[Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker and the Society of German Scientists]

The Federation of German Scientists (VDW) was founded in 1959 as West-German pendant of the Federation of American Scientists and as West-German group of the Pugwah Conferences. From the beginning, Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker played a leading role in the VDW and pleaded for influencing politicians by scientifically and politically uncontestable studies, in the 1960s mainly of the effects of nuclear war and world food affairs. These studies were conducted by a research institute in Hamburg funded by external funds, industry and banks. It was the nucleus of the "Max Planck Institute for living conditions of the technical-industrial world" founded in Starnberg in 1969. Due to a "super inheritance", the research institute was continued in addition to the Starnberg institute. Young Marxist social scientists published several studies here which the executive board of the VDW disapproved of. Numerous prominent members left the VDW, donations decreased rapidly. In 1975, the research institute was closed down.