Page - 216 - in Otto Bauer (1881–1938) - Thinker and Politician

216 chapter 5 Bauer’s socialisationprogramme–expropriations and the creationof social- ised enterprises – appearedmuch worse in practice. The preparatory pro- gramme for socialisation passed in parliament on 14March 1919 announced expropriations in the spirit ofBauer’s programme–yet IgnazSeipel, headof the socialisation commission, sabotaged its implementation from the start, even going so far as to introduce an alternative socialisation programme in the name of the Christian Social Party in order to forestall the sdap.117 The extent inwhichprocesses of the socialisation commissionwent their separ- atewayswasnotonlyasignofinter-partystrifeandprogrammaticdifferences, butalsobroughtthebrittlenessandforcedcharacterofworkinginacoalitionto the fore.Thecoalitiongovernmentcontented itselfwith introducingasocial- isationprogramme for coalmines, steelmines, electricityworks, largewood- lands, andthewood industry inMay1919–yeteventheseprogrammesnever really tookshape.Likewise, lawspassed inparliament–suchas theexpropri- ation law of 30May 1919 or the law concerning the formation ofmunicipal enterprises of 29 July 1919–had little effect. Becauseof the resistanceof the bourgeois bloc, the law regulating theexpropriationof industrial enterprises was, inpractice, a procedural principlewithout any relevantbasis andpoint of reference.118 It couldnotbeapplied foranumberof reasons: the statecof- ferswereempty, foreigncredit tohelppaythecompensationwas lacking,and individual federal states, primarily Styria andCarinthia, resisted theplanned changes.119 Socialisation plans were stunted further by economic crisis, the sectional interestsof the federal statesandargumentsamongtheparliament- ary fraction as to howbest to proceedwhenbuilding socialised enterprises. Only a small number ofmilitarisedworkplaceswithout any great economic significanceweresuccessfullysocialised.Asaresult,thefollowinghadbecome community-controlled enterprises: the textiles factory of Steyr, the Sollenau chemicalplant, theGerman-Austriandressproduction factories, anumberof shoemanufacturers, pharma producers, a loan office in Vienna, and an old arms factory in the old Vienna armoury in the third district. Some of these enterpriseswentbankruptduringthe1922crisis,whiletherestwereshutdown 117 TheChristianSocialParty’sproposal confined itself to industrieswheremonopolisation had long advanced, i.e. transport companies,mines, and factoriesmanufacturingmass consumergoods.CompareWeissel 1976,p.262. 118 CompareLeser1968,p.322. 119 Theminister of economy and theorist of economics, Joseph Schumpeter, energetically opposed Bauer’s plan to gain financial means for compensation by taxing assets and inheritances.