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Terrorism and Communism: a Contribution to the Natural History of Revolution

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Terrorism and Communism: a Contribution to the Natural History of Revolution Terrorism and Communism A Contribution to the Natural History of Revolution Karl Kautsky 1919 Preface I. Revolution and Terror II. Paris III. The Great Revolution IV. The First Paris Commune The Paris Proletariat and Its Fighting Methods The Failure of Terrorism V. The Traditions of the Reign of Terror VI. The Second Paris Commune The Origin of the Commune Workmen’s Councils and the Central Committee The Jacobins in the Commune The International and the Commune The Socialism of the Commune Centralisation and Federalism Terrorist Ideas of the Commune VII. The Effect of Civilisation on Human Customs Brutality and Humanity Two Tendencies Slaughter and Terrorism The Humanising of Conduct in the Nineteenth Century The Effects of the War VIII. The Communists at Work Expropriation and Organisation The Growth of the Proletariat The Dictatorship Corruption The Change in Bolshevism The Terror The Outlook for the Soviet Republic The Outlook for the World Revolution Preface The following work was begun about a year ago, but was dropped as the result of the Revolution of November 9; for the Revolution brought me other obligations than merely theoretical and historical research. It was only after several months that I could return to the work in order, with occasional interruptions, to bring this book to a class. The course of recent events did not minister to the uniformity of this work. It was rendered more difficult by the fact that, as time went on, the examination of this subject shifted itself to some extent. My starting point represented the central problem of modern Socialism, the attitude of Social Democracy to Bolshevik methods. But since Bolshevism had, of its own accord, referred to the Paris Commune of 1871 as being to some extent its precursor and its prototype, and as having received the sanction of Marx himself, and since the Commune is little known and understood by the present generation, I undertook to draw a parallel between the Commune and the Soviet Republic. In order to make the Commune comprehensible I had to refer to the Paris Commune, and afterwards to the French Revolution and its Reign of Terror. This gave me fresh means for another parallel to the Soviet Republic, hence an examination of the Commune led to an examination of Terrorism, its origin and its consequences. Thus there are two lines of thought which become merged in this book, the one occasionally leading away from the other. At first I felt this to be rather disturbing, and even considered whether it would not be better to divide the work into two separate sections, the one representing the exposition of the Commune, the other a, discussion of Terrorism. However, in regard to my starting point, the Soviet Republic is in such very close connection with these two events in history, that it seemed to me impossible to treat them separately. I hope therefore that, in spite of the difficulties inherent in the dual nature of this book, I shall have succeeded in preserving uniformity in the structure of the thoughts contained therein. However academic the reader may think many of my illustrations and expositions, they are all of the highest practical importance, especially at such a wildly fermented time as the present. This does not mean to say that I have adapted, as it were, the truth to the needs of the moment. Instead I have always sought, even in those sections where I was referring to a period long past, to treat only of that side of the subject which seemed calculated to throw light upon the chaos that surrounds us. If we regard only this chaos as it exists in Russia and Germany at the present moment, our prospects at the moment and our future must be very far from cheering. We see a world sinking under economic ruin and fratricidal murder. In both countries we find Socialists under the Governments acting against other Socialists, with similar cruelty to that practised more than half a century ago by the Versailles butchers of the Commune ? cruelty which has earned the most laudable indignation of the whole International Proletariat ever since. Nevertheless, the outlook becomes brighter se soon as we consider the International. The workers of West Europe have arisen. It rests with them to accomplish actual results, only with more worthy methods than those practised up to the present in the East. 2 Hence it is necessary that they should learn from us, and that they should learn to recognise the different methods of struggle, as well as of construction, by their results. It is not so much a blind adulation of the methods of the Revolution hitherto prevailing, but the strictest criticism which is necessary, and especially necessary just at present, when the Revolution and the Socialist Parties are passing through a most difficult crisis, in which different methods are struggling to gain the ascendancy. The success of the Revolution will depend not a little on whether or not it discovers the right methods of carrying the revolutionary message to the Proletariat. To examine methods is at the present moment our highest duty. To help with this examination and thus to further the Revolution is the object of this present work. Karl Kautsky Charlottenburg, June 1919 3 Chapter I Revolution and Terror Up to the outbreak of war, the idea was current in the widest circles of social democracy that the time for revolutions, not only for West Europe, but also for Germany and Austria., was long since past. Whoever thought differently was scoffed at as a revolutionary romancer. Now we have the Revolution with us, and it is taking on forms of barbarity, which even the most fantastic of revolutionary romancers could scarce have expected. The abolition of the death penalty was for every social democrat a perfectly obvious claim. The Revolution, however, has brought with it the most bloody terrorism practised by Socialist Governments. The Bolsheviks in Russia started this, and were in consequence condemned in the most bitter terms by all who did not accept the Bolshevik standpoint. Among them are the German Majority Socialists. Rut these latter hardly felt their own power threatened before they resorted to the same means practised by the Regime of Terror, which have characterised the Revolution in the East. Noske has boldly followed in Trotsky’s footsteps; certainly with this difference, that he himself does not regard his dictatorship as the dictatorship of the proletariat. But both justify their slaughter on the grounds of the rights of the Revolution. It is, in fact, a widely spread idea that Terrorism belongs to the very essence of revolution, and that whoever wants a revolution must somehow come to some sort of terms with terrorism. As proof of this assertion, over and over again the great French Revolution has been cited. It is regarded as the Revolution par excellence. An examination of Terrorism, of its conditions and consequences, can best proceed from a description of the Regime of Terror instituted by the Sans-culottists. With this we will begin. This will take us back same considerable distance from contemporary events, but these we shall better understand after an examination of the past. It is striking to find how many resemblances there are between the great French Revolution and the revolutions of the present time, especially the Russian. Yet the revolutions of our times differ in many essential points from the revolution of the 18th century. This is shown at once by a comparison of our proletariat, our industry and commerce, with the corresponding phenomena of that period. Chapter II Paris The present German Revolution has no centre, whereas the French Revolution was controlled from Paris. That Revolution, as well as the Regiment of Terror that operated within it, are quite incapable of comprehension, without a consideration of the economic and political importance which Paris had acquired for France as a whole. No town in the 18th, or indeed the 19th century has exercised such power as did Paris at that period. This was due to the importance which the royal residence as being the central Government possesses in a modern bureaucratic centralised State, so long as economic 4 decentralisation, which modern industrial capitalism and the development of means of transport bring in its train, has not set in. In a feudal State the powers of its central body, of its monarch, are in reality very few. Its functions do not extend very far, nor is the corresponding government apparatus at all large. This apparatus can be very easily transferred from one city or estate to another. The monarch is all the more often compelled to resort to this measure, so long as the system of transport remains in an undeveloped state, and so long as the separate localities do not suffice to maintain him and his retainers. Hence he has more urgent cause to visit personally the different regions of his domain, since this is the only means whereby he may count on preserving their fealty and obedience. In those early times, therefore, it was the chief business of the monarch to wander from place to place like a nomad, seeking out one rich pasturage after the other, forsaking it as soon as he had exhausted its possibilities. In process of time, however, the government apparatus undergoes development, especially as a result of the increase in production, which the money system makes possible, and which exacts tribute in payment of easily transportable coin, instead of cumbrous natural products. In proportion to the increase of tribute, the power of the monarch increases also, likewise the government apparatus in the form of a bureaucracy and a standing army.
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