Quadragesimo anno in the context of "Pope Pius XI"

The Fatherland Front (Austrian German: Vaterländische Front, VF) was the right-wing conservative, authoritarian, nationalist, corporatist, and Catholic ruling political organisation of the Federal State of Austria. It claimed to be a nonpartisan movement, and aimed to unite all the people of Austria, overcoming political and social divisions. Established on 20 May 1933 by Christian Social Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss as the only legally permitted party in the country, it was aligned with the Catholic Church, and did not advocate any racial ideology. It advocated Austrian nationalism and independence from Germany on the basis of protecting Austria's Catholic religious identity from what they considered a Protestant-dominated German state.

The Fatherland Front, which was strongly linked with Austria's Catholic clergy, absorbed Dollfuss's Christian Social Party, the agrarian Landbund and the right-wing paramilitary Heimwehren, all of which were opposed to Nazism, Marxism, laissez-faire capitalism and liberal democracy. It established an authoritarian and corporatist regime, the Federal State of Austria, which is commonly known in German as the Ständestaat ("corporate state"). According to the Fatherland Front this form of government and society implemented the social teaching of Pope Pius XI's 1931 encyclical Quadragesimo anno. The Front banned and persecuted all its political opponents, including Communists, Social Democrats—who fought against it in a brief civil war in February 1934—as well as the Austrian Nazis who wanted Austria to join Germany. Chancellor Dollfuss was assassinated by the Nazis in July 1934. He was succeeded as leader of the VF and Chancellor of Austria by Kurt Schuschnigg, who ruled until the invigorated Nazis forced him to resign on 11 March 1938. Austria was annexed by Nazi Germany the next day.

Distributism is an economic theory asserting that the world's productive assets should be widely owned rather than concentrated. Developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, distributism was based upon Catholic social teaching principles, especially those of Pope Leo XIII in his encyclical Rerum novarum (1891) and Pope Pius XI in Quadragesimo anno (1931). It has influenced Anglo Christian Democratic movements, and has been recognized as one of many influences on the social market economy.

Distributism views laissez-faire capitalism and state socialism as equally flawed and exploitative, due to their extreme concentration of ownership. Instead, it favours small independent craftsmen and producers; or, if that is not possible, economic mechanisms such as cooperatives and member-owned mutual organisations, as well as small to medium enterprises and vigorous anti-trust laws to restrain or eliminate overweening economic power. Christian democratic political parties such as the American Solidarity Party have advocated distributism alongside social market economy in their economic policies and party platform.

Rerum novarum, or Rights and Duties of Capital and Labor, is an encyclical issued by Pope Leo XIII on 15 May 1891. It is an open letter, passed to all Catholic patriarchs, primates, archbishops, and bishops, which addressed the condition of the working class. It discusses the relationships and mutual duties between labor and capital, as well as government and its citizens. Of primary concern is the need for poverty amelioration of the working class. It supports the rights of labor to form trade unions, and rejects socialism and laissez-faire capitalism, or unregulated, brutal capitalism, while affirming the right to private property and to a living wage.

A foundational text of modern Catholic social teaching, many of the positions in Rerum novarum are supplemented by later encyclicals, in particular Pius XI's Quadragesimo anno (1931), John XXIII's Mater et magistra (1961), Paul VI's Octogesima adveniens (1971), and John Paul II's Centesimus annus (1991), each of which commemorates an anniversary of the publication of Rerum novarum. It also inspired Catholic activism, and influenced distributists and supporters of corporatism. Socialists generally contest the encyclical's interpretation of socialism, and some socialists, particularly Catholic socialists, interpret Rerum novarum as not rejecting socialism, argue that divine law justifies the abolition of private property, and emphasize its anti-capitalist character.