The German-Dutch Communist Left - Libcom

towards anarchism and ‘propaganda by the deed’. In 1885 it was succeeded by that of the ‘Jungen’, based on the
students and bohemian intellectual milieu of Berlin. Led by Max Schippel (1859-1928), Conrad Schmidt (1863–
1932), Ignaz Auer (1846-1907), and later by Georg von Vollmar (1850-1922), it revolted against the
‘dictatorship’ of the parliamentary fraction, and in 1886 boycotted the Berlin local elections. It denounced the
“petty-bourgeois and state socialist influence” in the Social-Democratic Party. But above all, it proposed the
replacement of a centralised organisation with the “formation of autonomous – in other words independent –
groups, in which the centralist principle is left completely to one side”. In 1891, the split became final. The
‘Jungen’ created the federalist Association of Independent Socialists (Verein Unabhängiger Sozialisten). Like
the anarchists, it developed the idea of the ‘individualisation of the worker’ and advocated the tactics of ‘pure
class struggle’, along with a vigorous antiparliamentarism. Hostile to anarchism at the outset, most of the
Association’s members – like Gustav Landauer (1870-1919) – moved towards this current. The organisation
broke up in 1894, most of its militants returning to the SPD. Its leaders, such as Max Schippel, and Georg von
Vollmar, were soon to become spokesmen for revisionism. There are certainly similarities between the German
‘Jungen’ and the Domela Nieuwenhuis current. Ideologically, they prefigure the anti-centralist and anti-political
form of council communism. 10
In Belgium, the economic crisis affecting the whole of Europe in 1886 gave rise to violent workers’ riots. The
general strike spread spontaneously, like wildfire, especially in the French-speaking region (Wallonia). In an
atmosphere of intense social struggle, a current formed within the Belgian Workers’ Party (Parti Ouvrier Belge –
POB), calling for direct action. In 1887, Alfred Defuisseaux’s group left the POB to form the Republican
Socialist Party (PSR), which although in favour of universal suffrage – unlike the ‘Jungen’ – proclaimed itself
the champion of the insurrectional strike. Their ideology was coloured by Blanquism: calls for minority
violence, through the use of “petrol and dynamite”. This dissident group was based among the miners of
Borinage, and declared that “the revolution is thundering at the gate”. Without either programme or perspectives,
the group dissolved in 1889 and rejoined the Party. Its disappearance left the way open to a reformist and
electoralist orientation within the POB, which pushed the revolution into the background in favour of an
electoral strategy focused on the demand for universal suffrage. This orientation was expressed perfectly by
Cesar de Paepe (1842-1890): “If we want universal suffrage, it is to avoid revolution, since reform or revolution,
universal suffrage or universal upheaval is the dilemma facing the Belgian people today.” 11
In fact, the question facing the workers’ movement of the day was whether the period was immediately
revolutionary, or whether, on the contrary, it was the beginning of a cycle of capitalist growth implying an
activity of workers’ organisation within the unions and electoral agitation. On this question, Domela
Nieuwenhuis and the ‘Jungen’ in Germany crystallised an impatience which was all the more vigorous because
it was fed by large social movements and opposed the real reformist tendencies within emerging social
democracy.
The idea of ‘direct action’ encountered wide support within the SDB. It is highly significant that Johan Schaper
(1868-1934), a future leader of the revisionist current, proposed to the SDB’s 1898 congress that the party
should put aside money for weapons, and that the delegates should practice the revolver between sessions of the
congress! Shortly before their split, all the future revisionist leaders of the SDAP adopted an extremely radical
attitude: Henri Hubert van Kol (1852-1925), still a personal friend of Domela Nieuwenhuis, was antiparliamentarian,
and made inflammatory declarations in favour of revolution “by violent civil war alone”. In
1894, Pieter Jelles Troelstra (1860-1930) declared himself unconditionally in favour of violence. All these
inflammatory declarations, especially those of Schaper, led to the SDB being banned by the government in 1894.
The party changed its name to the ‘Socialistenbond’ (‘Socialist Union’). 12
10 See: H. M. Bock, Geschichte des ‘linken Radikalismus’ in Deutschland. Ein Versuch (Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1976),
pp. 38-73. See also introduction by Roger Dangeville: K. Marx, F. Engels, La Social-Démocratie allemande (Paris: 10/18,
1975).
11 C. de Paepe, Le Suffrage universel et la capacité politique de la Classe ouvrière (Gent: Drukkerij J. Foucaert, 1890), p. 10.
12 A. de Jong, op. cit., pp. 35-40.
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