Rosa Luxemburg Internet Archive
Rebuilding the International
Written: 1915
Source: Die Internationale no.1, 1915
Transcription/Markup: Dario Romeo and Brian Basgen
Online Version: Rosa Luxemburg Internet Archive (marxists.org) 2000
On August 4th, 1914, German Social Democracy
abdicated politically, and at the same time the Socialist
International collapsed. All attempts at denying or concealing
this fact, regardless of the motives on which they are based, tend
objectively to perpetuate, and to justify, the disastrous
self-deception of the socialist parties, the inner malady of the
movement, that led to the collapse, and in the long run to make
the Socialist International a fiction, a hypocrisy.
To collapse itself is without precedent in the history of all
times. Socialism or Imperialism – this alternative summarizes
completely the political orientation of the labour parties in the
past decade. For in Germany it was formulated in innumerable
program speeches, mass meetings, brochures and newspaper articles
as the slogan of Social Democracy, as the party’s
interpretation of the tendencies of the present historical
epoch.
With the outbreak of the world war, word has become substance,
the alternative has grown from a historical tendency into the
political situation. Faced with this alternative, which it had
been the first to recognize and bring to the masses’
consciousness, Social Democracy backed down without a struggle and
conceded victory to imperialism. Never before in the history of
class struggles, since there have been political parties, has
there been a party that, in this way, after fifty years of
uninterrupted growth, after achieving a first-rate position of
power, after assembling millions around it, has so completely and
ignominiously abdicated as a political force within twenty-four
hours, as Social Democracy has done. Precisely because it was the
best-organized and best-disciplined vanguard of the International,
the present-day collapse of socialism can be demonstrated by
Social Democracy’s example.
Kautsky, as the representative of the so-called ‘Marxist
Centre’, or, in political term, as the theoretician of the
swamp, has for years degraded theory into the obliging hand-maiden
of the official practice of the party bureaucrats and thus made
his own sincere contribution to the present collapse of the
party. Already he has thought out an opportune new theory to
justify and explain the collapse. According to this theory, Social
Democracy is an instrument for peace but not a means of combatting
war. Or, as Kautsky’s faithful pupils in the Austrian
‘struggle’, sighing profusely at the present aberration of
German Social Democracy, decree: the only policy befitting
socialism during the war is ‘silence’; only when the bells
of peace peal out can socialism again begin to function.(1) This theory of
a voluntary assumed eunuch role, which says that socialism’s
virtue can be upheld only if, at the crucial moments, it is
eliminated as a factor in world history, suffer from the basic
mistake of all account of political impotence: it overlooks the
most vital factor.
Faced with the alternative of coming out for or against the
war, Social Democracy, from the moment it abandoned its
opposition, has been forced by the iron compulsion of history to
throw its full weight behind the war. The same Kautsky who in the
memorable meeting of the parliamentary party of August
3rd pleaded for its consent to the war credits, the
same ‘Austro-Marxists’ (as they call themselves) who now see
as self-evident the Social-Democratic parliamentary party’s
consent to the war credits – even they now occasionally shed a
few tears at the nationalistic excesses of the Social-Democratic
party organs and at their inadequate theoretical training,
particularly in the razor-thin separation of the concept of
‘nationality’ and of other ‘concepts’ allegedly guilty
of those aberrations. But events have their own logic, even when
human beings do not. Once Social Democracy’s parliamentary
representative had decided in favour of supporting the war,
everything else followed automatically with the inevitability of
historical destiny.
On August 4th, German Social Democracy, far from
being ‘silent’, assumed an extremely important historical
function: the shield-bearer of imperialism in the present
war. Napoleon ones said that two factors decide the outcome of a
battle: the ‘earthly’ factor, consisting of the terrain,
quality of the weapons, weather, etc,, and the ‘divine’
factor, that is, the moral constitution of the army, its morale,
its belief in its own cause. The ‘earthly’ factor was taken
care of on the German side largely by the Krupp firm of Essen; the
‘divine’ factor can be charged above all to Social
Democracy’s account. The services since August 4th
that it has rendered and it is rendering daily to the German war
leaders are immeasurable: the trade unions that on the outbreak of
war shelved their battle for higher wages and invested with the
aura of ‘socialism’ all the military authorities’
security measures aimed at preventing popular uprisings; the
Social-Democratic women who withdrew all their time and effort
from Social-Democratic agitation and, arm in arm with bourgeois
patriots, used these to assist the needy warriors’ families;
the Social-Democratic press which, with a few exceptions, uses its
daily papers and weekly and monthly periodicals to propagate the
war as a national cause and the cause of the proletariat; that
press which, depending on the turns the war takes, depicts the
Russian peril and the horror of the Tsarist government, or
abandons a perfidious Albion to the people’s hatred, or
rejoices at the uprisings and revolutions in foreign colonies; or
which prophesies the re-strengthening of Turkey after this war,
which promises freedom to the Poles, the Ruthenians and all
peoples, which imparts martial bravery and heroism to the
proletarian youth – in short, completely manipulates public
opinion and the masses for the ideology of war; the
Social-Democratic parliamentarians and party leaders, finally, who
not only consent to funds for the waging of war, but who attempt
to suppress energetically any disquieting stirrings of doubt and
criticism in the masses, calling these ‘intrigues’, and who
for their part support the government with personal services of a
discreet nature, such as brochures, speeches and articles
displaying the most genuine German-national patriotism – when
in world history was there a war in which anything like this
happened?
Where and when has the suspension of all constitutional rights
been accepted so submissively as a matter of course? Where has
such a hymn of praise to the most severe press censorship been
sung from the rank of the opposition as it has in the individual
newspapers of German Social Democracy? Never before has a war
found such Pindars; never has a military dictatorship found such
obedience; never has a political party so fervently sacrificed all
that it stood for and possessed on the altar of a cause which it
had sworn a thousand times before the world to fight to the last
drop of blood. Judged against this metamorphosis, the National
Liberals are real Roman Catos, rochers de bronze [bronze
rocks]. Precisely the powerful organization and the much-praised
discipline of German Social Democracy were confirmed when the body
of four million allowed a handful of parliamentarism to turn it
around and harness it to a wagon heading in the opposite direction
to its aim in life. The fifty years of preparatory work by Social
Democracy have materialized in the present war. And the trade
unions and party leaders can claim that the impetus and victorious
strength of this war on the German side are in large measure the
fruits of the ‘training’ of the masses in the proletarian
organizations. Marx and Engels, Lassalle and Liebknecht, Bebel and
Singer trained the German proletariat so that Hindenburg might
lead it. And the more advanced the training, the organization, the
famous discipline, the consolidation of the trade unions and the
workers’ press in Germany, in comparison with France, the more
affective is the assistance rendered to war by German Social
Democracy than that given by the France Social-Democratic
Party. The France socialists, together with their ministers, seem
to be the merest dabblers in the unfamiliar trade of nationalism
and the waging of war, when one compares their deeds with the
services being rendered to the patriotic imperialism by German
Social Democracy and the German trade unions.
II
The official theory which misuses Marxism as it pleases for the
current domestic requirements of the party officials in order to
justify their day-to-day dealings, and whose organ is Die Neue
Zeit, attempts to explain the minor discrepancy between the
present function of the workers’ party and its words of
yesterday by saying that international socialism was much
concerned with the question of doing something against the
outbreak of war, but not with doing something after it had broken
out.(2) Like a
girl who obliges all, this theory assures us that the most
wonderful harmony prevail between the present practice of
socialism and its past, that none of the socialist parties need
reproach themselves with anything which would call into question
their membership in the International. At the same time, however,
this conveniently elastic theory also has an adequate explanation
at hand for the contradiction between the present position of
international Social Democracy and its past, a contradiction that
strikes even the most short-sighted of people. The International
is said to have aired only the question of the prevention of
war. Then, however, ‘the war was upon us’, as the formula
goes, and now it turns out that quite different standards of
behaviour apply to the socialists after the war had begun than
before it. The moment the war was upon us, the only question left
for the proletariat of each country was: victory or defeat. Or, as
another ‘Austro-Marxist’, F. Adler, explained more in terms
of natural science and philosophy: the nation, like any organism,
must above all ensure its survival. In good German this means: for
the proletariat there is not one vital rule, as scientific
socialism has hitherto proclaimed, but rather there are two such
rules: one for peace and one for war. In peace-time the class
struggle applies within each country, and international solidarity
vis-à-vis other countries; in war-time it is class
solidarity within and the struggle between the workers of the
various countries without. The global historical appeal of the
Communist Manifesto undergoes a fundamental revision and,
as amended by Kautsky, now reads: proletarians of all countries,
unite in peace-time and cut each other’s throats in war! Thus
today: ‘Every shell a Russian in Hell – every engagement a
dead Frenchman’ (jeder Schuss ein Russ – jeder Stoss ein
Franzos), and tomorrow, after peace has been concluded:
‘We embrace the millions of the whole world.’ For the
International is ‘essentially an instrument for peace’ but
not an ‘effective implement in war’.(3)
This obliging theory does not merely open up charming
perspectives for Social-Democratic practice by elevating the
fickleness of the parliamentary party, coupled with the Jesuitism
of the Centre Party, to virtually a fundamental dogma of the
Socialist International. It also inaugurates a completely new
‘revision’ of historical materialism compared with which all
Bernstein’s former attempts appear as innocent child’s
play. The proletarian tactics prior to and after the outbreak of
the war are supposed to be based on different, indeed opposite,
guiding principles. This presupposes that the social conditions,
the foundations of our tactics, are also basically different in
war than in peace. According to historical materialism as founded
by Marx, all hitherto written history is the history of class
struggles. According to Kautsky’s revised materialism, the
words, ‘except in time of war’, must be added. Accordingly,
social development, since for millennia it has been periodically
interspersed with wars, take its course according to the following
scheme: a period of class struggle, then a pause in which there is
a merger of the classes and a national struggle, then again a
period of class struggles, again a pause and class merger, and so
forth, in this charming pattern. Each time the foundations of
social life in peace-time are turned upside down by the outbreak
of war and those in periods of war are inverted the moment peace
is concluded. This, as one can see, is no longer a theory of
social development ‘in catastrophes’, against which Kautsky
once had to defend himself, this is a theory of development –
in somersaults. According to this theory, society moves in
somewhat the same manner as an iceberg driven by spring waters,
which, when in base has melted away all side in the tepid stream,
after a certain time does a nose dive, whereupon this cute gam
periodically repeats itself.
Now this revised historical materialism crudely affronts all
the hitherto accepted facts of history. This freshly constructed
antithesis between war and class struggle neither explains nor
demonstrates that constant dialectical transition from war into
class struggle and from class struggle into war, which reveals
their essential inner unity. So it was in the wars within medieval
cities, in the wars of the Reformation, in the Dutch war of
liberation, in the wars of the great French Revolution, in the
American War of Secession, in the uprising of the Paris Commune,
in the great Russian Revolution of 1905. And this is not all; even
in purely abstract-theoretical terms, Kautsky’s theory of
historical development completely wipes out the Marxist theory, as
a moment’s reflection would make clear. For if, as Marx
assumes, both the class struggle and war do not fall from the sky,
but originate in deeply rooted economic and social causes, then
the two cannot disappear periodically unless their causes vanish
into thin air. Now the proletarian class struggle is only a
necessary consequence of the economic exploitation and of the
political class rule of the bourgeoisie. But during the war,
economic exploitation does not diminish in the least; on the
contrary, its impetus is increased immensely by the speculative
mania which flourishes in the exuberant atmosphere of war and
industry, and by the pressure of the political dictatorship on the
worker. Neither is the political class rule of the bourgeoisie
diminished in war-time; on the contrary, it is raised to a stark
class dictatorship by the suspension of constitutional
rights. Since the economic and political sources of the class
struggle in society inevitably increase tenfold in war-time, how
then can the class struggle cease to exist? Conversely, in the
present historical periods, wars originate in the competitive
interests of groups of capitalists and in capitalism’s need to
expand. Both motives, however, are operative not only while the
canons are roaring, but also during peace-time, which means that
they prepare and make inevitable further outbreaks of war. War is
indeed – as Kautsky is wont to quote from Clausewitz – only
‘the continuations of politics by other means’. And the
imperialist phase of the rule of capitalism has indeed made peace
illusory by actually declaring the dictatorship of militarism –
war – to be permanent.
For the exponents of the revised historical materialism, this
results in the necessity of choosing between two
alternatives. Either the class struggle is the paramount law of
existence of the proletariat, and the party officials’
proclamation of class harmony in its place during war-time is an
outrage against the proletariat’s vital interests; or the class
struggle in both war and peace is an outrage against the
‘national interests’ and ‘the security of the
fatherland’. Both in war-time and in peace-time, either the
class struggle or class harmony is the fundamental factor of
social life. In practice the alternative is even clearer: either
Social Democracy must say pater peccavi to the patriotic
bourgeoisie (as former young daredevils and present day old
devotees in our ranks are already proclaiming contritely) and thus
have to revise fundamentally all its tactics and principles, in
peace-time as well as in war-time, in order to adapt to its
present social-imperialist position; or the party will have to say
pater peccavi to the international proletariat and adapt
its behaviour during the war to its principles in peace-time. And
what applies to the German labour movement of course also applies
to the French.
Either the International will remain a refuse heap after the
war, or its resurrection will begin on the basis of the class
struggle from which alone it draws its vital forces. Not by
re-telling the same old story will it be revived after the war,
not by returning fresh, cheerful, marry and bold, as though noting
had happened, not by playing the old melodies that captivated the
world until August 4th. Only by means of an
‘excruciantingly thorough denunciation of our own indecision
and weakness’, of our own moral fall since August
4th, can be rebuilding of the International begin. And
the first step in this direction is to take action for the rapid
termination of the war and for the preparation of a peace in
accordance with the common interest of the international
proletariat.
III
Until now, only two positions on the question of peace have
been visible within the party. The first of these, advocated by a
member of a Party Executive, Scheidemann, and by several other
Reichstag deputies and party newspapers, echoes the government in
its support of the slogan of ‘holding out’, and opposes the
movement for peace as inopportune and dangerous to the military
interests of the fatherland. The proponents of this trend advocate
the continuation of the war and are thus objectively ensuring that
the war is continued according to the wishes of the ruling classes
'‘until a victory is won which accords with the sacrifices
made’, until ‘a secure peace’ is guaranteed. In other
words, the supporters of the policy of ‘holding out’ are
ensuring that the actual development of the war approximates as
closely as possible to the imperialist conquests which the
Post, which Rohrbach, Dix and others prophets of
Germany’s global dominance have openly declared to be the aim
of the war. If all these wonderful dreams do not become reality,
if the trees of youthful imperialism do not grow into the sky, it
will not be through any fault of the Post people and
their pacemakers in Social Democracy. It is apparently not the
solemn ‘declarations’ in parliament ‘against any policy
of conquest’ that are conclusive for the outcome of the war,
but rather the affirmation of the policy of ‘holding
out’. The war, whose continuation is advocated by Scheidemann
and others, has its own logic. Its real sponsors are those
capitalistic-agrarian elements that are in the saddle in Germany
today, not the modest figures of the Social-Democratic
parliamentarians and editors who merely hold the stirrup for
them. Among those propagating this trend, the social-imperialist
attitude of the party is most clearly manifest.
While in France, too, the party leaders – admittedly in a
completely different military situation – cling to the slogan,
‘hold out until victory’, a movement for the speediest
termination of the war is making itself gradually but increasingly
felt in all countries. The greatest single characteristic of all
these thoughts and desires for peace is the most cautious
preparation of peace guarantees which are to be demanded before
war is finished. Not only the universal demand for no annexations,
but also a whole series of new demands are appearing: universal
disarmament (or, more modestly, systematic limitation of the arms
race), abolition of secret diplomacy, free trade for all nations
in the colonies, and other such wonderful proposals. The admirable
aspect of all these clauses calling for the future happiness of
humanity and for the prevention of future wars is the
irrepressible optimism with which, emerging intact from the
terrible catastrophe of the present war, new resolutions are to be
planted at the grave of the old aspirations. If the collapse of
August 4th has proved anything, it is the lesson in
world history that neither pious hopes nor cleverly devised
utopian formulas addressed to the ruling class can provide
effective guarantees of peace or build a wall against war.
The only real safeguard for peace depends on the resolution of
the proletariat to remain faithful to its class politics and its
international solidarity through all the storm of
imperialism. There was no lack of demands and formulae on the part
of the socialist parties in the crucial countries, above all in
Germany; the deficiency was in their ability to back up these
demands with a will and with deeds in the spirit of the class
struggle and internationalism. If today, after all that we
experienced, we viewed the action for peace as a process for of
reasoning out the best formulae against war, this would be the
greatest danger to international socialism. For this would mean
that, despite its cruel lessons, it would have learnt nothing and
forgotten nothing.
Here again we find the prime example of this in Germany. In a
recent issue of Die Neue Zeit, the Reichstag deputy,
Hoch, laid down a peace programme which – as the party organ
attested – he warmly supported. Nothing was missing from this
programme: neither a list of enumerated demand which was supposed
to prevent future was in the most painless and reliable manner,
nor a very convincing statement that an impending peace was
possible, necessary and desirable. There was only one thing
missing: an explanation of how one should work for this peace with
act, not with ‘desires’! For the author belongs to the
compact majority in the parliamentary party that not only twice
voted for war credits, but also in each occasion called its action
a political, patriotic, socialist necessity. And excellently
drilled in its new role, this group is prepared to grant further
credits for the continuation of the war as a matter of course. To
support a material means of continuing the war, and, in the same
breath, to praise the desirability of an early peace with all its
blessings, ‘to press the sword into the government’s fist
with one hand and with the other to wave the soft palm branch over
the International’ – this is a classical chapter in
practical politics of the swamp as propagated theoretically in the
same Neue Zeit. When the socialists of neutral countries,
for example the Copenhagen Conference participants, seriously
consider the preparation of demands and proposals for peace on
paper as an action contributing to the speedy termination of the
war, then this is a relatively harmless error. An understanding of
this salient point in the present situation of the International
and of the causes of its collapse can and must be common property
of all socialist parties. The redeeming deed for the restoration
of peace and of the International can only emanate from the
socialist parties of the belligerent countries. The first step
towards peace and towards the International is the rejection of
social imperialism. And if the Social-Democratic parliamentarians
continue to approve funds for the waging of the war, then their
desires and declarations for peace and their solemn proclamation
‘against any policy of conquest’, are a hypocrisy and a
delusion. This is particularly true of Kautsky’s International
and its members who alternately embrace one another fraternally
and cut each other’s throat, declare that they ‘have nothing
with which to reproach themselves’. Here again events have
their own logic. When they grant war credits, people like Hoch
surrender the controlling reins and bring about the virtual
opposite of peace, namely, a policy of ‘holding out’. When
people like Scheidemann support the policy of ‘holding out’,
they in fact hand over the reins to the Post people and
thus accomplish the reverse of their solemn declarations against
‘any policy of conquest’, i.e. the unleashing of the
imperialist instincts – until the country bleeds to death. Here
again there is only one choice: either Bethmann-Hollweg – or
Liebknecht. Either imperialism or socialism as Marx understood
it.
Just as in Marx himself the roles of acute historical analyst
and bold revolutionary, the man of ideas and the man of action
were inseparably bond up, mutually supporting and complementing
each other, so for the first time in the history of the modern
labour movement the socialist teaching of Marxism united
theoretical knowledge with revolutionary energy, the one
illuminating and stimulating the other. Both are in equal measure
part of the essence of Marxism; each, separated from the other,
transforms Marxism into a sad caricature of itself. In the course
of half a century, the German Social Democracy harvested the most
abundant fruit from the theoretical knowledge of Marxism and,
nurtured on its milk, grew into a powerful body. Put to the
greatest historical test – a test which, moreover, it had
foreseen theoretically with scientific certainty and foretold in
all its important features – Social Democracy was found
completely lacking in the second vital element of the labour
movement: the energetic will, not merely be to understand history,
but to change it as well. With all its exemplary theoretical
knowledge and strength of organization, the party was caught in
the vortex of the historical current, turned around in a trice
like a rudderless hulk, and exposed to the winds of imperialism
against which it was supposed to work its way forward to the
saving islands of socialism. Even without the mistakes of others,
the defeat of the whole International was sealed by this failure
of its ‘vanguard’, its best trained and strongest
élite.
It was an epoch-making collapse of the first order which
enmeshes man and delays his liberation from capitalism. However if
it comes down to it, Marxism itself is not completely without
blame. And all attempts to adapt Marxism to the present
decrepitude of socialist practice, to prostitute it to the level
of the venal apologetics of social imperialism, are more dangerous
than even all the open and glaring excesses of nationalistic
errors in the ranks of the party; these attempts tend not only to
conceal the real causes of the great failure of the International,
but also to drain sources of its future rebuilding. If the
International, like the peace, is to correspond to the interests
of the proletarian cause, it must be born of the self-criticism of
the proletariat, of its reflection upon its own power, the same
power that broke like a reed in a storm, but that, grown to its
true size, is historically qualified to uproot thousand-years-old
oaks of social injustice and to move mountains. The road to this
power – one that is not paved with resolutions – is at the
same time the road to peace and to the rebuilding of the
International.
(1)
See the article by F. Adler in the January numbers of Kampf.
(2)
See Kautsky’s article in the Die Neue Zeit of October 2nd of last year [1914].
(3)
See Kautsky’s article in the Die Neue Zeit of October 27th of last year [1914].