Joel A Lewis Youth Against Fascism.pdf
Joel A Lewis Youth Against Fascism.pdf
Joel A Lewis Youth Against Fascism.pdf
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NOTES<br />
scribe themselves and the persons and the things they like and all the concepts of the unfavourable connotations to describe<br />
the persons and things they dislike… Each side contends that the other does not sincerely believe what it says." See<br />
William Glaser, "The Semantics of the Cold War," The Public Opinion Quarterly 20, no.4 (Winter, 1956-57): 691-716.<br />
For another insightful commentary on Cold War language, symbols and propaganda see Ole R. Holsti, "The Study of International<br />
Politics Makes Strange Bedfellows: Theories of the Radical Right and the Radical Left," The American Political<br />
Science Review 68, no.1 (March, 1974): 217-242.<br />
66. See V.I. Lenin, "Opportunism and the Collapse of the Second International," in The V.I. Lenin Internet Archive<br />
.<br />
67. By its very nature, periodization is an artificial historical tool that can obscure trends of continuity by focusing on dramatic<br />
divergence and change. The decision to reperiodize the inter-war era by generations was not an artificial choice, but<br />
flowed directly from the language utilized in Popular Front propaganda. Communists contended that the Great Depression<br />
and the Nazi Reich redefined world politics, necessitating a new approach to communist theory and practice. Popular<br />
Front propaganda contended that the youth of the thirties had a distinctly different world outlook and that this "new generation"<br />
was far more receptive to Popular Front theory and tactics. The Comintern and YCI therefore put great emphasis<br />
upon themes of "youth" and an "anti-fascist generation" in their Popular Front program. For a communist comparison of<br />
the distinctions between generations see Earl Browder, "Your Generation and Mine," Young Communist Review 4, no.3<br />
(May, 1939): 4-6.<br />
68. To "deny" that the communist movement was directed by the Comintern distorts the realities of this period and democratic<br />
centralism. The problem with studies like Thorpe's is that it focuses on individual cases of dissent that dismiss the<br />
Comintern's ability to coerce conformity. Numerous examples from the inter-war period show that continued dissent typically<br />
resulted in expulsion and demonization. The problem with the Haynes-Klehr approach is that it focuses upon the<br />
treasonous and slavish mindset that facilitated consent to the Comintern, not addressing the historical context or propaganda<br />
that bred active consent in "Stalinist" culture. The Comintern was consciously formed as a highly centralized institution<br />
for strategic reasons and continued to exert its leadership until it was dissolved in 1943. Individuals followed<br />
Comintern directives because they were interpreted to them through effective propaganda that bred consent and active<br />
agreement; communists were also well aware that active dissent could be met with coercion. High membership fluctuation<br />
in this period reflects the tensions involved in this process and relationship.<br />
VANGUARD OF THE RED DAWN: THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE LENINIST GENERATION<br />
1. Quoted in Victor Privalov, The Young Communist International and its Origins (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1971), 7-8.<br />
2. ECYCI, Remove the Frontiers! An Appeal for the International Organization of all Young Workers (Berlin: ECYCI,<br />
1920), 4.<br />
3. The Communist International, also known as the Third International or the Comintern, was founded in March, 1919 under<br />
the leadership of V.I. Lenin to create a new, highly centralized organization of international revolutionaries. The goal of<br />
the Comintern was to replace the "discredited" & reformist leadership of the Second International with a "World Communist<br />
Party" to lead the working class in an international socialist revolution.<br />
4. The Bolshevik Party was established in 1903 during a split within the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party between<br />
Menshevik reformists and Bolshevik revolutionaries. In 1918 the Bolsheviks changed their name to the "All-Russian<br />
Communist Party (Bolsheviks)," often known simply as the "Communist Party."<br />
5. The Second International, later known as the Labour and Socialist International, was founded in 1889 as a federalist body<br />
of political parties and labor unions to continue the movement for international socialism under the Marxist traditions of<br />
the First International. After the death of Engels in 1895, the Second International increasingly came under the "reformist"<br />
influences of the German evolutionary socialist Eduard Bernstein. With the outbreak of WWI, the Second International<br />
fell into disarray, helping to facilitate the establishment of the Comintern.<br />
6. Rejecting the Wilsonian vision of post-war reconstruction, the SYI came to accepting the basis of Lenin's April Thesis that<br />
capitulation to capitalist traditions and institutions under the post-war era of "Imperialism" would serve to strengthen capitalism,<br />
betray the revolution and in turn enable the perpetuation of future imperialist wars. See Arno Mayer, Wilson vs.<br />
Lenin: Political Origins of the New Diplomacy 1917-1918, (Cleveland: Meridian Books, 1964).<br />
7. See R. Craig Nation, War on War: Lenin, the Zimmerwald Left, and the Origins of Communist Internationalism (London:<br />
Duke University Press, 1989), ix.<br />
8. Karl Liebknecht, "Anti-Militarism of the Old and the New International" in Karl Liebknecht Internet Archive<br />
.<br />
9. Quoted in Nation, 10.<br />
10. Albert S. Lindemann, A History of European Socialism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1983), 188.<br />
11. V.I. Lenin, "Socialism and War," in The Lenin Anthology, ed. Robert C. Tucker (New York: W.W. Norton, 1975), 183.<br />
Historical discourse has rarely addressed the continuities concerning peace that existed between the Second and Third Internationals.<br />
See Martin Ceadal, "The First Communist Peace Society: The British Anti-War Movement 1932-1935,"<br />
Twentieth Century British History 1, no.1 (1990): 58-86.<br />
12. See V.I. Lenin, "Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism," in The Lenin Anthology, ed. Robert C. Tucker (New York:<br />
W.W. Norton, 1975), 204-274.<br />
13. Karl Liebknecht was a member of the left wing of the German Social Democratic Party (SPD) and is considered the main<br />
founder of the Socialist <strong>Youth</strong> International. Despite several terms in prison, Liebknecht consistently fought for a revolutionary<br />
anti-militarist policy, being the only member of the German Reichstag to vote against war in December, 1914.<br />
14. Victor Privalov, The Young Communist International and its Origins (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1971), 29.<br />
15. Cornell, Revolutionary Vanguard, 11.<br />
16. Privalov, 28-29.<br />
17. Karl Liebknecht, "Anti-militarism in Germany and German Social-Democracy " in Karl Liebknecht Internet Archive<br />
; Karl Liebknecht,<br />
"The Anti-militarist Tasks of German Social-Democracy " in Karl Liebknecht Internet Archive<br />
.<br />
18. Karl Liebknecht, " The Future Belongs to the People: Education in Germany in War Time" in Karl Liebknecht Internet<br />
Archive .<br />
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