Gerhard Hildebrand


Gerhard Hildebrand, was a controversial German socialist.

Life

He was active as a journalist and from 1903 as a member of the Social Democratic Party. He was on the revisionist wing of the party, and many of his articles were published in the Sozialistische Monatshefte revisionist magazine. He came to be viewed as one of the prominent exponents of social imperialism.
His main work was the book Die Erschütterung der Industrieherrschaft und des Industriesozialismus, published in 1910, in which he doubted that an economy should be socialised completely. He called for the acquisition of colonies, and for a "West European customs union"
His "heretical views" on nationalism and imperialism led to his expulsion from the party, at the convention in Chemnitz on 16 September 1912. The reason given for his exclusion was heavy violation of the basic principles of the party platform. He was defended by major revisionist Social Democrats like Eduard Bernstein and Wolfgang Heine, but the conventions majority voted against Hildebrand. Hildebrand said, he would stay being a Social Democrat, and went on promoting his ideas.
Hildebrand was denounced by Lenin as an "opportunist".

Works

;Articles