Karl Kautsky - Worth a read?

[Questionable]

I've read quite a few works by the Bolsheviks, and I'm aware that they had quite a nasty feud with social-democrat Karl Kautsky. I took a look at some of his works out of curiousity, and his book "The Economic Doctrines of Karl Marx" actually seemed to be a pretty helpful analysis of Das Kapital (For me, at least).

So are other works by Kautsky worth a read? Is there a kind of "cut-off" point where he began to advocate reformism, or are his works hit-and-miss? Which ones should I read and which should I not waste my time with?

[Искра]

Well read Kautsky why not? If you read him you'll be able to judge his work from your own perspective...

[Q]

Yes, he is certainly worth a read. As for the feud with the Bolsheviks, this was a post-1914 phenomena. Kautsky collapsed to the nationalist rhetoric of World War I and subsequently Lenin broke with him. However, he didn't break with his politics of building a mass party along the SPD model under Russian (police state) conditions. In later writings Lenin still refers a lot to Kautsky "when he was still a Marxist".

Due to the very long culture of bashing Kautsky on the far left, very little is translated or at all put online, but he maintained a journal (first a monthly, later a weekly) in the period from 1884 to 1917, called Die Neue Zeit ("The New Era") which acted as a theoretical pole of development for whole generations of Marxists in that time throughout the world, including Lenin.

If you want to understand the Kautsky-Lenin relationship better, there is a scholarly work published called Lenin Rediscovered: 'What is to be done?' in context, by Canadian independent academic Lars Lih. He also wrote quite a lot of articles on the subject and I can look up some links if you're interested.

[l'Enfermé]

It's usually forgotten by most that the 3 men who had most influence on Lenin theory were Marx, Engels, and Kautsy(of course, before he betrayed his own teachings). I'd recommend reading his Road to Power (http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1909/power/index.htm). There's also The Social Revolution (http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1902/socrev/index.htm) and Kautsky's work on Christianity, Foundations of Christianity (http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1908/christ/index.htm), which while unrelated to revolutionary politics, is still a good read.

Also, Lenin's Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/prrk/index.htm) is a must read.

[l'Enfermé]

Kautsky collapsed to the nationalist rhetoric of World War I and subsequently Lenin broke with him.

The man actually claimed that Germany was defending itself against imperialist aggression of Czarist Russia.

[Q]

It's usually forgotten by most that the 3 men who had most influence on Lenin theory were Marx, Engels, and Kautsy(of course, before he betrayed his own teachings). I'd recommend reading his Road to Power (http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1909/power/index.htm). There's also The Social Revolution (http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1902/socrev/index.htm) and Kautsky's work on Christianity, Foundations of Christianity (http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1908/christ/index.htm), which while unrelated to revolutionary politics, is still a good read.

Also, Lenin's Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/prrk/index.htm) is a must read.

The Erfurt Program (http://www.marxists.org/history/international/social-democracy/1891/erfurt-program.htm) and the commentary on it, The Class Struggle (http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1892/erfurt/index.htm) are also important reads, as they influenced Social-Democracy everywhere, including, again, the Bolsheviks.

[Q]

The man actually claimed that Germany was defending itself against imperialist aggression of Czarist Russia.

True. I believe the argumentation actually was that if Russia was to win, reaction would spread across Germany, destroying the German workers movement (at the time the most organised, biggest Marxist force on the planet), thus throwing back the working class movement by decades.

[l'Enfermé]

True. I believe the argumentation actually was that if Russia was to win, reaction would spread across Germany, destroying the German workers movement (at the time the most organised, biggest Marxist force on the planet), thus throwing back the working class movement by decades.
Yeah, I think that was exactly the argument. The problem with that argument was that the Russian Empire itself was internally decomposing for such a long time, capable of defeating only other internally decomposing empires, i.e the Ottomans, the Persians, the Habsburgs(Russian military victories during WW1 being mostly against the Austrians), etc, etc, so Russia was bound to lose.

Either way, as history is our witness, it took the betrayal of the Social-Democrats to crush the Worker's movement, and not the endless reactionary hordes of Russian Cossacks.