"For one estate to be par excellence the
estate of liberation, another estate must conversely be the obvious estate of
oppression. The negative general significance of the French nobility and
the French clergy determined the positive general significance of the nearest
neighboring and opposed class of the bourgeoisie."[1]
The resentment festering from brutal repression at the hands of their Monarch's, Emperor's, Cromwell's, or indeed J.D Rockefeller’s hired mercenaries, bred radical antipathy and a desire for vengeance, overpowering impulses which would manifest in radical & extreme actions on the part of the oppressed masses. The more a master embodies the Master in relation to his subjects, the more of a target he makes of himself, and masters in general, marking clear boundaries of class division, flaunting their privilege and attracting the evil eye of the toiling masses.
Kaiser Wilhelm II demonstrated that he understood this fact in his refusal to persecute the striking miners of the Rhine Valley in 1889, as did his Father in 1881 when he suggested that, "those who are disabled from work by age and invalidity have a well-grounded claim to care from the state.".
As Chancellor of the newly unified German State, Otto Von Bismarck led a two pronged attack against the radical worker's movement. On the one hand legally enforcing years of censorship and suppression, of groups promoting Socialist Principles in Germany [1878-1890], and on the other actually implementing socialist policies through his Chancellorship during the same period. Despite
this opposition, the German Socialist Democratic Party [SDWP], founded as an amalgamation
of Intellectual, Working class and Trade Union organizations in 1875,
became increasingly popular in German politics, but by the time it assumed power -with double the votes of their nearest challenger in 1912- it had cast away much of it's revolutionary shell, revealing the essentially conservative character of many of it's members and leadership.
The resentment festering from brutal repression at the hands of their Monarch's, Emperor's, Cromwell's, or indeed J.D Rockefeller’s hired mercenaries, bred radical antipathy and a desire for vengeance, overpowering impulses which would manifest in radical & extreme actions on the part of the oppressed masses. The more a master embodies the Master in relation to his subjects, the more of a target he makes of himself, and masters in general, marking clear boundaries of class division, flaunting their privilege and attracting the evil eye of the toiling masses.
Kaiser Wilhelm II demonstrated that he understood this fact in his refusal to persecute the striking miners of the Rhine Valley in 1889, as did his Father in 1881 when he suggested that, "those who are disabled from work by age and invalidity have a well-grounded claim to care from the state.".
As Chancellor of the newly unified German State, Otto Von Bismarck led a two pronged attack against the radical worker's movement. On the one hand legally enforcing years of censorship and suppression, of groups promoting Socialist Principles in Germany [1878-1890], and on the other actually implementing socialist policies through his Chancellorship during the same period.
"People
who pronounce themselves in favor of the method of legislative reform
in place of and in contradistinction to the conquest of political power
and social revolution, do not really choose a more tranquil, calmer and
slower road to the same goal, but a different goal. Instead of taking a
stand for the establishment of a new society they take a stand for the
surface modification of the old society."[2]
The object of her criticism in "Reform or Revolution", was the revisionist wing of the SDWP, which had departed completely from a strategy of class conflict and direct action, towards one of political and economic collaboration within the framework of parliamentary reform.
Now that the political activity of the intelligentsia was legal, they were established as representative of the revolutionary working classes, and since Europe's Anarchists had convinced it's Kings to sit a little more safely on their thrones, the middle class leaders had no further need of the Plebeian threat, or "that revolutionary daring which flings at the adversary the defiant words: I am nothing but I must be everything."[1] They had became the Tribunes of the Plebs, managing their wholesale exploitation and petitioning the owners of property, on their behalf.
The object of her criticism in "Reform or Revolution", was the revisionist wing of the SDWP, which had departed completely from a strategy of class conflict and direct action, towards one of political and economic collaboration within the framework of parliamentary reform.
Now that the political activity of the intelligentsia was legal, they were established as representative of the revolutionary working classes, and since Europe's Anarchists had convinced it's Kings to sit a little more safely on their thrones, the middle class leaders had no further need of the Plebeian threat, or "that revolutionary daring which flings at the adversary the defiant words: I am nothing but I must be everything."[1] They had became the Tribunes of the Plebs, managing their wholesale exploitation and petitioning the owners of property, on their behalf.
Rosa argued that the crucial antagonism, and massive imbalance in power between capital and labour, could only be redressed by the working classes assuming power and control over their own political & social activity, managing their own productive power through democratic, workers councils, similar to those adopted during and after the Russian Revolution, with the ability and potential to implement revolutionary changes, in not only methods of production, but also modes of everyday life and political organization.
The path of political reform which Rosa opposed, for it's failure to go to the very root of things and reshape society along socialist lines, was powerless to prevent the build up of War.
Despite the Second International's agreement to oppose militarism, the SWPD supported the German war effort and adopted "Burgfriedenspolitik", refraining from calling strikes or criticising the government. Those intellectuals, spokespeople, academics, lawyers, and elected representatives of the people, would come to hide behind the bayonets, and guard-towers of the same forces they themselves were persecuted by, as they crushed the Socialist opposition to the first World War. Banning mass demonstrations, locking up conscientious objectors and left wing opponents like traitors, while aligning with the established powers of Church and State.
Writing the Junius Pamphlet, from the jail cell she shared with fellow Socialist objectors to the 1st World War, Rosa both embodied, symbolized & eulogized the dying revolutionary current in European politics: "What does “regression into barbarism” mean to our lofty European civilization? Until now, we have all probably read and repeated these words thoughtlessly, without suspecting their fearsome seriousness. A look around us at this moment [1915] shows what the regression of bourgeois society into barbarism means. This world war is a regression into barbarism."[3]
At this point, Rosa was directly quoting people who had spoken decades previously. Even as Karl Kautsky was positing the choice in 1892 the revolutionary workers movement, -scattered throughout Europe as political exiles and refugees, or under state surveillance, in jail and facing persecution at home-, was in retreat after numerous crushing defeats in industrial, political, and social struggles over it's past 100 years.
Her lament continues...
"The flower of our mature and youthful strength, hundreds of thousands of whom were socialistically schooled in England, France, Belgium, Germany, and Russia... The fruits of decades of sacrifice and the efforts of generations are destroyed in a few weeks. The key troops of the international proletariat are torn up by the roots.
The blood-letting of the June days [1848] paralyzed the French
workers’ movement for a decade and a half. Then the blood-letting of the
Commune massacres again retarded it for more than a decade. What is now
occurring is an unprecedented mass slaughter that is reducing the adult
working population of all the leading civilized countries to women, old
people, and cripples.
Despite
the apparent hopelessness of the situation, Rosa continued her critical work from Prison along with Karl Liebknecht, both imprisoned for their roles in organizing an
antiwar demonstration in Berlin. Her notebooks being smuggled out
and printed as pamphlet's, would lead to the founding of the Spartacist League, ensuring a continuity of the Marxist tendency within the International Socialist movement.
After two years of war, the split between leftwing radicals along with those who simply opposed the war, and the more militarist factions inside the SWPD, became more apparent. increasingly it's members of parliament refused to vote for the bonds needed to fund the war, and were expelled, leading to the birth of the Independent Social Democratic Party[USPD] which the Spartacist's, and various left wing activists would affiliate with.
The structural integrity of the SWPD was not the only thing under pressure, the Russian Monarchy had come under considerable threat from anti-War and Social Democratic currents both at home and abroad. By March 13th 1917 the Emperor had abdicated, passing control of the war torn country to the largely Socialist Democratic Russian Provisional Government, which would now continue to wage War against Germany, until the October Revolution later that year.
After two years of war, the split between leftwing radicals along with those who simply opposed the war, and the more militarist factions inside the SWPD, became more apparent. increasingly it's members of parliament refused to vote for the bonds needed to fund the war, and were expelled, leading to the birth of the Independent Social Democratic Party[USPD] which the Spartacist's, and various left wing activists would affiliate with.
The structural integrity of the SWPD was not the only thing under pressure, the Russian Monarchy had come under considerable threat from anti-War and Social Democratic currents both at home and abroad. By March 13th 1917 the Emperor had abdicated, passing control of the war torn country to the largely Socialist Democratic Russian Provisional Government, which would now continue to wage War against Germany, until the October Revolution later that year.
According to internal German communications, in order to weaken the Russian Government, in April 1917, German Supreme Command allowed Vladimir Illich Lenin, safe passage on a sealed Train from the German Border with Switzerland into Russia. Upon arrival Lenin set
into motion a conspiracy that would ensure he and a small band of loyal
co-conspirators, would come to rule whatever emerged from the ruins of
Feudal Russia.
Among Rosa's prison notebooks in 1918, was The Russian Revolution, criticizing the authoritarian tendencies, dualistic logic, and vulgar materialism of the new Russian Government, the Bolshevik Party and it's establishment of dictatorship over, not of, the Proletariat: "[Lenin and Trotsky] decide in favor of dictatorship in contradistinction to democracy, and thereby, in favor of the dictatorship of a handful of persons, that is, in favor of dictatorship on the bourgeois model."[5]
Writing some time later Simone Weil would echo her sentiment: "Fifteen years have elapsed. The Russian Revolution has not been crushed. Its enemies, both abroad and at home, have been vanquished. And yet nowhere on the surface of the globe—including Russia—are there any soviets; nowhere on the surface of the globe—including Russia—is there any communist party properly so called. The “stinking corpse” of social democracy has continued for fifteen years to infect the political atmosphere, which is hardly the action of a corpse; if at last it has largely been swept away, this has been the work of fascism, not of the Revolution."[6]
Rosa was eventually released on November the 8th, three days before the end of the War, and just days after the Kiel Mutiny and various other spontaneous refusals of sailors to carry out their orders, had led to wide scale civil unrest. In her words: "On the ninth of November, workers and soldiers smashed the old German regime." Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated his throne and fled the country, "the German proletariat rose up to throw off the shameful yoke. The Hohenzollerns were driven out; workers’ and soldiers’ councils were elected"[7], the German Revolution was now in motion. Rosa and Karl immediately began agitating, creating the Red Flag Newspaper, and on 14 December 1918, they published the new programme of the Spartacus League.[7]
Through The Red Flag, Rosa and Karl encouraged the rebels to occupy the editorial offices of the liberal press and later, all positions of power, however Friedrich Ebert, leader of the WSPD, attempting to mitigate a complete socialist transformation of society, had created the Council of People's Deputies, which took over the function of head of state and head of government (Chancellor), and issued decrees replacing the legislation of parliament, and Federal Council. Further, in order to neutralize the opposed revolutionary councils, the WSPD rejoined with the more radical USPD, with 3 members from each party assuming key positions on the Council.
Weeks later, what remained of the radical workers movement called a joint congress of the League of Independent Socialists, including the Sparticists and the International Communists of Germany, leading to their unification and the founding of the Communist Party of Germany, under the leadership of Rosa and Karl. On New Year's Day, Luxemburg declared: "Today we can seriously set about destroying capitalism once and for all. Nay, more; not merely are we today in a position to perform this task, nor merely is its performance a duty toward the proletariat, but our solution offers the only means of saving human society from destruction."[8]
The Revolutionaries, perhaps at this point a little swept away by their own propaganda, saw their opportunity during protests over the sacking of popular chief of police Emil Eichhorn, a general strike was declared on January 6th, 1919. Over 100,000 workers were involved in the action and rebellion which would become known as the Spartacist Uprising.
Fearing an all-out civil war in Germany, between militant workers and reactionary conservatives, the Council of the People's Deputies, refused to strip the old German upper classes of their power, property and privileges immediately, seeking instead to peacefully
integrate them into the new social democratic order over time. In persuing this aim Ebert had made alliances with the German Supreme Command, enabling him to use the army and the Freikorps (nationalist militias) to crush the Spartacist movement.
Rosa and Karl would face capture, interrogation and within days be murdered as enemies of the state. The revolution was over, the flower of it's mature and youthful strength, had been torn up by the roots.
Rosa had already experienced it's defeat to the Reformist tendency of the WSPD, witnessed the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of European Socialists during the war, and rebuked the Soviet Union for it's despotic character, despite this, or perhaps because of it, she gave her life in the fight for the radical demands of the revolutionary workers movement.
Rosa and Karl would face capture, interrogation and within days be murdered as enemies of the state. The revolution was over, the flower of it's mature and youthful strength, had been torn up by the roots.
Rosa had already experienced it's defeat to the Reformist tendency of the WSPD, witnessed the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of European Socialists during the war, and rebuked the Soviet Union for it's despotic character, despite this, or perhaps because of it, she gave her life in the fight for the radical demands of the revolutionary workers movement.
Surface modification of the old society was well underway throughout Europe and the World.
The singular tyrannical monad was being replaced by 1000 mini tyrants, all vying for supremacy and commercial opportunity, in the national & ethno-local territories emerging from the fragments of destroyed empires.
In response to the chaos and instability resulting from such conditions of all against all, we see time and time again the influence of slogans like stability, security, and safety, and how they are employed to ensure the strongest, most well armed war lords, Generals or Dictators assume the reigns of power.
The hard fought battles lost and occasionally won, by the revolutionary workers movement, would begin to fade into memory, to be replaced by the attainment of the Social and Liberal, welfare state reforms of the 20th century, and the Liberal World Order's defeat of Fascism in WWII. The proletarian class in general, would gradually become pacified by their experience of progress, passivity and political paternalism, with the advent of mass culture & mass production the class struggle had been contained, in regards to Revolution, everything that was once directly lived proceeded into representation.
The singular tyrannical monad was being replaced by 1000 mini tyrants, all vying for supremacy and commercial opportunity, in the national & ethno-local territories emerging from the fragments of destroyed empires.
In response to the chaos and instability resulting from such conditions of all against all, we see time and time again the influence of slogans like stability, security, and safety, and how they are employed to ensure the strongest, most well armed war lords, Generals or Dictators assume the reigns of power.
The hard fought battles lost and occasionally won, by the revolutionary workers movement, would begin to fade into memory, to be replaced by the attainment of the Social and Liberal, welfare state reforms of the 20th century, and the Liberal World Order's defeat of Fascism in WWII. The proletarian class in general, would gradually become pacified by their experience of progress, passivity and political paternalism, with the advent of mass culture & mass production the class struggle had been contained, in regards to Revolution, everything that was once directly lived proceeded into representation.
The
outcome of the Bourgeois revolution; the victory of Liberal, Enlightenment values in the field of politics; the "surface modification of society", has been an
improvement in the techniques of surveillance, exploitation and domination, as much as it has fostered a sense of individual liberty.
_______________
[3] Rosa Luxemburg, Junius Pamphlet 1915 Ch.1
[4] Rosa Luxemburg, Junius Pamphlet 1915 Ch. 8
[5] Rosa Luxemburg, The Russian Revoltion 1918 Ch. 8
[6] Simone Weil, Oppression and Liberty, Introduction, 'Prospects' .
"The very novelty of such a régime makes it difficult to analyse. Trotsky persists in saying that we have here a “dictatorship of the proletariat”, a “workers’ State”, albeit with “bureaucratic deformations”, and that, as regards the necessity for such a régime to expand or perish, Lenin and he were mistaken only over the time-scale. But when an error in degree attains such proportions we may be permitted to think that an error in kind is involved, in other words a mistake touching the actual nature of the régime of whose conditions of existence a definition is being attempted. Besides, to call a State a “workers’ State” when you go on to explain that each worker in it is put economically and politically at the complete disposal of a bureaucratic caste, sounds like a bad joke. As for the “deformations”, this term, singularly out of place in the case of a State all of whose characteristics are exactly the reverse of those theoretically associated with a workers’ State, seems to imply that the Stalin régime is a sort of anomaly or disease of the Russian Revolution. But the distinction between the pathological and the normal has no theoretical validity.
[4] Rosa Luxemburg, Junius Pamphlet 1915 Ch. 8
[5] Rosa Luxemburg, The Russian Revoltion 1918 Ch. 8
[6] Simone Weil, Oppression and Liberty, Introduction, 'Prospects' .
"The very novelty of such a régime makes it difficult to analyse. Trotsky persists in saying that we have here a “dictatorship of the proletariat”, a “workers’ State”, albeit with “bureaucratic deformations”, and that, as regards the necessity for such a régime to expand or perish, Lenin and he were mistaken only over the time-scale. But when an error in degree attains such proportions we may be permitted to think that an error in kind is involved, in other words a mistake touching the actual nature of the régime of whose conditions of existence a definition is being attempted. Besides, to call a State a “workers’ State” when you go on to explain that each worker in it is put economically and politically at the complete disposal of a bureaucratic caste, sounds like a bad joke. As for the “deformations”, this term, singularly out of place in the case of a State all of whose characteristics are exactly the reverse of those theoretically associated with a workers’ State, seems to imply that the Stalin régime is a sort of anomaly or disease of the Russian Revolution. But the distinction between the pathological and the normal has no theoretical validity.
Descartes used to say that a clock out of order is not an
exception to the laws governing clocks, but a different mechanism
obeying its own laws; in the same way we should regard the Stalin
régime, not as a workers’ State out of order, but as a different social
mechanism, whose definition is to be found in the wheels of which it is
composed and which functions according to the nature of those wheels.
And, whereas the wheels of a workers’ State would consist of the
democratic institutions of the working class, those of the Stalin régime
consist exclusively of the various parts of a centralized
administrative system on which the whole economic, political and
intellectual life of the country is entirely dependent."
[8] Nettl,
J. P. Rosa Luxemburg. Vol. 1. p. 131. Waters, Mary-Alice Waters (ed.). Rosa
Luxemburg Speaks. p. 7.
