American Populist Socialism

[Paul Cockshott]

Interesting article on American Populist Socialism by Charlotte Cataline

http://reality.gn.apc.org/polemic/PopulistSocialism.pdf

[Die Neue Zeit]

Comrade, I don't know. That part about explicit support vs. implicit support is very slippery-slope towards Bakunin's minoritarian line. It's the crucial difference between left agitation and left education. If anything else, there's too much of the former and not enough of the latter.

Also, I don't like the "within and outside the Democratic party" crap that has been tried to fail time and again.

[Paul Cockshott]

i agree thst she has illusions aboit dp participation

[l'Enfermé]

I am in agreement with DNZ.


But when the final curtain call comes,
this cadre must be willing to split from the Democrats
when and if the time comes. Essentially, it is analogous to
what Rosa Luxemburg could have done had she foreseen
the split between the SPD and KPD. The groundwork for
15
an independent mass movement could have been laid
earlier, and the KPD could have emerged much stronger
(perhaps including what became the USPD) and the
German Revolution could have proceeded much
differentlyReally? I don't understand how it is analogous at all. And anyway, wasn't Luxemburg's Spartakusbund a part of the USPD...wouldn't that make the KPD basically an USPD splinter? If so how could the KPD have emerged including what became the USPD?:confused: But yes, the German Revolution could have proceeded much more differently, and much more positively, if the USPD expelled it's right-wing and if it wasn't deprived of much of it's left-wing by the ultra-left KPD formation.

[zimmerwald1915]

The Internationale group predated the USPD, and joined it when it formed. If I recall correctly it continued to publish its own journal and organize at least some independent activity while affiliated to the USPD--certainly it did not dissolve itself entirely into the USPD so that its members joined as individuals.

The KPD was formed by the merger of the Internationale group, the Internationale Communists of Germany, and a few smaller groups after the Internationale group left the USPD. The rest of the USPD carried on more or less as before, and more or less tailed the SPD for the rest of its existence, ending up with a merger back into the SPD.

Please note: this "history" is both biased and extremely abridged. Read a book or two on the subject.

[l'Enfermé]

The USPD didn't merge into the SPD though. The majority merged into the KPD in 1920 after the Halle Congress in October, at which the the USPD decided to join the Comintern. What joined the SPD was the right-wing minority.

[Zeus the Moose]

The USPD didn't merge into the SPD though. The majority merged into the KPD in 1920 after the Halle Congress in October, at which the the USPD decided to join the Comintern. What joined the SPD was the right-wing minority.

There was pro-Comintern majority that ultimately merged with the KPD, the right-wing minority that eventually merged with the SPD (somewhere around 1922-24, I think?), and there was a centrist minority which carried on as the USPD. IIRC that group merged with some Right Oppositionists and left-social democrats in the early 30s to create the Socialist Workers Party of Germany (SAPD.)

[l'Enfermé]

Aye. I believe the following numbers are more or less correct: Just before the Halle Congress, the USPD had 890,000 members. After the split following Halle, the right-wing leftovers of the USPD had around 290,000 by June 1922, two months before the merge into the SPD. Of these 290,000, around 100,000 joined the SPD(renamed to VSPD until from then on until 1924 - the V standing for "Vereinigte"(United?) , many joined the KPD instead, and a few remained.

Those that remained were lead by Karl Liebknecht's brother, Theodore, and George Ledebour, who was to the left of Theodore apparently. Theodore mostly insisted on not joining the SPD because he blamed them for his brother's murder. It mostly collapsed in 1924, when Liebknecht had Ledebour and his followers expelled. Ledebour than founded the Socialist League. Then in 1931, the remnants of the USPD under Theodore Liebknecht, Ledebour's Socialist League, joined the SAPD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Workers%27_Party_of_Germany), a splinter from SPD's left-wing. They advocated a United Front between the SPD, KDP, and the Unions against fascists.

[Die Neue Zeit]

There was pro-Comintern majority that ultimately merged with the KPD, the right-wing minority that eventually merged with the SPD (somewhere around 1922-24, I think?), and there was a centrist minority which carried on as the USPD. IIRC that group merged with some Right Oppositionists and left-social democrats in the early 30s to create the Socialist Workers Party of Germany (SAPD.)

Translation: there was a vast liquidationist majority spanning the left and right, against the continued existence of "an outstanding role model for left politics today"; the left legitimizing the ultra-left formation of the KPD, and the right kissing the asses of the MSPD. The later SAPD wasn't as opportunist as this post for some reason makes it out to be.

[Zeus the Moose]

Translation: there was a vast liquidationist majority spanning the left and right, against the continued existence of "an outstanding role model for left politics today"; the left legitimizing the ultra-left formation of the KPD, and the right kissing the asses of the MSPD. The later SAPD wasn't as opportunist as this post for some reason makes it out to be.

It wasn't my intention to call the SAPD opportunist, so I'm not sure how I did. Could you explain that?

[Die Neue Zeit]

Comrade, "merged with some Right Oppositionists and left-social democrats" sounds like the organization's very founding was opportunist. I apologize if you meant to convey something else.

[Zeus the Moose]

Comrade, "merged with some Right Oppositionists and left-social democrats" sounds like the organization's very founding was opportunist. I apologize if you meant to convey something else.

Ah, alright. It wasn't my intention to make a political judgement on the formation of the SAPD, just so state that, based on my recollection, that's where the forces that created the SAPD came from. As far as their politics go, the limited information that's out there about the SAPD (at least in English) seems rather positive.

[Die Neue Zeit]

It's too bad Hilferding didn't join the SAPD. He became an "eagle" (to quote Lenin on "eagles" and "hens") only after the Nazis took power. :(