Max Adler

Max Adler (1873 to 1937) was an Austrian jurist, politician and social philosopher whose theories were of central importance to Austromarxism. He obtained a doctorate in law in 1896 and became a professional lawyer, began teaching in the Schönbrunn Circle in 1919, qualified at the University of Vienna in 1920 and became extraordinary professor of sociology and social philosophy there. From 1919 to 1921 he sat for the Social Democrats in the regional parliament of Lower Austria, and from 1904 to 1925 he edited the Marx-Studien with Rudolf Hilferding. His first notable study concerned Max Stirner and socialism, and he went on to combine Marxist themes with Kantian transcendentalism in a theory of the social a priori, arguing that the individual consciousness is socialized from the start. His contributions to a Marxist theory of the state arose in disputes with Hans Kelsen and Hermann Heller, and his works include Die Staatsauffassung des Marxismus of 1922 and Das Rätsel der Gesellschaft of 1936.