This previous summer time I joined my son in Vienna. He was there on a fellowship from his senior yr at Carleton School to check structure, particularly the work of Otto Wagner, the Secession motion, and so forth. I had solely been there as soon as earlier than, when backpacking throughout legislation college. I accompanied him on his explorations and we feasted on Viennese delicacies at locations beneficial by native buddies.
I advised that we take time to go to the College of Vienna, in order that I might see the monuments to well-known Austrian economists who had taught there. The foyer highlights Nobel prize winners, together with Friedrich von Hayek; and within the “Colonnade,” or “arcade courtyard” (Arkadenhof, additionally domestically known as the aula), there are dozens of monuments—busts, bas-relief plaques—devoted to famous intellectuals, alumni, and professors from the College. Of explicit curiosity to devotees of Austrian economics, there are monuments to Carl Menger and his two college students Friedrich von Wieser and Eugen von Böhm-Bahwerk, all positioned close to one another within the Arcade Courtyard.
The method to have a monument permitted and funded may be very bureaucratic and might take years. It originates from a request from the faculty the place the professor taught (such because the College of Regulation and Political Science) and is then permitted by the Educational Senate, and apparently is often privately funded. Wieser’s monument took 21 years, for instance, from approval to completion. Menger’s was permitted in 1927 and accomplished and unveiled simply two years later. It seems to have been fast-tracked and a few guidelines waived on account of Menger’s standing:
In 1927, the Educational Senate, following a request from the College of Regulation and Political Science, determined to erect a monument to Carl Menger within the arcades. This resolution was made simply six years after the loss of life of the person to be honored. The ready interval, which had solely just lately been elevated from 5 to 10 years, was exceptionally not noticed in view of Menger’s extraordinary achievements.
The method culminates in a proper unveiling ceremony, which entails
a speech concerning the individual being honored and their companies to science in one of many ceremonial halls, musical accompaniment by the educational choir and the following unveiling of the monument within the arcade courtyard. The monument was usually embellished with flowers.
Hayek has no monument within the Arcade however does have one within the foyer, subsequent to different Nobel Prize successful alumni and professors of the College:
(The creator with the Hayek Nobel Prize monument.)
So the College of Vienna (UV) prominently and proudly options 4 of the nice early Austrian economists. Conspicuously absent, after all, is Ludwig von Mises, arguably the best Austrian economist of all time, who was additionally a professor at UV. His absence is conspicuous, on condition that the College boasts about Mises on its web site, together with the opposite 4: Menger, Wieser, Böhm-Bawerk, and Hayek.
I requested my pal Guido Hülsmann, Mises’s biographer, why Mises could be omitted. He surmised that Mises was too intransigent and never socialist sufficient. That is just like the explanation given by some Misesians as to why the Nobel Prize committee waited till Mises had died, in 1973, earlier than awarding the Nobel Prize in Economics for Mises’s work on enterprise cycle idea to his extra politically acceptable scholar, Hayek.
Nonetheless, I questioned, perhaps sufficient time has handed that the hostility to Mises has waned; in any case UV promotes him on its web site and acknowledges he was discriminated in opposition to for being Jewish—for “racist causes.” I used to be conscious of the Mises bust that had been commissioned by Doug French and Jeff Tucker when Doug was President of the Mises Institute:
I’ve one on my bookshelf. (My new custom-made Texas license plate reads: MISES.) However I questioned what it will take to have a flatter, “bas-relief“ model created, just like these of Menger, Wieser, and Böhm-Bawerk. One which be mounted on a wall as a substitute requiring a pedestal and more room.
After some looking I occurred throughout the work of sculptor Zenos Frudakis, well-known for his “Freedom Sculpture“ in Philadelphia:
He additionally featured a bust of Mises that I had by no means heard of earlier than, commissioned in 2023 for a non-public collector:
Intrigued, I despatched a message inquiring into the fee and feasibility of getting Frudakis put together a bas-relief bust of Mises for final presentation to the College of Vienna. To my shock, his spouse wrote me again expressing his curiosity on this undertaking. As Frudakis is a world-famous sculptor, it will not be low cost, after all.
I introduced this concept to the eye of Guido Hülsmann and Hans Hoppe and some different trusted colleagues, who have been intrigued about the opportunity of having a Mises bust ready and introduced to UV. Even when the undertaking would take some years, we envisioned a ceremony on the college, attended by lots of of Mises followers and students from everywhere in the world, seeing Mises lastly get his rightful due and recognition at his alma mater.
As well as, it appeared that there was a robust risk of some donors prepared to fund the undertaking, and Frudakis was additionally on board. We had two of the world’s main Mises students on board, together with his biographer. The one factor standing in the best way gave the impression to be the forms on the college. We requested our colleague, the famous scholar Rahim Taghizadegan, from Vienna, to inquire into the feasibility of this undertaking.
Sadly, it seems that the college is not going to settle for a Mises bust. Apparently there was an effort final yr by a famous Gödel scholar to have a monument devoted to the well-known mathematician Kurt Gödel positioned within the Arcade, as UV was his alma mater; he printed his well-known “Incompleteness Theorem” as a part of his doctoral research there, which he printed in 1931, shortly after his disseration in 1929. Nevertheless, over a yr of conferences amongst vice-rectors, the college senate, after which the formation of a “joint working group,” UV lastly determined to reject the Gödel monument—or some other new monuments, ever. The Arcade has apparently now grow to be an ossified museum.
The article doesn’t specify the explanations for this resolution—for rejecting a monument for one essentially the most well-known thinkers of the 20th century and certainly one of the crucial notable of all of UV’s college students and professors. Our inquiries led us to conclude that the explanation for UV’s rejection of the Gödel monument, and for closing the Arcade to future monuments, resembling one for Mises, is that UV is now too “woke” to allow extra monuments to useless, white males. Though Mises was Jewish and, as UV acknowledges, was discriminated in opposition to in his profession for for “racist causes,” and he’s the one considered one of their 5 main UV Austrian economics professors/alumni to not have a monument (and the one Jew), that is nonetheless not sufficient. He’s a white male. So, like Gödel: no monument for Mises.
We will most likely anticipate the brand new Arcade “museum” to start out that includes warnings and indicators condemning previous sexism and racism. Possibly some monuments might be eliminated, because the Nazis eliminated Menger’s since he was “categorised as ‘Jewish’ in line with Nazi standards.” Who is aware of. Or perhaps they may begin to enable monuments ultimately, however solely to girls and minorities. As Hans Hoppe identified to me, it’s notable that “the slightly insignificant hard-core socialist girl Marie Jahoda obtained each conceivable honor from the college and the town of Vienna” in addition to a monument from UV in 2016. She, together with another girls, obtained monuments, earlier than UV closed the Arcade Courtyard to additional monuments after the Gödel controversy final yr.
Oh properly. It was value a shot. Mises should be within the UV Arcade, subsequent to Menger and the others. Or perhaps the College of Vienna doesn’t deserve him. Luckily, nobody wants the permission of the College of Vienna to study and revenue from considered one of its brightest stars. It’s their loss.
