Expressions of this protest [against feudal traditions and against the overriding influence of Austria and Germany in the field of culture], were Huszadik Század (Twentieth Century), periodical which first appeared in 1900, and The Society for Social Sciences, organized in 1901. The leaders in the society were also leaders in the periodical. It is noteworthy that the leadership for the Hungarian Philosophical Association, organized in 1901, and for the philosophical journal Athenaeum came principally from the university (…). Together with the rising socialism and the workers’ movement, Huszadik Század and the Society for Social Sciences, coming out of the rising intelligentsia of Budapest’s wealthy middle class, were of great importance for the development of Hungarian social and political studies, the members of the Society for Social Sciences were active in various aspects of political life; they propagandized and fought for universal suffrage, agricultural reform, and minority rights.

The Society for Social Sciences was not on the radical-left politically. In addition to studies of Marxism and socialism, they also published translations of H. Spencer, L. Ward, B. Kidd, K. Kautsky, and G. Ratzenhofer. True, it is clear that “The Society” was not open to reactionary ideas. Both “The Society” and Huszadik Század were financially independent.

Henk E.S. Woldring, Karl Mannheim. The development of his thought [1986], USA, New York, Saint Martin’s Press, p. 10

Concerned individuals

Oszkár Jászi

Polanyi wrote in Huszadik Század

  1. The Drama of Historical Materialism” [1907]
  2. The Scientific Method” [1909]
  3. The Crisis of our Ideologies” [1909 & 1910]