50 GERMANY 



has been to modify this principle so far as to 

 place a certain limit to the liability of in- 

 dividuals in the starting of new banks. On the 

 other hand it is claimed on behalf of the 

 Raiffeisen institutions of Germany that there 

 is no instance on record of a member having 

 suffered from the enforcement of the rule in 

 question. It is argued that the existence of 

 such a rule makes the members careful to ad- 

 vance money only to those whom they know to 

 be trustworthy, and it is the very essence of a 

 Raiffeisen bank that it should operate in some 

 village or small town where everybody is known 

 to everybody else. 



A brief experience convinced the pioneers of 

 the Raiffeisen bank movement that it was not 

 sufficient to put an easy credit within the reach 

 of the small cultivator. It was found that he 

 needed guidance in the spending of the money 

 as well. Hence the banks, in addition to re- 

 ceiving deposits and advancing loans, took up 

 the business of ordinary purchasing societies as 

 well — a procedure which excited a certain degree 

 of hostility on the part of the purchasing 

 societies, which, in their turn, started agri- 

 cultural credit banks on their own account. 



Of Raiffeisen banks in Germany affiliated to 

 the central institution at Neuwied there are now 



