Friedrich Albert Lange

Friedrich Albert Lange (1828 to 1875) was a German philosopher and sociologist, born in Wald near Solingen, the son of the theologian Johann Peter Lange. He taught as a schoolmaster in Cologne and Duisburg and as a Privatdozent in Bonn, resigned his school post when teachers were barred from political activity, and from 1862 edited a reform newspaper. His best-known books were Die Arbeiterfrage (1865) and Geschichte des Materialismus (1866). He sat on the executive committee of the Association of German Labour Unions from 1864 to 1866 alongside August Bebel, and in Switzerland helped write the constitution of the Canton of Zurich, with its referendum and recall. In 1872 he became professor at Marburg and is sometimes credited with founding the Marburg School of neo-Kantianism with Hermann Cohen. He rejected Marxist materialism but favoured an ethically motivated, reformist socialism and influenced the Revisionist theorist Eduard Bernstein. He died in Marburg in 1875.