Left Communist literature

[La Peur Rouge]

Left Coms (or anyone, really) what works would you consider to be essential left communist literature?

I would like to learn more about it.

[Zanthorus]

I suppose this is somewhat personal opinion, but Pannekoek's World Revolution and Communist Tactics (http://www.marxists.org/archive/pannekoe/tactics/index.htm) is my favourite exposition of the Dutch-German tradition. A lot of other 'Council Communists' in my experience rely heavily on economic determinism and a unilinear view of history, whereas Pannekoek was focusing on ideological hegemony and the problems raised by the spiritual domination of capitalist culture over the working-class long before the highly overrated (And practically counter-revolutionary in his actual politics) Antonio Gramsci. I actualy spent an entire day reading through everything on MIA's Pannkoek archive, except for the full length book on Workers' Councils. Apart from his works on Lenin ('The New Blanquism', 'Lenin as Philosopher' etc), there isn't much from his post 1910 works that I wouldn't reccomend reading.

The other essential Left-Communist theoretician in my view is Amadeo Bordiga. Unfortunately, Bordiga is something of an acquired taste. It is very easy to dismiss him as 'ultra-Leninist', 'more Leninist than Lenin' (I have even seen 'Left-Stalinist') and so on, but this is a very superficial view. I reccomend you start with Loren Goldner's piece on him, Communism is the Material Human Community: Amadeo Bordiga (http://libcom.org/library/communism-is-the-material-human-community-amadeo-bordiga-today). After that you can read The Lyons Theses (http://www.marxists.org/archive/bordiga/works/1926/lyons-theses.htm) and The Communist Left in the Third International (http://www.marxists.org/archive/bordiga/works/1926/comintern.htm).

You'll probably want to check out some of the documents and such put out by the two big Left-Communist orgs out there, the International Communist Current (http://en.internationalism.org/) and the Internationalist Communist Tendency (http://www.leftcom.org/en/). The link in my sig is a library of works by members of the 'Bordigist' tradition, the numerous 'International Communist Parties' and so on. There are some real gems in there such as The myth of «socialist planning» in Russia (http://www.sinistra.net/lib/upt/compro/lipo/lipoebubie.html).

[La Peur Rouge]

Awesome, thanks.

[Amphictyonis]

Awesome, thanks.

Kautsky

http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1903/xx/histmat.htm

And Luxemburg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Accumulation_of_Capital

[Blackscare]

Kautsky is more an Orthodox Marxist than specifically left-com.

[penguinfoot]

Kautsky

http://www.marxists.org/archive/kaut...xx/histmat.htm

Er, no. Also, there's very little sense in which Luxemburg is a Left Communist as the term is normally understood - yes, she had positions on national liberation and imperialism that have influenced the Left Communist tradition and she was certainly on the left of the SPD, but she was an advocate of parliamentary participation in the 1900s, and, because of her early death, it's hard to know how her political positions might have developed had she lived longer. The most important thing anyone should know about her is that her essay on the Russian Revolution was never titled (by her, that is) 'Marxism or Leninism'.

[Amphictyonis]

Kautsky is more an Orthodox Marxist than specifically left-com.

Shameless self promotion. He was 'leftist' early on then became 'centrist'. I consider most orthodox Marxists leftists though....compared to Lenin.

[Amphictyonis]

Er, no.

Don't let your bitterness in the other thread spread to this one. He was left wing early on and became 'centrist'. I was simply pointing this chap in the right direction as far as understanding the materialist conception of history and the accumulation of capital (globalization). Kautsky was in fact 'left wing' at one time. Do some reading.

[penguinfoot]

He was left wing early on and became 'centrist'

Firstly, even if he was on the left wing of the SPD, that doesn't make him a Left Communist. The tradition of Left Communism grew out of the Comintern (I think - it's not my forte) so it's problematic to speak of there being any Left Communists in a meaningful sense in the 1900s and 1910s.

More directly, he wasn't even on the left wing of the SPD. His thought betrays what Colletti has rightly identified as one of the primary features of the Marxism of the Second International and a feature which manifested itself in the thought of thinkers as diverse as Bernstein and Plekhanov, namely, an particular understanding of the concept of the economy and of social relations of production - concepts which, in Marx, were meant to embrace both the production of things and the production of ideas, that is, production and intersubjective communication embodied in a single process, but which, in the hands of the Second International, involved the concept of the economy being turned into “one isolated factor”, separated from other moments and deprived of socio-historical content, such that social production was transformed into production techniques and the materialist conception of history was turned into a technological conception of history. The effect of this conception was a highly problematic understanding of the notion of capitalist breakdown whereby it was assumed that the victory of socialism would come about as a direct consequence of capitalist crisis, rather than being, as in Luxemburg, only one possible consequence of crises that, whilst inevitable in themselves, were just as capable of bringing about renewed barbarism.

Lest it be thought that Kautsky himself was not guilty of this mechanical understanding of history or that this was a feature only of his later thought, we need look no further than his commentary on the Erfurt Programme, the first half of which was written by Kautsky in 1891, as in the commentary, he asserted in simple language that "the erection of a new form of society in place of the existing one is no longer something merely desirable; it has become something inevitable". This is the essence of centrist thinking because it excludes the subjective element in the historical process, that is, revolutionary leadership, and undermines the importance of theory in the revolutionary movement, precisely because socialism is seen only as the final effect of an objective process.

[Blackscare]

Shameless self promotion. He was 'leftist' early on then became 'centrist'. I consider most orthodox Marxists leftists though....compared to Lenin.


Eh, what? Obviously Orthodox Marxists are leftist. Promotion? Of what?


I don't think you understand what Left-Communism is :confused:

[theblackmask]

Can't forget Otto Ruhle.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/ruhle/index.htm

[Amphictyonis]

Eh, what? Obviously Orthodox Marxists are leftist. Promotion? Of what?


I don't think you understand what Left-Communism is :confused:

Promotion of orthodox Marxism.


Kautsky was actually considered 'centrist' later in life. I'm not sure I want to take part in pointless bickering. It is what it is what it is.

[Blackscare]

Promotion of orthodox Marxism.


Kautsky was actually considered 'centrist' later in life. I'm not sure I want to take part in pointless bickering. It is what it is what it is.


Uh, I just corrected you, I'm not promoting shit. You're the one doing the pointless (and confused) bickering.

I'm not even an Orthodox Marxist.

[Amphictyonis]

Uh, I just corrected you, I'm not promoting shit. You're the one doing the pointless (and confused) bickering.

I'm not even an Orthodox Marxist.

Corrected me shorrected me. :tt2: Kautsky was considered 'leftist' early on and 'centrist' later in life.

[penguinfoot]

Corrected me shorrected me. :tt2: Kautsky was considered 'leftist' early on and 'centrist' later in life.

And yet you continue to fail to show what was leftist about Kautsky at any point in his life or how he could ever be relevant for a thread about Left Communism.

[Blackscare]

And yet you continue to fail to show what was leftist about Kautsky at any point in his life or how he could ever be relevant for a thread about Left Communism.


Really depends on how you look at the left. He was certainly brilliant expounding on a mass, broad left party, which is of course totally necessary. Only a fool would ever think that a revolutionary party (not supported by pre-existing states, which no longer exist) just builds a mass support base out of nowhere.

You need a mass party in the begining to forge a worker's movement, then the revolutionaries break off when things come to a head and internal contradictions actually take on real-world consequences.

[penguinfoot]

Really depends on how you look at the left. He was certainly brilliant expounding on a mass, broad left party, which is of course totally necessary

I don't see a "broad left party" as necessary at all, I support a revolutionary party based on the most advanced section of the working class, albeit one that remains in close contact with the class as a whole and establishes a dialectical relationship between itself and working-class struggle. If there was any flaw in Luxemburg's strategic approach it was precisely that she did not split from the SPD during the earlier stages of its bureaucratic and opportunist degeneration. I would also point out that whilst I'm not of the view that the internal factions and political currents were always simple or continuous in the SPD - you cannot, for example, in my view, draw a simple straight line all the way from the revisionist controversy in the late 1890s up to the votes in favour of war credits in 1914, because to do so would ignore the changes undergone by the party during the intervening period in terms of the increasing role of the parliamentary deputies as well as the more obvious fact that Bernstein himself did not support the SPD's stance on the war and joined the USPD along with Luxemburg and Kautsky, even if his opposition was based on bourgeois pacifism rather than a revolutionary position - there were, at the same time, discernible groupings that are important for the purposes of analysis, and of these, there existed a left that was critical of the party's determinism and of its insular attitude, which coexisted with parliamentary reformism, and this left simply did not, in any meaningful way, include Kautsky - it was based around people like Luxemburg, Parvus, and Liebknecht, whose perspectives Kautsky did not share.


Only a fool would ever think that a revolutionary party (not supported by pre-existing states, which no longer exist) just builds a mass support base out of nowhere.

The issue, however, is that Kautsky, like almost the entirety of the SPD, held to a deterministic conception of socialism that ruled out revolutionary leadership, because socialism was seen to be something that would inevitably emerge from economic crises that were themselves the necessary product of capitalism's internal contradictions. So I would question in what sense he was a revolutionary.

[Amphictyonis]

And yet you continue to fail to show what was leftist about Kautsky at any point in his life or how he could ever be relevant for a thread about Left Communism.

Since this is the learning section I may humor you. From around the late 1890's to 1910 he was more left. He was more in line with Luxemburg, Parvus and Plekhanov during that period but then he came out with a 'strategy of attrition' which caused the left to criticize him.

[penguinfoot]

Since this is the learning section I may humor you. From around the late 1890's to 1910 he was more left. He was more in line with Luxemburg, Parvus and Plekhanov during that period but then he came out with a 'strategy of attrition' which caused the left to criticize him.

You might as well say that Bernstein was more left before 1896, just because before that point he hadn't opened the revisionist controversy. That doesn't show that he or Kautsky were actually part of the left wing of the SPD. I would also be wary of lumping Plekhanov and Luxmeburg together or of consider Plekhanov part of the left of the international socialist movement at the time, because Plekhanov (according to Colletti, and I agree) is the foremost example of the mechanical materialism and determinism which characterized the thought of almost all of the leading intellectuals of the SPD as well as the rest of the Second International, including Kautsky, as is clear from his comments on the Erfurt Programme, and you could even go so far as to argue that it was really only Luxemburg who stood out on the question of crisis and revolution and who kept the original meaning of Marx's theory of history alive, because she was almost alone in stressing that revolution is not the only possible outcome of the crises to which capitalism inevitably gives rise, and that the pursuit of socialism as the alternative to barbarism depends on conscious revolutionary organization and leadership of the kind that Kautsky did not support. Once you acknowledge Kautsky's determinism and the extent to which this determinism was a defining characteristic of the Second International, the thesis of a sudden change in Kautsky's political positions becomes less tenable, because his opposition to the Bolshevik revolution was underpinned by a hostility towards political action that can only be seen as the necessary consequence of a belief that socialism will be the eventual and inevitable product of objective economic processes, this belief being one that was always a key part of his politics.

[Amphictyonis]

In the other thread (where your hostility is coming from) you made arguments by assuming things and by putting words in my mouth to the point of useless absurdity. I see this thread going in the same direction. I posted te proper understanding of historical materialism in the thread on revisionism in the theory section. I suggest you read it. I also suggest you take a look at Kautsky's positions 1890's to 1910.

If you can also explain why any of this matters it would be greatly appreciated (his move from left to centrist).

[penguinfoot]

I posted te proper understanding of historical materialism in the thread on revisionism in the theory section. I suggest you read it. I also suggest you take a look at Kautsky's positions 1890's to 1910.

No, you don't understand historical materialism, and that's been shown in the other thread, because no-one who understands historical materialism could believe that capitalism had not exhausted its progressive role by the beginning of the twentieth century, and they would be able to recognize events such as WW1 as symptoms of capitalism's reactionary phase, and as evidence of the historical necessity of socialism. As for this thread, the OP asked for Left-Communist literature. You've pointed to Kautsky, probably because he shared the same deterministic attitude that you do, without explaining how he was ever part of the Left Communist tradition, or how he could be, when the birth of that tradition was partly tied to the October Revolution and its aftermath, and without even explaining how he was part of the left of the SPD.

If you want to specify how Kautsky was left - in the sense of sharing the perspectives of the left wing of the SPD, grouped around Luxemburg - at any point in his political development then go ahead, because you haven't been able to do that yet. Likewise, if you can point to where I've put words in your mouth, I'd be grateful, as all I've done is ask you to defend your description of Kautsky as left - whether that means part of the Communist Left or on the left of the SPD.

[Amphictyonis]

No, you don't understand historical materialism, and that's been shown in the other thread, because no-one who understands historical materialism could believe that capitalism had not exhausted its progressive role by the beginning of the twentieth century, and they would be able to recognize events such as WW1 as symptoms of capitalism's reactionary phase, and as evidence of the necessity of socialism. As for this thread, the OP asked for Left-Communist literature. You've pointed to Kautsky, probably because he shared the same deterministic attitude that you do, without explaining how he was ever part of the Left Communist tradition, or how he could be, when the birth of that tradition was partly tied to the October Revolution and its aftermath, and without even explaining how he was part of the left of the SPD.

If you want to specify how Kautsky was left - in the sense of sharing the perspectives of the left wing of the SPD, grouped around Luxemburg - at any point in his political development then go ahead, because you haven't been able to do that yet.

You seriously believe capitalism had exhausted it productive FORCES in the early 20'th century?

Anyhow here's what I said in the other thread-


KIEV SAID- "why bother with all these revolutionary activities, if the capitalism itself will inevitably lead to socialism? Let's just watch and wait"

That's not my logic. Revolt without a clear understanding of socialism is pointless. Struggle under capitalism may not be the spark that ignites revolt but ideology is key - ideology is what turns revolt into revolution. The working class becomes aware through struggle. Some of you have a nasty habit of putting words in my mouth. :tt2:

Quote me saying revolution is not necessary. Quote me saying struggle isnt key to spreading proper class awareness. Good luck with that.

I never said "the development of productive forces automatically leads to socialism". Quote me saying that. Until then I have no interest in corresponding with such an assumptive person. Next you'll assert I think communism will arise out of a magical Jack In The Box.
Where did Marx/Engels say socialism would form through backwards nations inspiring advanced capitalist nations? That pesky nationalism got in the way of that. The point is to not repeat the mistakes made in the past. Not to fixate ourselves on Lenins path to socialism. I don't have any harsh criticisms for Lenin other than what I've already said, the Russian revolution was premature, not overthrowing the feudal system, but, setting up a "workers state". The means of production and culture (as Marx thought) should have been allowed to advance under true capitalism and Lenin's thought that capitalism had extended it's global productive forces was also wrong. Some patience would have been key. Capitalism was just hitting full stride in his time.

In our modern times we're not going to see global socialism manifest from backwards nations it will take the advanced capitalist nations. It will take nationalism being marginalized while regions that actually produce commodities turn to socialism (China). It's going to take a crisis of the magnitude we have never seen to snap western workers out of the fog we're in at the moment. Western workers won't see socialism take hold in Venezuela then decide to facilitate revolution in the USA. Marx tried to dispel Hegelian idealism of that nature. There will be material causes- most likely sparked by a global capitalist crisis (ie capitalism's productive forces becoming regressive).

If you guys want to place Lenin's ideas above those of Marx/Engels so be it but I think the way forward is to look at Marx/Engels original works and apply them to today's conditions. Perhaps even apply the past works of others in advanced capitalist nations (Germany). There was a reason Marx supported free trade, a reason he wanted capitalism to spread around the globe as quickly as possible. A reason he thought socialism would arise from the advanced capitalist nations. A reason Marx said the bourgeoisie class produces its own “gravediggers”.

It's a fact western workers have appreciated advances in quality of life. Longer life expectancy as well. So long as this keeps going, along with the expansion of the market, I don't see socialism taking hold. I'm not advocating abject material determinism here I'm simply saying our ideology won't be attractive to the masses until they become uncomfortable under capitalism. Marx's crisis theory states the crisis will become worse and worse over time- we're seeing this happen now (declining material conditions). I think this current crisis is a great test for us, I also think we're somewhat dropping the ball (in the USA). Now read this and tell me where I veer from the proper understanding of historical materialism-

http://www.workersliberty.org/system/files/marx-engels-materialism.pdf

[penguinfoot]

You seriously believe capitalism had exhausted it productive FORCES in the early 20'th century?

I've already explained this before, so I'm only going to do it once more, and pay attention this time. No, I did not say that capitalism had exhausted its productive forces in the early twentieth century, and not have I ever said that, which is why I said in my last post that capitalism had exhausted its progressive role, which is not the same as saying it had exhausted its productive forces. I hope this is clear for you. By saying that capitalism had exhausted its progressive role I do not mean that capitalism had brought the growth of the productive forces to a complete stop or that it had resulted in the productive forces going into decline, both because this would be obviously inaccurate as a description of what was happening during the first decades of the twentieth century, and also because there is nothing in Marx's theory of history, be it in the 1859 Preface, The German Ideology, or anywhere else, to indicate that he believed that, when modes of production cease to be progressive, they involve the forces of production being exhausted, in the sense of becoming absolutely stagnant or going into decline, and that they are no longer progressive for this reason. This would be a strange theory for Marx to have, because he was fully aware that feudal societies were still developing at the time of their bourgeois revolutions but that the bourgeois revolutions were still able to triumph and spread capitalism around the world. The concept of progressive and reactionary phases of modes of production, which is expressed in the Preface in terms of fettering, entails that at a given level of the productive forces there exist relations of production that can best utilize and develop those forces, but that, once the forces have developed beyond a certain point, the existing relations are no longer the most effective in those areas, *even whilst they might still allow for development to continue in quantitative terms*, with it being for this reason, because there exists an alternative set of relations that can better utilize and develop the forces, that the existing relations have exhausted themselves and are no longer progressive.

Can you read the starred and italicized section above? This is nothing new, I said the same with the same degree of clarity in my very first post in the other thread.

I hold that this was true in the early twentieth century insofar as socialist relations of production represented the most effective way of developing and utilizing the forces that had been developed under capitalist relations during capitalism's progressive phase. The most obvious manifestation in the early twentieth century of capitalism having entered its reactionary phase was that the forces of production were used for the purpose of mass slaughter, in the form of the armaments race and WW1. I stated in the other thread and I'll state again that you have a very confused understanding of historical materialism because you seem to believe that the forces have to stop developing (and maybe decline) and that there has to be a sudden plummet in living standards - even though crises are a recurrent feature of capitalism throughout its development - in order for capitalism to have exhausted its progressive role, and for revolutions to no longer be premature. This has been confirmed in the post you just quoted in that you describe the moment of revolution as one where "capitalism's productive forces [have become] regressive". We can only assume, on the basis of this, that you think that a revolution today would still be premature, because the productive forces have not become regressive, they are continuing to grow. I don't know how you could ever have gained the impression that this is a sensible theory of history or an accurate reconstruction of Marx's theory.

[Amphictyonis]

I've already explained this before, so I'm only going to do it once more, and pay attention this time. You have no subsistence behind this condescending approach of yours
No, I did not say that capitalism had exhausted its productive forces No kidding, which is why I used all caps. I never said capitalism was still a progressive force as the industrial means of production has been sufficiently developed in the advanced capitalist nations in order to set the stage for the next step- socialism. What we're talking about here is the material pre conditions likely for global revolution. Yes capitalism became inexcusable decades ago. I agree. What I'm talking about is not the same thing you're referring- Productive [email protected]# What do you think I mean when i say this? You need to re read Engels words- http://www.workersliberty.org/system/files/marx-engels-materialism.pdf And my words when I said-
"why bother with all these revolutionary activities, if the capitalism itself will inevitably lead to socialism? Let's just watch and wait" That's not my logic. Revolt (based in material conditions) without a clear understanding of socialism is pointless. Struggle under capitalism may not be the spark that ignites revolt but ideology is key - ideology is what turns revolt into revolution. The working class becomes aware through struggle. Some of you have a nasty habit of putting words in my mouth. Quote me saying revolution is not necessary. Quote me saying struggle isnt key to spreading proper class awareness. Good luck with that. I never said "the development of productive forces automatically leads to socialism". Quote me saying that. Until then I have no interest in corresponding with such an assumptive person. Next you'll assert I think communism will arise out of a magical Jack In The Box. You're being extremely insincere when you accuse me of material (economic) determinism. Why did you think I asked what motivates prisoners in prisons to take over the prison? They're mostly there unjustly, pure ideology could drive them to rightly revolt and escape but they don't. Prisoners riot when material conditions decline. Look at the world as a giant prison. It's unlikely we will overthrow capitalism on pure ideology but socialism canot be attained without ideology....it will simply be material conditions that spark the revolution (until then it's our job to spread ideology via struggle). Revolt sparked by material conditions without ideology is useless, it's revolt not revolution. Only when material conditions worsen (capitalism's productive forces experience great crisis) will the stage most likely be set for revolution in the advanced capitalist nations. This (below) wasnt the last stage of capitalism http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/index.htm Try reading "The New Imperialism" by David Harvey and get back to me. As he said in the book Lenin took imperialism in his time as the death throws of capitalism. This simply wasn't so. I agree with David Harvey when he said it was just the first stage of bourgeois rule.

[Amphictyonis]

From the German Ideology-


(the materialist conception of history) does not explain practice from the idea but explains the formation of ideas from material practice; and accordingly it comes to the conclusion that all forms and products of consciousness cannot be dissolved by mental criticism, by resolution into “self-consciousness” or transformation into “apparitions,” “spectres,” “fancies,” etc. but only by the practical overthrow of the actual social relations which gave rise to this idealistic humbug; that not criticism but revolution is the driving force of history, also of religion, of philosophy and all other types of theory........It shows that circumstances make men just as much as men make circumstances



What do you think Marx meant by that?

[Amphictyonis]

The expansion of PRODUCTIVE FORCES-

XyqLjNHUaRM

So long as that is happening this isnt-


u5kU0zcbYlY

Deal with it.

[Devrim]

I am not sure where this argument is coming from you two, but this is a 'learning' about 'left communist literature'. Could you take it back where it came from please.

Kautsky is of, of course, nothing to do with the communist left.


I suppose this is somewhat personal opinion, but Pannekoek's World Revolution and Communist Tactics (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/pannekoe/tactics/index.htm) is my favourite exposition of the Dutch-German tradition.

My personal favourite from this historical period in the German/Dutch tradition. 'Open Letter to Comrade Lenin' (http://www.marxists.org/archive/gorter/1920/open-letter/index.htm) is as good a start as any.


I actualy spent an entire day reading through everything on MIA's Pannkoek archive, except for the full length book on Workers' Councils.

I have read this book. It was written just after the war, and is a very different Pannekoek than the 1920s one you refer to above.

Devrim

[Amphictyonis]

I am not sure where this argument is coming from you two, but this is a 'learning' about 'left communist literature'. Could you take it back where it came from please.

Kautsky is of, of course, nothing to do with the communist left.


http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/lwc/

Tell that to Lenin's ghost :)

And ya, I'd rather not have this discussion with the Penguin (concerning historical materialism) at all but if we must the other thread should be the place. I agree.

[Devrim]

[/URL]And ya, I'd rather not have this discussion with the Penguin (concerning historical materialism) at all

Don't then. He is not going to keep responding if you don't. It is not always essential to have the last word.


but if we must the other thread should be the place. I agree.

Yes, please.


[URL]http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/lwc/ (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/lwc/)

Tell that to Lenin's ghost :)

This is on topic though.

I think that if you think Lenin is criticising Kautsky as a left communist then you have seriously misunderstood the text. Which specific bits are you referring to? I can try to explain them for you.

To a certain extent the foundations of the German communist left are very much defined by opposition to Kautsky, particularly 'Theory and Practice' (http://http://www.marxists.org/archive/luxemburg/1910/theory-practice).
Kautsky was condemned by Lenin as a renegade in 'The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky' (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/oct/10.htm). It was not for being a left communist though.

Possibly the confusion comes from Kautsky being described as on the left, but it is the left wing of the Second International whereas the left communists were the left wing of the third.

Devrim

[penguinfoot]

I never said capitalism was still a progressive force as the industrial means of production has been sufficiently developed in the advanced capitalist nations in order to set the stage for the next step- socialism

I'm not that interested in continuing this discussion, all I'll say is that you seem very confused over concepts like the forces of production, relations of production, prematurity, fettering, and material conditions, and that you haven't yet given any clear articulation of how or why the Russian Revolution was premature, especially if you believe that capitalism was no longer progressive by 1917. I mean, how can a revolution directed against the exiting relations of production be premature in a historic sense if those relations have ceased to be progressive? How can you assert at one point that capitalism was no longer progressive only to claim in the first place that revolution cannot happen whilst the productive forces are still expanding? There is nothing but ambiguity and mystification here.

[Ravachol]

I take it you're not only referring to the Dutch/Italian (Bordigist) tradition of left communism so I'd recommend the following as well (apart from the obvious Libertarian/Anarcho-Communist literature):

The eclipse and re-emergence of the Communist movement (http://www.prole.info/pamphlets/eclipse.pdf) - Gilles Dauve

Concerning Operaismo and Autonomism:

From Operaismo to Autonomist Marxism (http://www.prole.info/pamphlets/automarx.pdf) - Aufheben

Books for Burning - Antonio Negri
Storming Heaven - Steve Wright

Concerning Situationism:

Society of The Spectacle - Guy Debord

Making sense of the situationists (http://www.prole.info/pamphlets/situationistsabout.pdf)

Concerning the (mainly French) 'Ultra-Gauche' tradition:

This is not a program (http://zinelibrary.info/files/tinap_imposed_1.pdf) - Tiqqun

Introduction to Civil War (http://zinelibrary.info/files/introcivil_read.pdf) - Tiqqun

Nihilist Communism (http://libcom.org/library/nihilist-communism-monsieur-dupont) - Monsieur Dupont

[Widerstand]

I take it you're not only referring to the Dutch/Italian (Bordigist) tradition of left communism so I'd recommend the following as well (apart from the obvious Libertarian/Anarcho-Communist literature):

The eclipse and re-emergence of the Communist movement (http://www.prole.info/pamphlets/eclipse.pdf) - Gilles Dauve

Concerning Operaismo and Autonomism:

From Operaismo to Autonomist Marxism (http://www.prole.info/pamphlets/automarx.pdf) - Aufheben

Books for Burning - Antonio Negri
Storming Heaven - Steve Wright

Shouldn't the major work of post-operaismo, Negri and Hardt's Empire also be listed?



Concerning Situationism:

Society of The Spectacle - Guy Debord

Making sense of the situationists (http://www.prole.info/pamphlets/situationistsabout.pdf)

Society of the Spectacle can be read here: http://theanarchistlibrary.org/HTML/Guy_Debord__The_Society_of_the_Spectacle.html

I also found "The Revolution Of Everyday Life" an interesting read: http://theanarchistlibrary.org/HTML/Raoul_Vaneigem__The_Revolution_of_Everyday_Life.ht ml

Overall I find it interesting that you declare Situationism and Operaismo as Left Communism. I've never seen that connection made before.

[Ravachol]

Shouldn't the major work of post-operaismo, Negri and Hardt's Empire also be listed?


Well, while I enjoyed Empire to a certain degree I've come to reject it's politics. They're, if one reads past the terminology, solidly reformist and a complete departure from Autonomist politics.

Basically the premise of Negri/Hardt's post-operaist politics goes as follows:

- Desire is prior to power/Labour is prior to Capital. (classical Operaist thesis, I agree to a certain degree)

- Power's reactive nature means it has to adapt to Desire's movements.

- It thus follows that resistance can mold and shape Capital and it's structures.

- Thus we can influence Capital's structures through our forms of resistance.

Effectively, this is reformism in it's purest sense. The problem is that while power is indeed reactive and adaptive to our resistance it is only so in order to encapsulate it and contain, manage and surpress it better. The very nature of the structures, it's core, it's essence is the problem, not this or that form.

A good Insurrectionary critique (which ought to resonate with just about every Anarchist) by 'Chrisso & Odotheo' can be found here (http://www.insurgentdesire.org.uk/barbarians.htm).

An alternative departure from post-operaismo is possible, there have been mergers between classical Anarcho-Syndicalist theories and Post-operaist practice (as described in the text I linked and here (libcom.org/library/lessons-defeat-antonio-negri-autonomist-marxism-anarcho-syndicalism-seventies-italy-toda).

Also, the "Ultra-Gauche" and Insurrectionary Anarchism have their roots in Post-Autonomist theory and practice, both developing in their particular directions. Both have interesting insights to offer, especially the "Ultra-Gauche" notion of the "War Machine":



“On Deleuze’s side, this axiom is that desire is active and power is reactive. Or rather, with respect to power, “La résistence est première”. Resistance is temporally and ontologically prior to power.”[1]
They would further argue that, following Italian Operaismo or autonomist Marxism, this is also the case in Marx. That is to say that, the labor is always the active, creative producing force in Marx, whereas the capital is reactive and dependent on the labor. This is one of the central ideas in Hardt & Negri’s Multitude vs. Empire. Here again, it is not Empire vs. Multitude simply because Empire is the passive, reactive, dependent part. All the desire, creativity and production are located in Multitude- which is the new working class according to them. There can be no Capital without the proletariat, but proletariat can exist without the Capital. Therefore, it is not that Empire is exploiting the Multitude and Multitude is developing strategies for escaping from the Empire. It is actually the opposite: by the very fact of their becoming, Multitude creates new forms of resistance, and Empire tries to adjust itself in order to capture these new becomings.
Now it seems quite fascinating to see how our traditional ways of thinking about resistance and power is that pessimistic and how we accepted our defeat so easily. Marx saw this pessimism long ago and asked: “Hey! You produce, so why are you chained?’. Although, some may argue that Marx’s concept of ‘production’ is not limited to the ‘material production of commodities’, most of his analysis was actually based on material production and how bourgeoisie exploits this production. It is in this sense that, we need to move from Marx to Deleuze and revise Marx’s question: “Hey! You produce the whole life, so why are you chained?’ Here production refers to all activities that produce the social life; material production, immaterial production, desire, affects, linguistic, communicational activities, in sum: the life itself.[2] Desire! Deleuze & Guattari would say, we are desiring machines and we form connections with the others in an open way. Before there is any order, purpose or end, there is desire and machinic connections. Once again: resistance precedes the power.
What is the State, therefore? The State is the apparatus that organizes and facilitates the exploitation of the worker by the Capital. This definition seems quite Marxist at first instance. However, just like the limitedness of the concept of production in Marx, the concept of State is also limited. If the production extends beyond the walls of factory and begins to cover the whole life in the contemporary societies[3], then the State would also develop new strategies to capture and organize this production. In other words, the State diffuses into society. In a similar vein, Foucault would term this process as the ‘governmentalisation of the state’.[4] It is in this sense that political power is not located in the State. The State is no longer a centralized apparatus of rule, rather it is diffused to the whole society and particularly to the subjects. Politics-ethics-aesthetics are inseparable from each other. How we conduct ourselves (i.e. ethics) has a certain aesthetic significance which is always political.
Finally, we can ask this question: What is the war machine? In Thousand Plateaus, Deleuze & Guattari says: “As for the war machine in itself, it seems to be irreducible to the State apparatus, to be outside its sovereignty and prior to its law” (TP: 352). War machine is the creative force outside of the State: “The war machine is of another species, another nature, another origin than the State apparatus” (Ibid).
It is in this sense that war machine precedes State, just like the labor precedes the Capital. It is the creative force while the State is the reactive/passive apparatus. We have already discussed how State reacts against the war machine today: through diffusing into the society; into the inner strata of the individuals and their way of being. However, it is always the war machine that creates the whole trouble for the State. Before State diffusing into society and into the individuals, the individuals were already using war machines as tools of resistance. If political power is not only about the power of the central State, than everything can be war machines.


While I have my criticisms regarding desire being prior or even the actual 'content' of desire and the possibility of an already-existing 'exterior' to Capital (which I don't think there is, it can only be broken open through a seccession, a rip in the biopolitical tissue) I think this is a nice summation of the ideas that emerged from Post-Autonomism.




Overall I find it interesting that you declare Situationism and Operaismo as Left Communism. I've never seen that connection made before.

Well for one thing, Wikipedia does this :p But if we consider 'Left Communism' to be everything to 'the left' of Leninism Situationism and Autonomism are surely 'Left Communism'. To what degree "Ultra-Gauche" and other tendencies being closer to anarchism than to Marxism are even 'leftist' (not meant as an insult) is debatable.

[Devrim]

Well for one thing, Wikipedia does this :p But if we consider 'Left Communism' to be everything to 'the left' of Leninism Situationism and Autonomism are surely 'Left Communism'. To what degree "Ultra-Gauche" and other tendencies being closer to anarchism than to Marxism are even 'leftist' (not meant as an insult) is debatable.

I just looked at the Wikipedia page on Left Communism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left_communism) and it doesn't. Left communism really is the trends in the political tradition of the German, and/or Italian left.

Left communism is not "everything to the left of Leninism", but a distinct political current. Of the people you list, I think really only Giles Dauve would fit in, but then his roots are in the Italian left.

Devrim

[Ravachol]

I just looked at the Wikipedia page on Left Communism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left_communism) and it doesn't. Left communism really is the trends in the political tradition of the German, and/or Italian left.

Left communism is not "everything to the left of Leninism", but a distinct political current. Of the people you list, I think really only Giles Dauve would fit in, but then his roots are in the Italian left.

Devrim

True. On the other hand, the Situationist's roots are in Dutch/German Council Communism (through 'Socialisme ou Barbari' which was influenced by both Dutch/German council communism and contained many ex-Bordigists).

Operaismo and the subsequent Italian Autonomism have their roots in a 'workerist' re-interpretation of Leninism.

While obviously different from the Left Communism of the ICC, the roots of both Autonomism and Situationism lie in the Dutch/German & Italian communist left.

[Devrim]

True. On the other hand, the Situationist's roots are in Dutch/German Council Communism (through 'Socialisme ou Barbari' which was influenced by both Dutch/German council communism and contained many ex-Bordigists).

Operaismo and the subsequent Italian Autonomism have their roots in a 'workerist' re-interpretation of Leninism.

While obviously different from the Left Communism of the ICC, the roots of both Autonomism and Situationism lie in the Dutch/German & Italian communist left.

SouB did discuss with remerents of the German/Dutch left (Pannekoek wrote them two letters), and did as you say had a point when a small group of ex-Bordigists joined. However, the political roots lie in the crisis of Trotskyism after the Second World War, and specifically in the French section of the Fourth International:


The changed situation also led to intense debates within the international Trotskyist movement, especially about Eastern Europe. It is unnecessary to enter into the niceties of this discussion; it seems sufficient to note that there were minorities in a number of countries who refused to regard the Soviet Union as a 'transitional society' between capitalism and socialism, as had Trotsky. These minorities considered both East and West to have equally reprehensible systems of exploitation and repression. In the United States such a view was defended by a group known as the Johnson-Forest Tendency. Johnson was the pseudonym of the black revolutionary C.L.R. James, Forest the cover identity of
Rae Spiegel (Raya Dunayevskaya), a former secretary of Trotsky. In Great Britain the opposition inside the Trotskyist movement was led by Ygael Gluckstein from Palestine, who operated under the name of Tony Cliff. In France it was Castoriadis and Lefort in their Chaulieu-Montal Tendency who voiced the opposition to the old viewpoints. All these opponents left the international Trotskyist organization, the Fourth International, between 1948 and 1951 in order to set up independent groups. They were to maintain regular contacts with each other. Castoriadis and Dunayevskaya were still working together in the Sixties. (11)
In August 1946 Castoriadis and Lefort published 0n the Regime and Against the Defence of the USSR, in which they criticized the Trotskyist critical-positive evaluation of the Soviet Union. They especially opposed the idea that Stalinist society - despite the shortcomings also admitted by the Trotskists (specifically the lack of any democracy)- should have to be defended against capitalism.
Castoriadis and Lefort proposed that a new elite, a "social layer" of bureaucrats, had achieved power in the USSR and that this elite exclusively defended its own interests rather than those of the Soviet workers. For this reason the Soviet Union was a new kind of society, which scrove for expansion just as much as Western capitalism.(12)
In a later stage Castoriadis and Lefort abandoned the characterization of the Soviet Union as a new type of society and described it as 'bureaucratic capitalism.' According to them this was a society based on exploitation, without the classic laws of competitive capitalism but with the surplus value formation typical of capitalism.
Numerous articles were written by the opposition to convince their Trotskyist party comrades." When this failed and the Chaulieu-Montal Tendency seemed doomed to remain a small minority within a movement that was itself quite tiny," the dissidents decided to break with the Fourth International. At the end of 1948 ten or twenty of them left the organization. (15) In March 1949 the group published the first issue of the magazine Socialisme ou Barbarie - a well-made periodical of one hundred pages or more. The reasons for leaving the Fourth International were once again explained in an open letter to the members of the Fourth International who had been left behind. Trotskyism was reproached for being a movement without political-theoretical power because it was incapable of finding an "independent ideological basis for existence." Trotskyism could not truly liberate itself from Stalinism, because it continued to define itself as the opposite of Stalinism.


SouB went on to reject Marxism, which again would certainly place them outside of the communist left in any case.

Nor do the roots of Italian autonomism lie in the communist left. I think really you are just making a big bag of very different currents.

Devrim

[La Peur Rouge]

Thanks for the replies and recommendations, comrades. I've finished World Revolution and Communist Tactics, Open Letter to Comrade Lenin, and some stuff by the ICC so far. Hoping to look into Bordiga and some more Pannekoek today.

[Revolution starts with U]

Don't then. He is not going to keep responding if you don't. It is not always essential to have the last word.



That's crazy talk. Lock him up in the loony bin! :laugh:
;)

[ed miliband]

I've had Jan Appel recommended to me a number of times: http://libcom.org/tags/jan-appel

[Zanthorus]

The most important thing anyone should know about her is that her essay on the Russian Revolution was never titled (by her, that is) 'Marxism or Leninism'.

The most important thing about Luxemburg's essays on the Russian revolution is that she didn't publish them herself, they were only published as a single work after her death by Paul Levi. I think you are referring to 'Organisational Questions of the Russian Social-Democracy', since that was the one that was titled 'Leninism or Marxism' by Ann Arbour paperbacks. The most ironic thing about that work is that she counterposes the action of the Rostov-on-don workers to Lenin's apparently stifling centralism, but the Iskra articles she got here information from were written by Lenin himself. In fact, there is no evidence that Luxemburg ever read Lenin's 'One Step Forward, Two Steps Back'. Since we know that Lenin never really advocated the dictatorial centralism ascribed to him by Luxemburg, and Lenin himself wrote a reply pointing out that Luxemburg's 'critique' was stuffed full of straw, it's more than likely that Luxemburg got her knowledge of Lenin's views from pieces by the Mensheviks, who were in vogue with the SPD leadership at the time and would've had their articles published in Vorwarts and such.

Luxemburg's pamphlet usually isn't read carefully anyway. Most people come in with a preconcieved view of Luxemburg as a 'libertarian', and that's all they ever get out of her work. But if you actually pay attention to what she was saying, she was for centralised parties in Western Europe, and even advocated a greater degree of centralisation within the SPD of the time to counteract the influence of petty-bourgeois strata in the movement. Her opposition to Lenin's centralism was an opposition to such centralism in Russia, because she thought that the upcoming Russian revolution would be a classical 'bourgeois' revolution, and that opportunism would come in the form of a quasi-robesperrian bourgeois radical who would subject the workers to the interets of the capitalist class. Lenin thought on the contrary that the bourgeoisie was only willing to make timid proposals for tacking a constituent assembly onto Tsarism, and that it would have to be an alliance of the working-class and peasantry which brought the democratic revolution 'to the end', installing a revolutionary provisional government which would realise the whole of the RSDLP minimum programme. He saw opportunism as coming from an adaptation of the socialist movement to the Tsarist autocracy, in a similar manner to Lassalle's attempts to partner with Bismarck, and the main impetus behind much of his work in the pre-1914 period was fighting the economist trends which refused to make demands for radical political reform. Whatever you think of the whole permanent revolution vs Revolutionary-Democratic dictatorship issue, it's clear that Lenin was always closer to the mark than Luxemburg (Until after 1905 of course, when Luxemburg came to see the working-class as the main force for revolutionary social change in Russia along with Lenin, and even defended him against Plekhanov's accusations of 'Blanquism').


He was 'leftist' early on then became 'centrist'. I consider most orthodox Marxists leftists though....compared to Lenin.

'Left-Communism' has nothing to do with 'leftism', it is a historical tradition descending from the left-wing of the Third International.


I was simply pointing this chap in the right direction as far as understanding the materialist conception of history and the accumulation of capital (globalization).

This thread has nothing to do with the materialist conception of history or the accumulation of capital, it is about Left-Communism. Your posts are off-topic and border on trolling.


I have read this book. It was written just after the war, and is a very different Pannekoek than the 1920s one you refer to above.

I think there is a definite continuity between the two. Read Pannekoek's evaluation of the Russian revolution in Workers' Councils, for example. He does not fall for the idea which was characteristic of the 'Councillist' degeneration of the Dutch-German tradition of calling the revolution a simple bourgeois revolution. He maintains that it was a workers' and peasants' revolution with the working-class represented by the Bolshevik party. A lot of Councillists of the period also accepted some form of the theory that capitalism was collapsing, whereas Pannekoek explicitly rejected any and all ideas about the 'final crisis', and continually placed the emphasis on the conscious overthrow of capitalism by the working-class.


I take it you're not only referring to the Dutch/Italian (Bordigist) tradition of left communism

I don't think there is any other tradition of Left-Communism besides these two and the synthesis advocated by the ICC and ICT. Apart from Dauve, none of the works mentioned have anything to do with the tradition that descended from the most revolutionary elements of the Communist International.


But if we consider 'Left Communism' to be everything to 'the left' of Leninism

This is an idiosyncratic definition. It would put Ottorino Perrone, Onorato Damen, Amadeo Bordiga, and in fact all of the Italian Left outside of 'Left-Communism', since they were all 'Leninists'.


While obviously different from the Left Communism of the ICC, the roots of both Autonomism and Situationism lie in the Dutch/German & Italian communist left.

They may have links to the twilight phase of the Dutch-German Left, but I think that the pure 'Councillism' which was propagated after the collapse of the KAPD was a departure from Left-Communism. Left-Communists are for the party.

[Agnapostate]

Affirming some of the previous recommendations, Herman Gorter's Open Letter to Comrade Lenin (http://www.marxists.org/archive/gorter/1920/open-letter/index.htm) is a response to Lenin's Left Wing Communism: An Infantile Disorder. There are a couple of Pannekoek archives here (http://libcom.org/tags/anton-pannekoek) and here (http://www.marxists.org/archive/pannekoe/index.htm).

[Alf]

Did anyone mention the ICC's series of books on the history of the communist left - particular volumes on the Italian, Dutch-German, Russian and British left communist traditions? I would argue that these are indispensable if we want to understand this tradition. They can be bought here:http://en.internationalism.org/pamphlets, but some selections can be found on our site. The Russian communist left book contains both articles written about this tradition by the ICC and others and original texts from its different currents - the 1918 Left Communists, the Workers Opposition, Sapranov and the 'Decists' and the tendency around Miasnikov

[Ravachol]

Nor do the roots of Italian autonomism lie in the communist left. I think really you are just making a big bag of very different currents.
Devrim

Well, perhaps I'm indeed lumping together very different currents but the fact that Autonomist groups such as Lotta Continua and Potere Operaio drew upon the work from SoB as well as the fact that (if recall correctly) the 'Quaderni Rossi' notebooks at times referred to Councilist works implies at least some intellectual kinship.

[Amphictyonis]

This is on topic though.

I think that if you think Lenin is criticising Kautsky as a left communist then you have seriously misunderstood the text. Which specific bits are you referring to? I can try to explain them for you.

To a certain extent the foundations of the German communist left are very much defined by opposition to Kautsky, particularly 'Theory and Practice' (http://http://www.marxists.org/archive/luxemburg/1910/theory-practice).
Kautsky was condemned by Lenin as a renegade in 'The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky' (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/oct/10.htm). It was not for being a left communist though.

Possibly the confusion comes from Kautsky being described as on the left, but it is the left wing of the Second International whereas the left communists were the left wing of the third.

Devrim
As I admitted earlier in the thread I'm partial towards orthodox Marxism but you must realize Kautsky and Luxemburg were close, lived in the same town at one time and spoke quite often and his positions from the late 1800's to about 1910 were basically what would form the future left communist position. Late Kautsky is completley irrelevant in a discussion concerning left communism but much of the later criticism of the Bolsheviks anti democratic policies came from him. I think Luxemburg is the proper 'strain' of Marxism coming from Marx to Kautsy to Luxemburg. I'll make no secret of this. We in the west shouldn't pay much attention to the Russian path to so called socialism (in my opinion).

[Amphictyonis]

And Zathorus will be posting next to "debunk" Luxemburg.

[Amphictyonis]

If you're ignorant of Kautsky/Luxemburgs almost ten year intellectual partnership it's not my fault. Bankrupt rubbish? What specifically? The only position of mine you've attacked is my agreement with Marx that capitalism will decline, one Bernstein attacked. Do you agree with Bernstein? I agreed with Marx when Marx advocated free trade to end capitalism faster. Something Bernstein disagreed with. Of course I don't strictly adhere to any sect, the "insult" you left on my page was, well, silly. When I fisrst joined RevLeft I had Luxemburgism as my tendency- you then, for some reason, felt the need to "debunk" Luxemburgism at which point I told you I don't really care (I told you then I was a mixture of Orthodox and left communist). Anyhow, get to whatever point you have.

My basic points in many of the threads I post in has been we shouldn't look at the Russian situation as a map to socialism in advanced capitalist nations and we're probably not going to see a successful revoloution until the imminent decline of capitalism (material conditions) Marx predicted. If this angers you I'm sorry.

[Devrim]

Well, perhaps I'm indeed lumping together very different currents but the fact that Autonomist groups such as Lotta Continua and Potere Operaio drew upon the work from SoB as well as the fact that (if recall correctly) the 'Quaderni Rossi' notebooks at times referred to Councilist works implies at least some intellectual kinship.

Well what you are saying here is that the Autonomists drew on a group that wasn't left communist, which came out of Trotskyism and then abandoned Marxism. Also the 'councilism' in Quaderni Ross was not 'German/Dutch' councilism, but 'Italian councilist' ideas, basically those around Gramsci's L'Ordine Nuovo, which were very different from those of the left communists. It is a very tenuous link.

Devrim

[Devrim]

As I admitted earlier in the thread I'm partial towards orthodox Marxism but you must realize Kautsky and Luxemburg were close, lived in the same town at one time and spoke quite often and his positions from the late 1800's to about 1910 were basically what would form the future left communist position. Late Kautsky is completley irrelevant in a discussion concerning left communism but much of the later criticism of the Bolsheviks anti democratic policies came from him. I think Luxemburg is the proper 'strain' of Marxism coming from Marx to Kautsy to Luxemburg. I'll make no secret of this. We in the west shouldn't pay much attention to the Russian path to so called socialism (in my opinion).

I don't think that the fact that Luxemburg and Kautsky were close before 1910 is that relevant. One of the things that defined the left current in Germany was its struggle against the ideas of Kautsky. The reason that Luxemburg broke with Kautsky is the same as the reason for the split in the international.

It was a period when an epoch was closing and another one was dawning. Europe was drawing towards war, and in 1905 in Russia, perhaps in 1903 in Holland even, the working class has formed its own organs of struggle, the Soviets. It was these real events that caused the split between what was to become the communist left and Kautsky. The ideas that formed the theoretical basis of the communist left were new ones developed to understand the changing situation, completely opposed to Kautsky's conceptions.

Devrim

[Devrim]

You have brought up both of these points before aboutLuxemborg and Lenin, and I don't really see what you are trying to demonstrate with them:


The most ironic thing about that work is that she counterposes the action of the Rostov-on-don workers to Lenin's apparently stifling centralism, but the Iskra articles she got here information from were written by Lenin himself.

So what? I have got information about strike in Lebanon from the Hezbollah press. I can't really see what you draw from this.


In fact, there is no evidence that Luxemburg ever read Lenin's 'One Step Forward, Two Steps Back'.

I would imagine that she had. It was an important piece by a Lenin and I would presume that she had read it unless there was any information to make me think otherwise.


I think there is a definite continuity between the two. Read Pannekoek's evaluation of the Russian revolution in Workers' Councils, for example. He does not fall for the idea which was characteristic of the 'Councillist' degeneration of the Dutch-German tradition of calling the revolution a simple bourgeois revolution. He maintains that it was a workers' and peasants' revolution with the working-class represented by the Bolshevik party. A lot of Councillists of the period also accepted some form of the theory that capitalism was collapsing, whereas Pannekoek explicitly rejected any and all ideas about the 'final crisis', and continually placed the emphasis on the conscious overthrow of capitalism by the working-class.

I read it a very long time ago. There are of course similarities, but his view on the party question has certainly changed.


I don't think there is any other tradition of Left-Communism besides these two and the synthesis advocated by the ICC and ICT. Apart from Dauve, none of the works mentioned have anything to do with the tradition that descended from the most revolutionary elements of the Communist International.

They may have links to the twilight phase of the Dutch-German Left, but I think that the pure 'Councillism' which was propagated after the collapse of the KAPD was a departure from Left-Communism. Left-Communists are for the party.

Here I think that you are basically right. The three currents of the communist left are 'councilism, Bordigism, and the synthesis which came from Bilan.

Devrim

[Jock]

Here I think that you are basically right. The three currents of the communist left are 'councilism, Bordigism, and the synthesis which came from Bilan.

Devrim

Devrim and Zanthorus thanks for your posts (but I have not worked out how to do that yet). Careful though Devrim, I don't think that the ICT would say it came from any of the three trends you posed above since Onorato Damen was not in Bilan, had no contact with Bordiga after 1926(although some "Bordigist" texts such as the Platform of the Committee of Intesa (1925) were written by him). After 1945 Bordiga did not join the Internationalist Communist Party formally (although he wrote for its papers) and had been away from politics for nearly 20 years. He at first advised Italian Left Communists to join the newly formed Italian Communist Party of Togliatti (presumably as some sort of internal opposition) but this showed how out of touch he was and he quickly changed his mind. Current orthodox Bordigism begins really in 1948-52 when (the post war strike wave now over) Bordiga now had a rethink and rejected the five major points on which Damen had founded the PCInt in clandestinity in 1943. Damen's original nucleus (which included Stefanini) were all those who had survived fascist prisons and had little or no connection with Bilan. The Bilan people came back to Italy in 1945 bringing with them their own divisions (as over the career of Vercesi who was to once again side with Bordiga in 1951).

On the literature front, Paul Mattick's "Marx and Keynes" (alkthough a bit repetitive as it was a series of articles written at different times) did a fine job of asserting the validity of Marxist economics all throughout the 1950s and 1960s boom (which he predicted would not last) so it deserves a place on the list I think.

[Joyce]

Speaking - or writing- as a 'left communist' the problem with the term is it implies we are simply to the left of Stalinism when in fact we are on a different spectrum - which is simply communism. So the best reading list for left communism would in fact be one that started with Marx and Engels and 'classical' texts but then you need to read whatever you pick up in a historical context of the decline and defeat of the Russian Revolution and the wider revolutionary wave in the rest of the world. So, for example, Lenin's April Theses are as important for us as anyone but we don't think everything he wrote - for example on the national question or his views on supporting the Labour Party in 'Left Wing Communism' is valid. There are tendencies within today's so-called left communism – broadly between the Italian and German Left tradition. Within the Italian Left – which undoubtedly must historically always be associated with the period of Bordiga's leadership of the PCI until his imprisonment in 1923 and replacement with Gramsci who followed the behest of Moscow to 'bolshevise' the Party — the Internationalist Communist Tendency (ICT)is distinct from the various Bordigist groups since they all ultimately derive from Bordiga's break with the PCInt (Internationalist Communist Party – Battaglia Comunista). The PCInt was formed in 1943 with a platform based on the lessons of the period of counter-revolution and imperialist world war – i.e. that Russia was not socialist but state capitalist, imperialist; the trades unions were no longer weapons for the working class; the need for a new internationalist party but at the same time recognising that this cannot be formed merely by an effort of will whatever the situation. Bordiga came back from over a decade of political inactivity (unlike the founders of the PCInt who had remained politically active either in exile (producing Bilan in France, Prometeo in Belgium) or in danger of arrest or else under arrest (Damen) inside Mussolini's Italy.) to work with the PCInt but left over Russia (he thought it was something other than state capitalist, work inside the unions – which he though was still possible while Battaglia were creating factory groups inside workplaces outside the t. union frame) and over the question of the party which he gradually elaborated to be the class (the famous dictum that the working class does not exist without its party)...

There is no single individual writer or theoretician to recommend (although there are those who are trying to turn the ICT into a Damenist organisation) but a long tradition of continuous political work and writings (at least the Italians have). The CWO which started 'left communist' political life in 1975 sympathising with the German Left (KPD)more than the Italian eventually came to realise the inadequacies of the German Left view of political organisation and joined forces with Battaglia Comunista (PCInt) to form the nucleus of what is now an international tendency –including a group in Canada and, if you were interested enough, a comrade in the US (who, by the way, is well informed about Bordiga and the Italian Left.)

We have precious little in English that is still in print (e.g. waiting for reprint of our pamphlet on the Committee of Intesa, the first response of the Italian Left to the Bolshevisation of the PCI), but you could look at the ICT (or leftcom) website, would get you there) for example at the article on Bordiga's last stand inside the International (Internationalist Communist no.22 or even a short commemoration of the death of Onorato Damen which might give you an idea of the Italian Left is far from just Bordigism. (Of course, if you read Italian there is much more).

This has turned into an essay but the gist is – discovering left communism means finding out about how communist ideas have survived and developed as real political currents in today's world.

[Devrim]

Welcome Jock and Joyce. It is nice to have the ICT on here.


Devrim and Zanthorus thanks for your posts (but I have not worked out how to do that yet).

Click 'Thanks' in the bottom left hand corner.


Careful though Devrim, I don't think that the ICT would say it came from any of the three trends you posed above since Onorato Damen was not in Bilan, had no contact with Bordiga after 1926(although some "Bordigist" texts such as the Platform of the Committee of Intesa (1925) were written by him).
...The Bilan people came back to Italy in 1945 bringing with them their own divisions (as over the career of Vercesi who was to once again side with Bordiga in 1951).

My mistake, sorry, I still think the ICT is a synthesis of the Italian and German lefts though, even if it didn't come from Bilan directly, though some of them did join the PCInt in 1945 as you point out.

Devrim

[Zanthorus]

You have brought up both of these points before aboutLuxemborg and Lenin, and I don't really see what you are trying to demonstrate with them:

Essentially that Luxemburg's anti-Lenin polemic was motivated by a false understanding of Lenin's arguments.


So what? I have got information about strike in Lebanon from the Hezbollah press. I can't really see what you draw from this.

I would imagine that she had. It was an important piece by a Lenin and I would presume that she had read it unless there was any information to make me think otherwise.

I will answer your second point first, as the answer flows in with the answer to the first.

What leads me to suspect that Luxemburg never read Lenin's piece is a couple of things. First of all, she never quotes Lenin to substantiate her claims about what he believed, she merely asserts it. This gives us three options:

(1) Lenin wrote what Luxemburg believed he wrote, and she just never bothered to quote him.

(2) Luxemburg got her information about what he wrote from secondary (And most probably Menshevik) sources, and so couldn't substantiate her claims because she had never read Lenin.

(3) Luxemburg was actively working to discredit Lenin for some unknown reason.

I don't believe that (1) is true, and Lenin even wrote a reply to confirm that he had never held the positions ascribed to him by Luxemburg. Luxemburg was not an angel, so (3) is a definite possibility, however I am unaware of any disputes over other issues going on at the time that would motivate Luxemburg to attempt to discredit Lenin, and I cannot think of any personal issues that could've been involved. By process of elimination, I think (2) is the most likely option.

As for it being an important piece by Lenin, I don't see why that would mean that Luxemburg had read it. Remember that at this time Lenin was a marginal figure within the socialist movement, a member of a minority faction of a newly formed party. He was practically unknown outside Russia, and the only place I've seen his name in works from the period is in works on the disputes in the RSDLP. He only gained worldwide fame in the movement in 1917. Before that names like Pannekoek were more widely known than Lenin.

I believe it may be worth quoting the Lars T. Lih passage where he asserts his view in 'Lenin rediscovered':


Luxemburg's article... purports to be a review of Lenin's One Step Forward. Lenin's book is a blow-by-blow, hour-by-hour account of the Second Congress. Every vote, every debate is analysed in terms of the emerging split. Two themes predominate. One is that the Iskra-ite minority tended more and more to end up voting with the anti-Iskra-ites. The other is the inexcusability of the actions of the Iskra minority, first in boycotting, then in taking over, the central organ. Luxemburg passes over all of this in total silence.

I believe that Luxemburg was handed One Step by the Mensheviks who were organising the literary campaign against Lenin and who pointed out to her the notorious passages about factory discipline and Jacobins. Luxemburg had better things to do than actually read Lenin's long, obsessive polemic but, instead, relied on the anti-Iskra critique earlier deployed by her friend and mentor Boris Krichevskii. Indeed, her article can be called 'Krichevskii's revenge'. Due to this article's prestige, Krichevskii's main charge - that Iskra was so obsessed with rigid tactics/plans that it would miss the revolution - became inextricably attached to Lenin and to WITBD.

Lih also points out that actually the Mensheviks and Bolsheviks were in complete agreement on the functions of the Central Committee, and the rules on this subect were accepted unanimously at the Second Congress.

As for Luxemburg's getting her information about Rostov-on-don from Lenin, well she was using something Lenin did write to attempt to disprove something he didn't write. I think that really speaks for itself.

[Devrim]

What leads me to suspect that Luxemburg never read Lenin's piece is a couple of things. First of all, she never quotes Lenin to substantiate her claims about what he believed, she merely asserts it. This gives us three options:

(1) Lenin wrote what Luxemburg believed he wrote, and she just never bothered to quote him.

(2) Luxemburg got her information about what he wrote from secondary (And most probably Menshevik) sources, and so couldn't substantiate her claims because she had never read Lenin.

(3) Luxemburg was actively working to discredit Lenin for some unknown reason.

Of course there is a fourth, which is that she interpreted Lenin differently than you do.


As for it being an important piece by Lenin, I don't see why that would mean that Luxemburg had read it. Remember that at this time Lenin was a marginal figure within the socialist movement, a member of a minority faction of a newly formed party. He was practically unknown outside Russia, and the only place I've seen his name in works from the period is in works on the disputes in the RSDLP. He only gained worldwide fame in the movement in 1917. Before that names like Pannekoek were more widely known than Lenin.

But Luxemburg was polemicising against him, so obviously she had heard of him, so I would assume she had taken the time to read it.

I don't have a particular opinion on whether she had or not. I just wondered why you were so insistent on it.

Devrim

[Marion]

In the spirit of complete openness to both groups, I'd second the references both to the ICC's histories (currently reading the Dutch/German one and finding it fascinating) and the ICT pamphlet on the Committee of Intesa which has some excellent historical information, particularly on the manoeuvres of Gramsci...

[Android]

FWIW, as well as what others have suggested, I'd recommend Serge Bricianer's Pannekoek and the Workers' Councils (http://libcom.org/files/4927-pannekoek_and_the_workers.pdf). Which has at least one text ('Tactical Differences in the Workers Movement' - which I am told by another comrade was positively reviewed by Lenin as the best articulation of the deepening divisions in the workers movement at the time) I have not managed to come across any where else in English.


We have precious little in English that is still in print (e.g. waiting for reprint of our pamphlet on the Committee of Intesa, the first response of the Italian Left to the Bolshevisation of the PCI), but you could look at the ICT (or leftcom) website, would get you there) for example at the article on Bordiga's last stand inside the International (Internationalist Communist no.22 or even a short commemoration of the death of Onorato Damen which might give you an idea of the Italian Left is far from just Bordigism. (Of course, if you read Italian there is much more).


1926: Last Fight in the Communist International (http://www.leftcom.org/en/articles/1996-12-01/1926-last-fight-in-the-communist-international)

Background to the Italian Communist Left, Bordiga and Bordigism (http://www.leftcom.org/en/articles/2003-08-01/background-on-the-italian-communist-left-bordiga-and-bordigism)
Which I am assuming is the text by the ICT's comrade in the US referred to above by Joyce.

[Leo]

But Luxemburg was polemicising against him, so obviously she had heard of him, so I would assume she had taken the time to read it.

Well, at this point, Luxemburg's party in Poland was quite involved in the affairs of the Russian Party, so it was something that they felt the need to comment on. I actually also think that Luxemburg probably didn't read Lenin's text, as she struggled with Russian.


Of course there is a fourth, which is that she interpreted Lenin differently than you do.

Given that Lenin in his response said he actually agrees with Luxemburg, I think it would be fair to say Luxemburg based her criticisms on what Lenin's critics were saying on his work. Otherwise we would have to say that rather than Zanthorus interpreting Lenin differently from the way Luxemburg did, Lenin interpreted himself differently from the way Luxemburg did.