spartacist revolt

[Intifada]

i was just wondering, what if the spartacist revolution in january 1919 had actually worked? wouldn't it mean that germany would have been communist, and therefore the rise of the nazis might not have happened, so ww2 may also not have occurred? :huh:

[SonofRage]

That would have been great.

[Marxist in Nebraska]

Of course it would have been great... but that is not the point. We should not waste a bunch of time speculating about something that never happened. We should be asking what did the Spartacists do right? What were their blunders? How can we learn from their example to bring revolution TODAY?

EDIT: By the way, I do not know much about them, so my questions are not just rhetorical. Got any answers, comrades?

[Versive]

Originally posted by Marxist in [email protected] 4 2003, 01:02 AM
We should be asking what did the Spartacists do right? What were their blunders? How can we learn from their example to bring revolution TODAY?

EDIT: By the way, I do not know much about them, so my questions are not just rhetorical. Got any answers, comrades?
Hmmm... sadly, I'm not as familiar as I should be with Luxemburg, Rühl & Co., but I do remember some interesting critique from Paul Mattick, Rosa Luxemburg in Retrospect:

"The German Revolution of 1918 was not the product of any left-wing organization, though members of all organizations played various parts in it... This revolution, it has been aptly said, "was a Social Democratic revolution, suppressed by the Social Democratic leaders: a process hardly paralleled in the history of the world." (16) There was also a revolutionary minority, to be sure, advocating and fighting for the formation of a social system of workers' councils as a permanent institution; but this was soon systematically subdued by the military forces arrayed against it. To organize this revolutionary minority for sustained actions, the Spartacus League, in collaboration with other revolutionary groups, transformed itself into the Communist Party of Germany. Its program was written by Rosa Luxemburg.

Already at its founding congress, it became clear that the new party was internally split. Even at this late hour Rosa Luxemburg was not able to break totally with social-democratic traditions.... [S]he still adhered... to the view that the uncertainty of an early proletarian revolution demanded the consideration of policies defined within the given, social institutions and organizations. In practice this meant participation in the National Assembly and in trade unions. However, the majority of the congress voted in favor of anti-parliamentarism and for a struggle against the trade unions."

(In other words, she hesitated.)

I wish I could find the rest of the book, but it's too late right now, so a quote from the PDF will have to do.

[Saint-Just]

Yes, Luxemburg was not quite the same as Lenin. I think if Germany had become a communist nation it would have aided the international communist movement enormously. They have a large population and were and are still a well developed technological nation. In the 70's a EuroCommunist party came close to gaining power in Italy. Apparently the CIA funded the Red Brigade at the time so that people would become alienated from the left having seen the Red Brigade cause much disruption. I do not think it worked since the Red Brigade carefully selected their targets, however they were subsequently blamed for the killing of 70 or so people at a Milan railway station bombing It was not the Red Brigade who executed the attack though but a fascist direct action group. It did tarnish the image of the left, maybe the CIA was behind disinformation on the perpetrators of the attack.

Anyway, the point is the Communists coming to power in Germany would have had great effect. Particularly if the Communist block had maintained an anti-imperialist stand for decades more. They didn't, but perhaps if Germany was part of the socialist camp they might have.

Yes, it is correct that the Socialists split on what should be done, a parliamentary democracy or Soviet system. There was a good chance that it could have created a Soviet system. But someone has suggested that the communists were very weak in that split, I am not sure since the KPD became very successful later on after Luxemburg and Leibknecht had died.

[Marxist in Nebraska]

Versive and Chairman Mao,

Thanks for sharing, comrades... Do you know if there is any work by Luxemburg or Leibknecht that is well respected? A most famous work, or maybe something where one or the other explains their position in detail? I must read up on them.

EDIT: I noticed that Leibknecht has a biography of Marx. I saw a copy at the university library. I will probably read it, though it probably will tell me next to nothing about the author.

[Versive]

Originally posted by Marxist in [email protected] 5 2003, 12:25 AM
Thanks for sharing, comrades... Do you know if there is any work by Luxemburg or Leibknecht that is well respected? A most famous work, or maybe something where one or the other explains their position in detail? I must read up on them.
Hmmm... I'm not overly familiar with Liebknecht, but the book that really was Rosa's claim to fame was The Accumulation of Capital. I haven't read it yet (I'm only halfway through Capital, vol. 1 and the Gründrisse, and I *do* have classwork), but I'm planning to before the year's over.

Although it's somewhat eclectic and totally skimps on Liebknecht, Collective Knowledge (http://redlibertad.crosswinds.net/collectiveknowledge/) has a decent Luxemburg archive that you might find worth looking at.

[Saint-Just]

I think Luxemburg met Lenin, and they argued considerably about how best to create a revolution and what a socialist state should be like. I have read some Luxemburg and she seems like a pure Marxian Scholar, but not totally pure, they seemed to follow a Leninist path in many aspects.

[The Children of the Revolution]

A Leninist-Style Revolution in Germany would have helped enormously. My knowlege of the Spartacist Revolt isn't what it should be, (especially for a Marxist/Communist studying History to degree level ;) ) but I think that had Germany followed (in a sense) in Russia's footsteps, the Revolution could have survived.

As we all know, the Revolution was betrayed - mainly through the efforts of Stalin and his proposed "Socialism in one country". It was this slogan that gave him the upper hand in the power struggle immediately after Lenin's death. (sniff) If there had been another powerful European country with a broadly communist agenda, the ideas of Trotsky may have dominated and the Revolution may have survived to truly represent the views of the Proletariat.

And, as has been mentioned, we may have escaped without the Second World War.

AND, (as has been mentioned - I really should stop thieving other people's points!) Communist parties in other European countries may have been encouraged to revolt. Or perhaps the workers would not even have needed this authority - maybe Marx's vision of Proletarians uniting (across Europe at least) in glorious revolution could have been recognised!!! (Getting a bit carried away) This would have been made even more likely in the widespread depression of the early 1930's.

They could have rewritten history entirely!!! (But may have got bored with revolution and stayed indoors instead)

[RedComrade]

Chairman Mao is correct, Lenin and Luxemburg had two very different outlooks on the revolution. Lenin as explained best in the State and Revolution beleived that only a violent revolution followed by a dictatorship of the revolutionary organisation could build a sucessful socialist state. Luxemburg was famous for her theory of the general strike, which proposed a revolutionary overthrow of the old regime through one massive strike or at least thats how i understand it, while Ive read the State and Revolution Ive only read summarys and reviews of Luxemburg's theories, it's been too long.

[Marxist in Nebraska]

RedComrade,

I have heard that Luxemburg was a serious critic of Lenin. If your contrast in their tactics is true, then I can see why. I have to read some of Rosa's work...

TCotR,

I agree. Had there been international-minded socialist revolutions ongoing in Russia and Germany, there could have been great prospects for world revolution in the next decade or so...

Alas... we lost that opportunity. What do we today?

[The Children of the Revolution]

My position, as I have described elsewhere, is to promote eco-socialism in the west - a sensible form of government that offers a compromise with bourgeois democracy - and use this position to promote revolution in the developing and third world.

Capitalism has broken down international borders, as Marx predicted. The challenge we face is to make sure Communism does the same. The West in general has become the exploiting class; the rest of the world the proletariat. The sooner the masses are politicised in these countries the better - revoultion then stands a chance of "going international".

It is a shame however that the Spartacists did not succeed, as I see little chance of an armed coup or popular uprising succeeding in the West today. Aye, back in those days a revoultionary was a man of action!!!