Development of German Socialism 1890-1939

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The German Revolution - November 1918

The German Revolution – November 1918

Development of German Socialism 1890-1939

Apart from the works of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels Germany produced a disproportionate number of Socialist/Progressive theoreticians from the late 19th century up to the start of World War II. Some of these were involved in heated and substantial debates with VI Lenin as he was developing the revolutionary element of Marxism (which led, in 1917, to the victory of the October Revolution in Russia) whilst in German the emphasis was being placed upon what became Social Democracy.

Even one of the most revolutionary of the German Communists, Rosa Luxemburg, carried out a persistent polemic against Lenin on the need for an organised and structured revolutionary Party to lead the workers in the taking of state power. Whilst not the sole factory in the defeat of the Spartacist Revolution in 1918 the lack of such an ideologically organised Party certainly played its part in the failed insurrection.

The works presented below are all part of building up an extensive library of Socialist/Communist thought up to and following the October Revolution. The success in Russia in 1917 and the struggle for the building of Socialism subsequently certainly challenged the ideas of Social Democracy but the victory of revisionism following the death of JV Stalin has allowed these erroneous ideas to again establish a foothold in the anti-capitalist movement. The denigration of the achievements of Socialism in those countries which made efforts to construct a Socialist society from the 1945 onwards, principally the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics – USSR, the People’s Socialist Republic of Albania, the People’s Republic of China and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, also played its role in undermining revolutionary Marxism-Leninism. The ‘easy’ (though in reality the most difficult) road of Social Democracy has been, therefore, able to re-establish its sway in worker and peasant movements worldwide.

German Communism

Creating German Communism, 1890-1990 – from popular protests to Socialist State, Eric D. Weitz, Princeton University Press, 1997, 465 pages.

Rosa Luxemburg

On the National Question, Marxist Internet Archive edition, with internal hyperlinks as well as outside links to other documents on the MIA site, 146 pages.

The Mass Strike, the Political Party and the Trade Unions, English translation of 1906 German original, MIA edition.

The Crisis in the German Social-Democracy, (The Junius Pamphlet), The Socialist Publication Society, NY, 1919, 141 pages.

The Russian Revolution, Workers Age Publishers, NY, 1940, Marxist Internet Archive edition, 2020, 41 pages.

The Russian Revolution and Leninism or Marxism, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1961, 117 pages.

The Accumulation of Capital, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1951, translated by Agnes Schwarzschild, introduction by Joan Robinson, 474 pages.

The Accumulation of Capital, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 2003, translated by Agnes Schwarzschild, with a new introduction by Tadeusz Kowalik, 453 pages.

The Accumulation of Capital – an anti-critique and Imperialism and the Accumulation of Capital (by Nikolai Bukharin, written in 1924). Two separate works in one volume, edited with an Introduction by Kenneth Tarbuck, Monthly Review Press, NY, 1972, 289 pages. Luxemburg’s work is a reply to critics of her 1913 work (see above), while Bukharin’s work is another critique of Luxemburg which focuses on her 1915 Anti-Critique.

Letters to Karl and Luise Kautsky from 1896 to 1918, edited Luise Kautsky, translated from German by Louis P. Lochner, Robert M. McBride and Co., NY, 1925, 249 pages. Luise Kautsky’s introduction to this book is a good source for biographical information about Rosa Luxemburg.

Letters from Prison, Publishing House of the Young International, Berlin,1923, 79 pages.

Reform or Revolution, Vanguard Pamphlets, New Malden, 1951, 74 pages.

Leninism or Marxism, Independent Labour Party, London, 1971, 16 pages.

The Mass Strike, the Political Party and the Trade Unions, Young Socialist Publication, Colombo, 1970, 88 pages.

The Essential Rosa Luxemburg – Reform or Revolution and the Mass Strike, Helen Scott, ed., Haymarket, Chicago, 2008, 194 pages.

Selected political writings of Rosa Luxemburg, Dick Howard. ed., Monthly Review, NY, 1971, 441 pages.

The Rosa Luxemburg Reader, Peter Hudis and Kevin B. Anderson, ed., Monthly Review, NY, 2004, 447 pages.

The Complete Works of Rosa Luxemburg, Volume 1, Economic Writings 1, Peter Hudis, ed., Verso, London, 2013, 559 pages.

Rosa Luxemburg, Women’s Liberation, and Marx’s Philosophy of Revolution, Raya Dunayevskaya, Harvester Press, Sussex, 1981, 234 pages.

Rosa Luxemburg’s views on The Russian Revolution, Clara Zetkin, first published by the Communist International, 1922, reprint Red Star Publishers, 2017, 212 pages.

Karl Liebknecht

Militarism and Anti-Militarism, written in 1907, Rivers Press, Cambridge, 1973, Marxist Internet Archive version, 206 pages.

The future belongs to the People, speeches made since the beginning of the War, Macmillan, NY, November 1918, 148 pages.

Voices of Revolt – speeches of Karl Liebknecht, International, NY, 1927, 104 pages.

Karl Liebknecht – man without a country, Karl W. Meyer, Public Affairs Press, Washington, 1957, 191 pages.

In Memoriam to our Comrades Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, Martyrs to the German Revolution, Max Bedacht, Socialist Party of San Francisco, 1919, 16 pages.

During the Weimar Era

Communism in Germany under the Weimar Republic, Ben Fowkes, Macmillan, London, 1984), 134 pages.

Barricades in Berlin, Klaus Neukrantz, International/Martin Lawrence, NY/London, n.d. 1933?, 191 pages. This is a novel based closely on the actual events of the police attack on the 1929 May Day demonstrations in Berlin.

During the Nazi Era

The German Communist Resistance: 1933-1945, T. Derbent, Foreign Languages Press, Paris, 2021, 128 pages.

Ernst Thaelmann

Ernst Thaelmann, fighter against war and Fascism, International Labor Defense, NY, 1935, 16 pages.

German Social-Democracy in the Late 19th Century and Early 20th Century

General

German Social Democracy, six lectures, Bertrand Russell, with an appendix on the SDP and the Woman Question in Germany by Alys Russell, Longmans, Green and Co., London, 1896, 216 pages.

The German Social-Democratic Party: 1914-1921, Abraham Joseph Berlau, NY. Columbia University Ph.D. thesis, 1949, 373 pages.

The SDP and World War I

The Socialist Party in the Reichstag and the Declaration of War, P. G. La Chesnais, T. Fisher Unwin, London, 1915, 140 pages.

Otto Bauer

Otto Bauer (1881-1938): Thinker and Politician, Ewa Czerwinska-Schupp, Brill Open Access, Leiden. 2017, 442 pages.

August Bebel

Woman and Socialism, Jubilee 50th Edition, Socialist Literature Co., NY, 1910, 513 pages.

Speeches of August Bebel, International Publishers, NY, 1928, 104 pages.

My Life, by August Bebel, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, n.d. 1912?, 358 pages.

Karl Kautsky

The Class Struggle, written in 1892 about the 1891 Erfurt Program, Charles H. Kerr and Co., Chicago, 1910, 217 pages.

Communism in Central Europe in the time of the Reformation, T. Fisher Unwin, London, 1897, 298 pages.

Ethics and the Materialist Conception of History, n.d. but the original German book was written in 1906, 216 pages.

The Social Revolution, with 2 lectures presented by Karl Kautsky in Amsterdam in 1902: Reform and Revolution and The Day After the Revolution, Charles H. Kerr and Co., Chicago, 1910, 190 pages.

The High Cost of Living: Changes in Gold-Production and the Rise in Prices, Charles H. Kerr and Co., Chicago, 1914, 133 pages.

The Dictatorship of the Proletariat, translated by H. J. Stenning, National Labour Press, Manchester, n.d. 1918 or 1919?, 158 pages.

Terrorism and Communism: A Contribution to the Natural History of Revolution, National Labour Press, Ltd., London, n.d. but first published in 1920, 245 pages.

The Guilt of William Hohenzollern, Skeffington and Son, Ltd., London, n.d. but late 1919 or early 1920, 270 pages.

Georgia – a Social-Democratic Peasant Republic: Impressions and Observations, translated by H. J. Stenning and revised by the Author, International Bookshops, Ltd., London,1921), 118 pages.

The twelve who are to die: The trial of the Socialists-Revolutionists in Moscow, with W. Woitinsky, published by the Delegation of the Party of Socialists-Revolutionists (i.e., the Russian Social-Revolutionary Party), Berlin, 1922), 144 pages.

Foundations of Christianity – a study of Christian origins, International Publishers, NY, 1925, 488 pages.

The Labour Revolution, George Allen and Unwin, London, 1925, 293 pages.

The Economic Doctrines of Karl Marx, A. and C. Black Ltd., London, 1925, 264 pages. Translated by H. J. Stenning.

Are the Jews a Race?, International, NY, English translation of 2nd German ed., 1926, 254 pages.

Thomas More and His Utopia, International Publishers, NY, 1927, 257 pages.

Academic and Historical Works on the Revolutionary Movement in Germany

General and Overall

The German Revolution, 1918-1919, Ralph Haswell Lutz, Stanford University, 1922, 187 pages.

The German Revolution and After, Heinrich Ströbel, Jarrolds, London, n.d. but circa 1923, 319 pages.

The November Revolution (of 1918) and the Overthrow of the Emperor

And the Kaiser abdicates – the story of the death of the German Empire and the birth of the Republic, told by an eyewitness, S. Miles Bouton, Yale University, New Haven, 1920, 280 pages.

Germany after the Armistice, Maurice Berger, Putnam, NY, 1920, 374 pages. About prevailing social conditions and attitudes.

Ebert and the German Republic, Robert George Brehmer, Jr., University of Wisconsin MA thesis, 1926, 172 pages. Supportive of Ebert’s bourgeois-democratic politics.

The Spartacist Revolt – the attempted Socialist Revolution following World War I

Failure of a Revolution: Germany 1918-1919, Sebastian Haffner, Banner Press, Chicago, 1986, 224 pages. Somewhat messy scan; our apologies.

The Forgotten Revolution – Germany, a conceptual map, by Gaard Kets and James Muldoon, 2019, 24 pages.

The Spartacist Uprising of 1919, and the crisis of the German Socialist Movement, Eric Waldman, Marquette Univ. Press, Milwaukee 1958, 269 pages.

On the KPD up until World War II

We are neither visionaries nor Utopian dreamers, Willi Münzenberg, the League Against Imperialism, and the Comintern, 1925-1933, Fredrik Petersson, Ph.D Thesis, 2013, 598 pages.

 

The Angel of the North – Antony Gormley – Gateshead

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Angel of the North

Angel of the North

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The Angel of the North – Antony Gormley – Gateshead

From controversial to inspirational

“The birth of the Angel marked the beginning of a great deal of change in our borough and indeed the wider region. It was the catalyst for the cultural regeneration of Gateshead Quays that led to the Gateshead Millennium Bridge, BALTIC and Sage.”

The Angel of the North is as much a part of Gateshead’s identity as the Statue of Liberty is to New York. Since it first spread its wings in February 1998, it has become one of the most talked about and recognisable pieces of public art ever produced.

It was in 1990 that the site, a former colliery pithead baths, was re-claimed and earmarked for a future sculpture. When sculptor Antony Gormley was selected as the winning artist in 1994, his designs originally caused uproar. The controversial material and site of the sculpture were frowned upon. However, once in place many people’s original views on the piece changed completely. Local residents have fallen in love with the Angel and it has become synonymous with Gateshead.

Amazing facts about the Angel of the North.

  • It is believed to be the largest angel sculpture in the world
  • It is one of the most famous artworks in the region – almost two thirds of people in the North East had already heard of the Angel of the North before it was built
  • Its 54 metre (175 foot) wingspan is bigger than a Boeing 757 or 767 jet and almost the same as a Jumbo jet
  • It is 20 metres (65 feet) high – the height of a five storey building or four double decker buses
  • It weighs 200 tonnes – the body 100 tonnes and the wings 50 tonnes each
  • There is enough steel in it to make 16 double decker buses or four Chieftain tanks
  • It will last for more than 100 years
  • It will withstand winds of more than 100 miles per hour
  • Below the sculpture, massive concrete piles 20 metres deep will anchor it to the solid rock beneath
  • It is made of weather resistant Cor-ten steel, containing a small amount of copper, which forms a patina on the surface that mellows with age
  • Huge sections of the Angel – up to six metres wide and 25 metres long – were transported to the site by lorry with a police escort
  • The total cost of The Angel of the North was £800,000.

The Artist

The sculpture was designed by internationally renowned sculptor Antony Gormley.

Antony Gormley OBE, who was born in 1950, is at the forefront of a generation of celebrated British artists who emerged during the 1980s. He has exhibited work around the world and has major public works in the USA, Japan, Australia, Norway and Eire. Public work in Britain can be seen in locations as diverse as the crypt at Winchester Cathedral and Birmingham city centre. In 1994 he won the prestigious Turner Prize and in 1997 was awarded the OBE for services to sculpture. He has exhibited in the Victoria and Albert Museum, Tate Gallery, British Museum and the Henry Moore Sculpture Gallery in Leeds.

“People are always asking, why an angel? The only response I can give is that no-one has ever seen one and we need to keep imagining them. The angel has three functions – firstly a historic one to remind us that below this site coal miners worked in the dark for two hundred years, secondly to grasp hold of the future, expressing our transition from the industrial to the information age, and lastly to be a focus for our hopes and fears – a sculpture is an evolving thing.”

Gormley said of the Angel: “The hilltop site is important and has the feeling of being a megalithic mound. When you think of the mining that was done underneath the site, there is a poetic resonance. Men worked beneath the surface in the dark. Now in the light, there is a celebration of this industry. The face will not have individual features. The effect of the piece is in the alertness, the awareness of space and the gesture of the wings – they are not flat, they’re about 3.5 degrees forward and give a sense of embrace. The most important thing is that this is a collaborative venture. We are evolving a collective work from the firms of the North East and the best engineers in the world.”

Above from: The history of the Angel of the North, Gateshead Council website.

Location;

Low Eighton, Lamesley, overlooking the A1 and A167 roads, at the southern entrance to Gateshead.

GPS;

54.9141°N

1.5895°W

How to get there;

Bus Angel 21, from Durham to Newcastle passes by the sculpture.

Although not in the United Kingdom another, even taller, public sculpture created by Gormley can be found close to the town of Lelystad, in the Netherlands. This is called Exposure, and if you visit in the winter you can understand how appropriate that name is.

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Bill Bland – anti-Revisionist writings

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Bill Bland

Bill Bland

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The Great ‘Marxist-Leninist’ Theoreticians

Bill Bland (1916-2001) – anti-Revisionist writings

Bill Bland was one of those British Communists who refused to accept the Revisionism which came to power in the Union of Soviet Socialist States (USSR) with the ascendency of Nikita Khrushchev following the death of Comrade Joseph Stalin in 1953.

In 1956, at the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union – CPSU (during the so-called Secret Speech) Khrushchev laid out the line of Soviet Revisionism but due to (perhaps mistaken) efforts by those revolutionary Communists to maintain unity it was until after the Meeting of the 81 Communist and Workers Parties in Moscow, on the 16th November, 1960, (where Enver Hoxha gave one of the most principled presentations of any Marxist-Leninist in the 20th century) that Revolutionary Marxist-Leninists worldwide were finally convinced the degeneration of the CPSU was irrevocable.

Bland was involved in the Anti-Revisionist Movement in Britain and was one of the founding members of the Marxist-Leninist Organisation of Britain (MLOB). Following disagreements and splits within the MLOB Bland founded the Communist League in 1975. He also was instrumental in the formation of the Stalin Society in the UK in 1991. He was subsequently expelled from that organisation when the supporters of Mao Tse-tung became dominant.

Bland was very much pro-Enver Hoxha and anti-Mao Tse-tung. This would have caused difficulties in the period between 1961 and 1976 when the People’s Socialist Republic of Albania and the People’s Republic of China stood shoulder to shoulder in the struggle against Revisionism during what was known as the Polemic in the International Communist Movement during the 1960s.

This pro-Hoxha, pro-People’s Socialist Republic of Albania stance might have gained some credibility following the death of Chairman Mao in 1976 with the coup and the assumption of power by the ‘capitalist roaders’ in China but following the collapse of the Socialist society in Albania in 1991 the differences became academic.

Now the challenge is to get the parasites in control out of their positions. We can have the struggle between different lines of thought after that milestone has been passed. The documents below can be considered part of that forthcoming Cultural Revolution.

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Engels’ ‘Condition of the working class in England’, paper presented at the International Seminar held in Italy, December 1995 to commemorate the Centenary of the death of Frederick Engels, 39 pages.

German-Soviet Non-aggression Pact – 1939, presented to the Stalin Society in London, February 1990, 21 pages.

Lenin’s Testament – 1922-1923, n.d., 45 pages.

Manifesto of the Communist League, Where we stand, adopted December 1975, 5 pages.

Meeting of German and British Marxist-Leninists, between the Communist League of the UK and the Communist Party of Germany (Marxist-Leninist), April 1999, 2 pages.

Socialists and fascism, n.d., 2 pages.

Stalin and the arts, an extended and annotated version of a lecture given at the Stalin Society in London in May 1993, 65 pages.

Stalinism, address to the Sarat Academy in London on 30th April 1999, 5 pages.

The ‘doctors case’ and the death of Stalin, an extended and annotated version of a lecture given to the Stalin Society in October 1991, 82 pages.

The assassination of Trotsky, Compass, magazine of the Communist League, No. 110, February 1994, 16 pages.

The Cominform fights Revisionism, presented to the Stalin Society in London, ca 1998, 16 pages.

The Cominform fights Revisionism, presented to the Stalin Society in London, ca 1998, version produced by the Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line, 16 pages.

The enforced resettlements, a paper presented to the Stalin Society in London in July 1993, 17 pages.

The historical significance of Stalin’s ‘Economic problems of Socialism in the USSR’, n.d., 31 pages.

The market under Socialism, paper presented following a presentation by Ella Rule at the Stalin Society on Stalin’s ‘Economic problems of Socialism in the USSR’, n.d., 6 pages.

The Pakistani revolution, Report of the Central Committee of the Marxist-Leninist Organisation of Britain, ca 1969, reprinted 2001 by Alliance, 86 pages.

The question of [trade] protection, January 1992, 2 pages.

The Revolutionary process in colonial countries, a paper presented on behalf of the Communist League, at the Marxist-Leninist Seminar in London in July 1993, 17 pages.

The struggle against Revisionism in the field of linguistics, Compass, magazine of the Communist League, No. 126, February 1997, 30 pages.

The Workers Party of Korea and Revisionism, n.d., 18 pages.

United Front tactics, paper presented to the Stalin Society in London, n.d., 15 pages.

More on Britain …

The Great ‘Marxist-Leninist’ Theoreticians