Leopold Caro

Leopold Caro (1864–1939) was a Polish historical school economist, international sociologist working with Gustav von Schmoller's Verein für Socialpolitik (VfS), and a lawyer. Caro functioned as an advocate for rights of oversea migrants and the establishment of economic cooperatives. Broadly conceived, he was a conservative symphatizer of the Sanation movement in Polish interwar politics, especially of its technocratic wing under Kazimierz Bartel, while he also maintained some contact with Narodowa Demokracja. First and foremost, Leopold Caro acted as a Catholic economist, who had strong ties with the church hierarchy and Catholic institutions. He is largely seen as a proponent of etatism, though he was a vocal critic as well as in-depth researcher of both National socialism and Soviet communism. He was a Jewish convert to Christianity of distant Sephardic origin who became a staunch anti-Semite.