The police managed to surpass themselves to begin with, refusing entrance not only to members of the press, but also to the speaker. It was only after a heated exchange that the excluded lecturer managed to penetrate into the hall by way of smaller side paths. After Comrade Luxemburg touched upon this incident in her introduction with a few sarcastic remarks, she moved on to discuss how the German working class has shown an enthusiastic and general interest in the political mass strike recently. Until a short while ago, German Social Democracy had considered this method of combat taboo. Sudden turning points of this kind in valuing a particular political solution always possess the symptomatic meaning that deep realignments have occurred in social relations, being what Hegel calls the turning point of quantity into a new quality.
What is of most value, according to Luxemburg,† is the sheer interest in the debate about the political mass strike—and it really is irrelevant whether this or that comrade, or this or that party newspaper positions itself against the political mass strike. The German working class has suddenly turned with passionate interest toward this slogan, without their leaders or specific bodies having shown any interest. We simply need to recall the Trade Union Congress in Cologne.‡ There, trade union representatives—the crème de la crème of a trade union class of civil servants for the whole of Germany—passed the resolution that not only should the political mass strike not be considered, but that merely discussing the issue should be forbidden. Although Comrade [Theodor] Bömelburg protested against this interpretation of the resolution, the Grundstein [Foundation Stone]§ writes nonetheless: “Despite Jena, and in keeping with our previous position, we will not consider using the political mass strike, and yes, we refuse any form of discussion about it.”
Such motions only reveal that particular persons work with a certain touching notion, deceiving themselves into thinking they can really direct the action, and also the inaction of the workers, by pronouncing a tsar-like ukase over the people: “You should keep your mouths shut!” Yet it’s been proven that the working masses are now ahead of their so-called leaders, and are seeing with more clarity. (Applause.) Our future does not lie in the infallibility of our leadership, i.e., in civil service circles, but in the large masses themselves. Every time we’re faced with a new question about tactics and principles, we’ve got to be clear about which general and theoretical foundation we’re working with, both to deal with these questions and to research the matter.
There are, in this vein, various positions regarding the mass strike. On the one hand, there is Comrade [Raphael] Friedeberg and his zealous preaching of the mass and general strike in his sense of the word. Friedeberg is opposed by the rigidly dismissive viewpoint of the trade unions, as discussed above. We can say that both parties spring from the same theoretical ground, which we can label anarchistic. Typical for anarchist thinking is to see the tasks of political struggle detached from economic and social development, and exclusively from a speculative perspective, as if floating in thin air. Only by using such unencumbered speculation can you believe that a mass strike is something you conjure up. Neither position views the mass strike from the perspective of historical necessity, but rather chooses to see it as a tool of struggle, to be used arbitrarily. You could say that they treat the mass strike as a kind of pocketknife that you always carry, to flick out or fold away again as the situation demands.*
Social Democracy’s position, based, as usual, on historical fundamentals, differentiates itself unequivocally from this trivial postulation, as it does in all questions of theory and tactics. Social Democracy does not ask: “Is it daring, or rather useful, to experiment with the mass strike? Shall we use it, or shall we not?” Based on its materialist approach to history, Social Democracy poses the question thusly: “When we glance at the current and forthcoming development of class contradictions in contemporary society, and reach our conclusions from that, will the mass strike take place as a historical necessity, as a historical form of class struggle—or not?” When posed in this way, the question need no longer engage with many of the objections raised by the opponents of the mass strike.
The speaker then branched off to talk about Weltpolitik† and sketched the situation in the Far East resulting from the last war between Russia and Japan, in order to conclude that we must expect even bloodier wars to come.‡ Sooner or later, even Germany will no longer be an observer, but rather a sharer in this suffering. Plans are afoot to turn Kiautschou into a naval fortress,§ and the powers behind that project are working toward a sea war.* Antagonism between the great powers has grown, and what is the other side of this same coin? Army and navy expansion, new trade tariffs, new taxes, and a new exploitation of the masses—antagonisms between classes, in both Germany and in other states, will be exacerbated!
To that should be added a new factor that must have a huge influence—revolutionary Russia. Its effects have already been demonstrated in social struggles in other countries. You just need to take a look at the struggle for suffrage in Austria and in Saxony.† Those are the sparks that have sprung across from the great sea of flames in the east. You would have to be struck down by stupidity to such an extent that it contravenes even police law—or better, to be afflicted by the police’s sort of blindness—not to grasp that more and more sparks will leap this gap every day.
Turning to the Russian Revolution, the speaker elucidated the way things stand in Russia today, arguing that the only form the revolution could create was that of a liberated, democratized, and bourgeois Russia. Social Democracy, the party with which we are fraternally joined, is leading the Russian proletariat. The new Russia will carry the molten lava of the class-conscious proletariat within it. New conflicts will arise and attempts to throw off the capitalist yoke will follow.
The rest of Europe will feel the effects. The Russian Revolution is not just an epoch for the Russian people, but also a milestone in world history. It is a prologue for other revolutions, which will develop by necessity, and which can have no other conclusion than the much maligned and previously ridiculed dictatorship of the proletariat.‡ The speaker didn’t want to engage in making vague prophecies. What she was saying was nothing other than wholly sober conclusions drawn from cool observation of both the Russian Revolution, and of the international context of class struggles in all other countries.
And what’s the situation regarding the political mass strike here in Germany? A conclusion can be drawn from the course of development world politics has taken in the last ten years, and from the development of the Russian Revolution in the last few years. Antagonisms between classes in all capitalist countries will be ratcheted up to an incredible degree, and the mass of workers will no longer be able to meekly put up with class hegemony—with all its humiliation and misery—as it does now. We can rather expect turbulent confrontations and direct battles with the ruling classes.
Having said that, the working class—having committed itself to a larger, communal struggle—will have to come out of slavery up to the surface, up out of the workshop, the factory and the mine. Downing tools and going out on strike in this manner is the natural first step for this class. It certainly would be possible to learn from the application of the mass strike in Russia; although there’s no place where it is less discussed than in Russia right now. The Russian Revolution has demonstrated that the mass strike has become historically necessary for the working class when it stirs into action. The time will also arrive in Germany, when the mass strike is seen as an irrefutable method of struggle.
The speaker [then] protested against the fact that she and others are depicted as opponents of parliamentarism among certain circles of comrades. Whether and to what extent parliamentarism should be seen as a form of working-class struggle can’t be decided by us, but only by the path of historical development. But precisely because of this situation, the mass strike shouldn’t be seen as the sole means of achieving bliss, even though it can be of excellent service to the workers’ movement under particular historical preconditions. The ruling classes are currently doing their best to prevent from us fighting our battles inside the house of parliamentarism, by stripping us of the means to do so. It isn’t radical Marxists who want to destroy parliamentarism—it’s rather the bolstered and toughened forces of reaction that are doing their best to strip us of the means [to use parliamentary methods]. We are almost compelled from without to turn to other means and methods.
While a mass strike can neither be forbidden nor arbitrarily triggered, as it always depends on the historical situation, let’s not lapse so far into fatalism as to say that every mass strike can only be sent down to us from heaven. It certainly is the case that if a strike is to be carried out according to plan, it has to be the result of a motion of the organized workforce. It is exclusively the situation that demands a mass strike in the first place, which cannot be ushered in through a motion. The main thing is that Social Democracy is ready and waiting should such a situation come about, and capable of acting as the vanguard of the masses.
The speaker then proceeded to tackle several of the well-known objections that have been brought up against the mass strike, by Comrade Frohme in the Hamburger Echo for example, and from trade union leaders and other individual comrades in the party. She also spoke out against seeing the trade unions as an end in themselves. Marxists are against these particular tactics and not against the trade unions in general. Marx saw the trade unions as an essential weapon for the workforce. However, the trade unions should also not be degraded to the status of a slave of the tools that the workforce is using for its liberation. It should be pointed out that nothing is as fruitful for the idea of organization as an open and intense class struggle. Not only would the trade union organizations together with the political organizations have nothing to fear in the case of a mass strike in Germany, this event would be a rebirth for them, and they would move on from it strengthened tenfold.
The question has been raised: “Would the unorganized masses follow us [in this mass strike]?” This again is a question that would solve itself in the process of playing the game, when individuals come down from agonizing on their pedestals, to the ground of the mass strike as a historical necessity. When we reach that point, we will also have arrived at a situation in which every word uttered by the organized party will also be taken up and followed by the not-yet-organized part of the proletariat. When the situation demands that the mass strike is a necessity, then that in itself will install clarity in the proletariat, etc.
After refuting Wolfgang Heine’s critique—“caution worthy of a state attorney [should be shown]”—the speaker summarized her own standpoint together once more, as elucidated above. She then closed her lecture that had been interrupted by applause on several occasions, with an admonishment that is as valid for Social Democracy as it is for every warrior: “What counts is being prepared!” (A storm of long-lasting applause.)
During the final section of her speech, Comrade Luxemburg took Mr. [Eric] Mühsam thoroughly to task,* which again earned her strong applause.
With thunderous cheers for international Social Democracy emancipating the world’s peoples that followed hard on the heels of cheers for Comrade Luxemburg herself, the impressive assembly closed.