comparisons of mortality, earnings, or marriage depend on decisions about whom—and what—to count.

Paying wages in cash does not by itself free workers from an employer’s control over their spending. In this 1893 article, Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen examines an Italian anti-truck bill through the distinction between legal freedom of contract and effective independence. His sharpest criticism concerns exceptions for agricultural labour and customary board and lodging: when does supplying necessities become a means of profiting from dependence? Rather than reject payment in kind outright, he proposes provision at the employer’s actual cost. Attention to coerced purchases, wage-backed credit, and goods already received makes this a concrete inquiry into legislative loopholes. Readers encounter a defence of worker protection that tests legal rules against bargaining power and enforceability, while also asking how remedies might themselves be abused.

Knowing how a social law is built is not the same as knowing whether it works. In this brief 1894 review of the expanded third edition of Conrad Bornhak’s Die deutsche Socialgesetzgebung, Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen praises a concise legal account especially useful to readers outside Germany. Its selective treatment helps them weigh comparable institutions against conditions in their own countries. Yet Schullern draws a firm evidentiary boundary: such judgments remain theoretical without statistics of the legislation’s effects—evidence outside Bornhak’s chosen task. The review offers a compact distinction between learning from foreign legislation and establishing its practical results, without making the absence of the latter a fault of the book.

Reconciling wealth and justice may be a worthy social aim—but is it the specific task of political economy? This distinction gives Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen’s 1894 review of Domenico di Bernardo’s unfinished La pubblica amministrazione e la sociologia its critical edge. Assessing the two published volumes, Schullern welcomes the project of grounding administration in sociology and public welfare while resisting the expansion of a single discipline’s remit. His sympathy for Bernardo’s ethical purpose does not excuse attacks on other scholars or a one-sided account of German imperial administration. The review offers a compact encounter with a precise intellectual tension: how to connect economics, law, and administrative science in pursuing social improvement without erasing their distinct tasks.

Can a population law grounded in changing social conditions claim universal validity? In this 1894 review of Francesco S. Nitti’s La popolazione e il sistema sociale, Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen tests an attempted replacement for Malthusian theory against that methodological difficulty. Nitti connects reproductive behaviour to poverty, property distribution and opportunities for individual development, envisaging conscious regulation under a more cooperative social order. Schullern takes this explanation seriously but distinguishes a plausible social prospect from a demonstrated law. His scrutiny extends to Austrian economics: its general propositions, too, depend on assumptions. The review offers a compact encounter between social explanations of fertility and the demand to specify exactly when an economic law holds—without accepting Nitti’s sharp opposition to Malthus.

Can an appeal to moral improvement rescue an account of supposedly natural economic harmony? In this short 1894 review of Gustave de Molinari’s Précis d’économie politique et de morale, Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen separates those two commitments. He reports Molinari’s claims that exchange tends toward equilibrium and that economic progress requires moral progress, but pointedly withholds assent from the underlying economic doctrines. His concession is precise: the attention to morality marks a modest advance beyond Bastiat’s optimism. The review offers a compact instance of critical discrimination—recognizing morality’s importance for economic policy without treating that recognition as proof of the economic theory attached to it.

Could social reform weaken Marxism by answering the demands that gave it force? In this 1894 review of Heinrich Herkner’s Die Arbeiterfrage. Eine Einführung, Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen combines opposition to Marxism with recognition of its role in making social concerns unavoidable. He endorses Herkner’s ethical criterion for reform: institutions should allow more people to develop their capacities freely, through both workers’ own activity and state intervention. His approval is not unqualified; he questions the explanation of workers’ hostility to churches and finds consumer cooperatives inadequately treated. This short review offers a concrete encounter with a reform-minded critic seeking an alternative to both revolutionary doctrine and the defence of existing privilege.

Changed convictions can be evidence of intellectual independence rather than grounds for embarrassment. That judgement anchors Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen’s brief 1894 review of Julius Platter’s collected essays. Schullern values Platter’s willingness to republish sixteen years of work without concealing shifts in his views, while acknowledging that altered circumstances may have dated some arguments. His attention to usury in Bukovina and criticism of Austrian agrarian bills gives this appraisal a concrete legislative setting. The review offers a pointed distinction between endorsing an author’s conclusions and recognising reasons to engage with them: for Schullern, Platter’s candour and substantive reasoning warrant scholarly and legislative attention even where they provoke disagreement.

Economic ruin is not, by itself, a sufficient basis for criminal liability: this distinction sharpens Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen’s 1894 review of Leopold Caro’s study of usury. While praising Caro’s account of its varied forms, Schullern argues that criminal punishment must require at least the creditor’s knowledge of the danger to the debtor. His support for intervention also produces an unexpected theoretical suggestion: marginal utility theory, rather than obstructing the case against usury, might explain why a borrower’s loss generally exceeds a lender’s gain. This brief review offers a precise encounter between social-policy commitment and analytical restraint, showing how Schullern endorses Caro’s economic scrutiny of legal questions without accepting either his definition unchanged or his polemic against Böhm-Bawerk.

Rising national wealth can ease the burden of public expenditure—and encourage still more spending. This tension shapes Hermann von Schullern zu Schrattenhofen’s brief 1894 review of Pietro Sitta’s inaugural lecture at Ferrara. Schullern accepts that state responsibilities must expand, yet denies that either prosperity or new responsibilities justify unlimited growth. His fiscal caution is qualified: limits vary among societies, and military expenditure, however regrettable, is compelled by international conditions. Readers encounter a compact judgement that distinguishes necessary spending from defensible limits, singles out debt interest and armaments as burdens, and commends Sitta’s connection of fiscal policy with marginal utility without elaborating that connection itself.