30 J.-A. PEMBERTON
announcement of its withdrawal from the LON in October 1933 on
the ground of the ISC’s institutional connection to the LON.^98 In
any case, it was Berber who invited Toynbee to speak in Hamburg and
it was also Berber who issued—or rather ‘conveyed’—another invita-
tion to Toynbee: an invitation to speak on peaceful change at the Nazi-
controlled German law society, that is, what was called the Akademie
für Deutsches Recht (Academy of German Law).^99 Berber was polit-
ically well connected: in addition to being selected to represent ‘the
Third Reich in intellectual international relations,’ as Toynbee informed
Bonnet in October 1934, he had become by February 1936 the speech-
writer of his patron Joachim von Ribbentrop. It is worth noting in this
context that on June 2, 1935, Ribbentrop, in his capacity as ambassador
at large, arrived in London in order to commence negotiations on the
Anglo-German Naval Agreement which the German leadership hoped
would be a prelude to a special Anglo-German relationship. It is also
worth noting that on June 3, Berber participated in the inaugural meet-
ing at the LSE of the ISC’s 1935 session. It is reasonable to presume
that Berber’s participation in this meeting as well as in the conference’s
subsequent study meetings on collective security had been authorised, at
least in part, on the ground that he had been identified as a useful instru-
ment of the German policy of forging a special Anglo-German relation-
ship. According to a letter sent to Bonnet in October 1936 by Halfdan
Olaus Christophersen, a Norwegian who had been appointed by the ISC
to the role of secretary-rapporteur on colonial questions, Ribbentrop’s
appointment as German ambassador at London in late 1936, would see
Berber make regular trips to England. It should be noted that in his role
as secretary-rapporteur, Christophersen, who, dating from 1936, served
as secretary of the Institut des hautes études internationales in Paris,
was required to consult with members, Berber among them, of the two
German colonial study groups one of which was based in Hamburg, the
other of which was based in Berlin. This consultation was conducted
(^98) Toynbee to Bonnet, 10 October 1934, AG 1-IICI-K-I-1.n, UA; League of Nations,
International Institute of International Cooperation, The International Studies Conference:
Its Origins, Functions, and Organisation (Paris: International Institute of Intellectual
Co-operation, 1937), 44; and Toynbee, Acquaintances, 277.
(^99) Toynbee, Acquaintances, 277. See also Leo Gross to Chalmers Wright, 9 January
1936, Conférence permanente des hautes études internationales: Peaceful Change, janvier-
février 1936, AG-IICI-K-I-15.b, UA, and McNeill, Arnold J. Toynbee: A Life, 171.