Institute for Social Research

In 2012, two books were returned to the Institute for Social Research ("Institut für Sozialforschung", IfS) at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main.

Founded in Frankfurt am Main in 1923, the IfS gained its importance especially under the direction of Max Horkheimer from 1931 on as the center of the Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School. On 13 July 1933, the IfS was declared dissolved and its property confiscated by the Gestapo on the basis of the law on the confiscation of communist property. Horkheimer had already prepared a partial relocation of the Institute to branch offices in Geneva and Paris and finally to Columbia University in New York. In 1951, the Institute returned to Frankfurt am Main.

The French-language stamp in one of the books makes it possible to assign this copy to the libraries in Paris or Geneva, where the IfS was called "Institut de recherches sociales."

After the end of the war, the returned books were transferred to the stock of the Berlin City Library via the salvage site No. 15, a depot of the Reich Main Security Office.