ADLER, GEORG

ADLER, GEORG (1863–1908), German economist and economic historian. Born in Posen, Adler taught at the universities of Berlin, Basle, and Kiel, and became professor of political economy at Freiburg. While in Basle, in 1894, he drafted the first law on workmen's unemployment insurance at the request of the Swiss government. He nevertheless considered the labor movement as necessary for social reform. A follower of the German historical school of economists, he advocated moderate socialism and bitterly opposed the revolutionary socialism of karl marx . He remained a protagonist of social insurance and of international legislation for the protection of labor. His works include Die Geschichte der ersten sozial-politischen Arbeiterbewegung in Deutschland (1885); Die Grundlagen der Karl Marx'schen Kritik der bestehenden Volkswirtschaft (1887); and Geschichte des Sozialismus und Kommunismus (1899). -BIBLIOGRAPHY: NDB, 1 (1953), 69. (Joachim O. Ronall)