Social Threefolding

Social threefolding is a sociological theory that suggests increasing the independence of society's three primary realms (economy, politics and culture) in such a way that those three realms can mutually correct each other in an ongoing process. The movement aims for democracy in political life, freedom in cultural life (art, science, religion, education, the media), and uncoerced associative cooperation in economic life. It originated out of the philosophy of Anthroposophy founded by Rudolf Steiner. Steiner held that it is socially destructive when one of the three spheres attempts to dominate the others; for example, theocracy means a cultural impulse dominates economy and politics; traditional types of capitalism mean economic life dominates the polity and culture; and state socialism means government dominates culture and economy. A more specific example: Arthur Salter, 1st Baron Salter has suggested that governments frequently fail when they begin to give "discretionary, particularly preferential privileges to competitive industry." Steiner said the three social spheres had very gradually, over thousands of years, been growing independent of each other, and would naturally tend to continue to do so. Consciously effecting stages of this independence thus works in accordance with society's natural evolution, and gradually leads society beyond the three forms of domination mentioned.

Many institutions have striven to realize a relative independence of the three spheres within their own structures; the Waldorf schools deserve special mention in this regard. Another application has been the creation of various socially responsible banks and foundations. Though many concrete reform proposals to advance a "threefold social order" at various scales have been advanced, Steiner emphasized that the specifics of how this could best be done are contingent on the particular situation. Bernard Lievegoed incorporated significant aspects of social threefolding in his work on organizational development.