Pre-Digger Communism

[ColonelCossack]

Does anyone have any examples of communists (or similar) prior to the Diggers and such groups at around the time of the English civil war? This does not include the "primitive communist" stages of society, this is communists that existed at the time of feudalism etc. I'm aware that there will be numerous religious groups that fit this description- possibly like some early quakers (citation needed!!!), or other people inclined in that direction.

Btw I mean the civil war with royalists and parliamentarians, not the one between Stephen and Matilda, or Henry Tudor and king Richard. The one with king Charles and Oliver Cromwell. That one.

[Bronco]

Are you just talking about England? There was actually quite a lot of class tension in the country prior to the Diggers and the Revolution. The years 1620-50 were one of the worst in England's history economically, with a lot of people blaming the government for mismanaging the economy, allowing for monopolies for example which notable increased the cost of living and there is evidence of a lot of hostility to the ruling class at the time. When the Duke of Buckingham was assassinated people so admired the man responsible that they often pretended to be him, and a quote from a Yorkshire blacksmith in 1633: "The devil go with the King and all the proud pack of them. What care I"

This is also an interesting excerpt from a pamphlet from 1649 about a government economic scheme:

"How many poor apple-women and broom-men, rag-merchants and people of all sorts, sold and pawned their bedding and clothes to buy themselves the freedom of the new royal incorporation of the suburbs of London? And when all was done, it proved a cheat: thus was the king's coffers filled with oppression"

Charles I himself warned of the danger before the Civil War that "at last the common people [may] set up for themselves, call parity and independence liberty,...destroy all rights and properties, all distinctions of families and merit"

Also in the 1500's you had the Anabaptists who were also fiercely critical of the State Church, opposing tithes and to the Church clergy being appointed by the ruling class, some of them also denying the "right" to private property. William Gouge who was a clergymen at the time noted how they "teach that all are alike and there is no difference betwixt masters and servants". The Familists as well were a religious sect which held all their property in common, thinking heaven could be built on Earth. (source for all of this is Christoper Hitchens The World Turned Upside Down by the way)

So yeah maybe the Anabaptists and Familists weren't Communists as such but they shared a lot of the same principles than the Diggers would later be based on, and when you look at the class tension in England at the time you can see why such an organisation as the Diggers was able to develop in the chaos of the Civil War, such attitudes against the Church, State and Monarchy were by no means new

[ColonelCossack]

Not just England; but I suppose most examples would probably be in Europe.

[Bronco]

Not just England; but I suppose most examples would probably be in Europe.

Have a look at the Peasants' War (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peasants'_War) in Germany and other parts of Europe in the early 1500's, Engels wrote on it comparing it to the 1848 revolution http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1850/peasant-war-germany/

[Sasha]

Get your hands on the book "orgasms of history" (AKpress) its completly filled with the stuff your looking for.

[Sasha]

If you can't get a copy, these are the chapters, maybe I can summaries those that you want to know more about:

The Cynics
Spartacus
The bagaudi
The norman peasant war
The English peasants revolt: the great company
Los remensas
Etienne de la boeties discourse on voluntary servitude
The iroquois league
The leagues and the carnival in Romans
Levellers, diggers and ranters
The ormee
French revolution
Paris commune
The cempuis orphanage
La ruche
Zapatistas
Makhnovshcina
Spartakus
The councils republic of bavaria
The hungarian councils republic
The Rio gallegos workers association
The Spanish revolution
The peoples uprising in hungary
The red guards of thr shengwulian
The sanfrancisco diggers
May '68
Christiania
The revolution of the carnations
Le larzac

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

Not just England; but I suppose most examples would probably be in Europe.

Why? Eurocentrism is so 1850

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

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

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

[Blake's Baby]

Are you looking for stuff about revolts, stuff about communal living, or stuff about socialist theory?

The early Christians were communists - I remember reading something the CPGB wrote about James, the brother of Jesus, 10 years or so years ago - http://www.cpgb.org.uk/worker2/index.php?action=viewarticle&article_id=1000953 is the link.

In the late Antique Church there was a group around the theologian Pelagius, some of whom had a fairly radical social doctrine - 'the world is divided into three classes; the rich the poor and those who have enough... the few rich are the cause of the many poor... abolish the rich and there will be no more poor' - you can try to get hold of a copy of 'De Divitiis' ('On Riches') which is an anonymous work ascribed to monk sometimes known as 'the Sicilian Briton', anf the author of the bit quoted above. But googling him and it I wasn't able to find much info.

[Tifosi]

Get your hands on the book "orgasms of history" (AKpress) its completly filled with the stuff your looking for.

Here (http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=VsnB0WA9zwEC&pg=PA17&lpg=PP1&output=html_text), on Google Books.

[the last donut of the night]

i'm really too lazy to give you links, but if you find the topic interesting, the late medieval period was (unlike most historians like to admit) frought with class tension and rebellion, especially in the cities. it was pretty common around the 14th century, for example, for workers in cities to post pictures of Fortune on their guild shops to announce the "changing of lots" in society. i recommend you read about the millenarian heretical movements, especially in italy. a good book, which focuses on the plight of women at the time is "caliban and the witch" by sylvia fredereci (spelling?). hope that helps

[bcbm]

"caliban and the witch" by sylvia fredereci (spelling?). hope that helps

silvia federici. here is a pdf of the whole book, it is very, very worth reading:

http://libcom.org/library/caliban-witch-silvia-federici

[the last donut of the night]

silvia federici. here is a pdf of the whole book, it is very, very worth reading:

http://libcom.org/library/caliban-witch-silvia-federici

thank god for libcom. yeah, really cool

[Red Commissar]

Why? Eurocentrism is so 1850

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

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

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

Yeah, those are interesting ones. What's a shame, especially when it comes to things like Mazdak, is that we don't have much information about it. For the longest time history merely parroted the accounts given by the kingdom which played up the charlatan and swindler angle of Mani, rather than the ramification of the things he was preaching.

I guess though that plagues historical interpretation of anything. 'History is written by the victors' and such.

[ernie2]

Karl Kautsky's Communism in Central Europe in the time of the Reformation is excellent on the historical development of pre-leveller communist and heretical movements (you can find it on marxists.org) and on the peasant wars. Max Beer wrote a multi-volume history of the class struggle in history, I do not have my copy at the moment, may be another comrade could help out? in 1904 a two volume of The Ancient Lowly was published which is meant to contain a lot of useful information on the class struggle in the ancient world but in a rather chaotic manner. I have not read it so cannot comment

[bcbm]

this book (http://www.amazon.com/Pursuit-Millennium-Revolutionary-Millenarians-Anarchists/dp/0195004566) is worth checking out, its written by a reactionary but still lots of good historical information. vaneigem wrote a similar book 'the movement of the free spirit'

[MarxSchmarx]

I'm surprised Wat Tyler's name hasn't come up yet. The English peasant's revolts are probably among the most famous, pre-civil war egalitarian movements on a large scale in Britain.

Also in keeping with SCN's non-western themed movements, the Ikko-ikki in Japan managed to hold on to a small dominion outside modern-day Osaka for several decades and served as a sort of refuge to peasants escaping oppressive samurai rule:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikk%C5%8D-ikki
It's not entirely clear they were explicitly "communist" but by and large they enforced a radically decentralized and communitarian, if highly religious, society in the areas under their control.

[Thirsty Crow]

thank god for libcom. yeah, really cool
I've only gotten so far with this book, but it strikes me as really interesting not only as a historical analysis, a representation of less kniown social/political phenomena, but also as a fairly interesting contribution to Marxist theory. Highly recommended, especially for those interested in the genesis of the capitalist mode of production.

[the last donut of the night]

I've only gotten so far with this book, but it strikes me as really interesting not only as a historical analysis, a representation of less kniown social/political phenomena, but also as a fairly interesting contribution to Marxist theory. Highly recommended, especially for those interested in the genesis of the capitalist mode of production.

yes, it's annoying how she's not well more known. for example, i live in brazil and her works haven't been published here, even more famous ones like caliban and the witch.

[Zealot]

Engels noted in his writing On the History of Early Christianity (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894/early-christianity/index.htm):

If, therefore, Prof. Anton Menger wonders in his Right to the Full Product of Labour why, with the enormous concentration of landownership under the Roman emperors and the boundless sufferings of the working class of the time, which was composed almost exclusively of slaves, "socialism did not follow the overthrow of the Roman Empire in the West," it is because he cannot see that this "socialism" did in fact, as far as it was possible at the time, exist and even became dominant — in Christianity.


Only this Christianity, as was bound to be the case in the historic conditions, did not want to accomplish the social transformation in this world, but beyond it, in heaven, in eternal life after death, in the impending "millennium."


He emphasizes that they sought liberation in a different world, however, as another poster demonstrated communal living was a feature of early Christianity. I think this is even mentioned in the Bible somewhere.


The problem with trying to find examples of early Communism, anywhere, is that, even in some of the cases we know of, they were essentially religious in nature and rather than trying to conquer the world, they isolated themselves from it, maybe by choice or by force. There were probably many, many Communist-type societies that we'll never know of because of their self-imposed (or state-imposed) isolation.