HILFERDING, RUDOLF (1877— ), German states man, was born on Aug. r0, 1877, at Vienna. He took his degree in medicine in Vienna University. In 1907 he joined the staff of Vorwarts in Berlin as political director, and became one of the most important publicists of the social-democratic party. He opposed the decision of the party to vote war credits in 1914, and conducted pacifist propaganda. After the war he acquired German citizenship and then conducted the Freiheit (1918-22) an organ of the majority socialist party, and was one of the most effective opponents of the communists. When, however, the new commun ist party broke off from the independent social democratic party, he became the leader of the independent social democrats and worked for their reunion, accomplished in 1922, with the social democratic party. Dr. Hilferding was one of the German experts at the Genoa conference (April—May 192 2) and from August to October 1923 finance minister in the Stresemann cabinet. Having failed to stop the devaluation of the mark, he had to retire, but remained the financial expert of the social democratic party, until appointed minister of finance in the Muller cabinet of 1928. Hil ferding edited Marx-studien (1904-1922, 4 vols.) and Gesellscha f t (1924 seq.), an international socialist review. His principal single work was Das Finanz Kapital (191o, 2nd ed. 1920).