International Communist Milieu

Δράση στο μνημείο του Ολοκαυτώματος στη Κέρκυρα. Εχθές 27/1/2019 στο Μνημείο Ολοκαυτώματος της Κέρκυρας ενώσαμε κι εμείς τις φωνές μας με όσους θυμούνται για να αποδόσουμε τιμή στα Θύματα της Shoah. ‘Έκλεισε έτσι ένας χ....

In meanwhile somewhere in the U.S

Red Army .. The liberators of Auschwitz

August 23: unhistorical anticommunist fiestas in Estonia consist a provocation for the millions of victims of na**sm, for all the peoples of Europe who, through their struggle, wrote the heroic pages of the Great Antifascist Victory. They consist a provocation for the millions of communists, the fighters who contributed decisively to the crush of na**sm-fascism. Those who liberated Auschwitz and Berlin are heros...

Long Live the Great Red Army ... the army of the USSR

A haredi family from Israel received a shock when they found an anti-Semitic sign at the Swiss hotel at which they were vacationing.

The family had found the Aparthaus Paradies hotel in the town of Arosa Switzerland online. Previous guests had given the hotel positive ratings.

However, when the family arrived at the hotel, they were greeted by a sign instructing all Jewish guests to shower before and after using the swimming pool.

The sign read in broken English: "To our Jewish guests, men women and children, please take a shower before you go swimming and also after swimming."

The sign contained a threat to ban Jewish swimmers if they failed to comply. "If you break the rules, I'm forced to close the pool for you."

"Thank you for understanding, Ruth Thomann," the sign concludes.

"After we reserved rooms at the hotel, we talked to the woman in charge, who was very nice to us," the father explained to News 2 Online. "We told her we were Jewish and she told us that a lot of Jews come there. She brought us what we needed for the baby. After we arrived, she was very nice."

However, shortly after they settled in the hotel, they noticed a sign on the refrigerator saying that the Jewish guests were limited in using it.

"For our Jewish guests: You are allowed to access the refrigerator only in the following hours: 10:00-11:00 and 16:30-17:30," the sign read. "I hope you understand that our team does not like being harassed every time."

"We were in shock," the father explained. "No one approached her because we did not want to start a confrontation, but the next day the other sign suddenly appeared at the pool, and that was very frightening."

He said that they attempted to speak with the hotel director about the offensive signs, but she was nowhere to be found.

"It was very strange," he continued. "Even the non-Jews did not understand - there is a very nice group of Jews here from all over the world - there are hardly any Israelis here [so it is not anti-Zionism] and everyone behaves in a very respectful way. It was very strange. It was a kind of anti-Semitism we have not been exposed to before."

The offensive signs have been taken down.

Already by the early 1980s work was being done on analysing election results from the 1930s. This work has been continually updated and enriched, and has now arrived at the following conclusion: the percentage of votes for the N**i party deriving from the working class showed a continual upswing in the period preceding the N**is’ seizure of power. Jurgen Falter is one of the historians who has researched the phenomenon in depth, and he presented his initial results in 1986 in the journal of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, an organisation close to the Social Democratic Party. In his most recent article, published at the start of this year (in the journal Geschichte und Gesellschaft), Falter previews the results of his research project carried out on 42,000 N**i party membership cards, from which it appears that the party’s working-class membership stood at more than 40 per cent.

What we find developing here is an interpretation of N**ism as a phenomenon within which the working-class component is strongly present, if not decisive. This flies in the face of the traditional interpretation, which sees the N**i party essentially as the party of the Mittelstand, in other words of the middle classes. This is one aspect of the problem.

In my opinion there is an even more important consideration. Namely: since the fall of the Berlin Wall, a number of articles and books have appeared in Germany, published with remarkable editorial efficiency, all tending to demonstrate not only that the working-class component was decisive within N**ism before Hi**er’s taking of power, but also that, after taking power, the policies pursued by the N**i regime were actively favourable to the working class and tended to bring its social status closer in line with that of the middle classes, along tendentially egalitarian lines, thus making Hi**er a true “social-revolutionary” of the twentieth century.

N**ism and the working class – Sergio Bologna NA**SM AND THE WORKING CLASS – 1933-93 by Sergio Bologna translated by Ed Emery [Paper presented at the Milan Camera del Lavoro, 3 June 1993] A meeting like this doesn’t just happen by …

Rethinking Marx (in a Post-Marxist World) (1)

Moishe Postone

The University of Chicago

for Charles Camic (ed.), Reclaiming the Sociological Classics

[First presented at the Theory Miniconference, "Reclaiming the Arguments of the Founders,"

90th Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association,

Washington, D.C., August 19 1995.]

www.obeco-online.org

No Tears for Krauz

“[Modern militarism] wants neither more nor less than the squaring of the circle; it arms the people against the people itself; it is insolent enough to force the workers ... to become oppressors, enemies and murderers of their own class comrades and friends, of their parents, brothers, sisters and children, murderers of their own past and future. It wants to be at the same time democratic and despotic, enlightened and machine-like, at the same time to serve the nation and to be its enemy.”

Karl Liebknecht: Militarism & Anti-Militarism Karl Liebknecht: Militarism and Anti-Militarism (1907)

AUGUST BEBEL, leader of the German Social-Democratic Party in the Reichstag, writes as follows :-

1st. What do we mean by patriotism?

That every nation which has its own language, its own customs, its own civilisation, and its history has the right of developing in its own way, and of governing itself. The man is a patriot who tries to obtain for the nation to which he belongs by his birth, his language, and his customs, without hurting or injuring any other nation, the highest civilisation in the interest of all. If he follows this ideal, without any idea of self-interest, and without helping the governing class, but in the interest of all, he is working for the highest ideal open to any man.

2nd. What do we mean by internationalism?

Not the suppression of nationalities, not the violent fusion of nations, but the upholding and the progress of pacific relations of civilisation among nations. Side by side with the national civilisation of a nation, there exists all international civilisation in which each nation participates in the measure of its moral and intellectual development. Our business relations, our scientific, artistic and literary activity, the exchange of inventions and discoveries are the principal characteristics of this international effort. Internationalism tends to make these relations more and more close by the entering into of commercial agreements, of maritime conventions, of treaties of alliance, by the exchange of all the resources of civilisation, by international laws for the protection of the “workers, by the development of international law, by the equalisation of rights and duties of foreigners and native-born subjects, by the progress of humanitarian effort among all nations, by the solution of differences between nations by an international court of arbitration.

This internationalism compels Socialists to fight constantly against the lust of conquest, the hostile isolation of nations, the tariff-wars, the bellicose naval and military armaments, because all this tends to increase national prejudice, and threatens constant war.

The aim of all international action should be a world-parliament, in which should sit representatives of all civilised nations, and which should regulate all international relations, making them more and more close.

Patriotism and Internationalism are not necessarily antagonistic, but supplement each other, marking towards a more and more perfect civilisation.

3rd. Therefore we see that Socialists should always work in that direction, whether in meetings, in the press, or in parliaments.

If opposition between nations cannot disappear at once, they must work to decrease it gradually.

4th. The duty of Socialists in case of war cannot he defined in one phrase. Socialists are still everywhere in a minority, both among nations and in parliaments. The foreign affairs of States are not directed by them, and their duty is to try and influence them in the direction which I have indicated above. But if, in spite of than, a war breaks out, they must examine its causes. If their own government is the aggressor, they must refuse to vote supplies, and fight against it by all possible means. If their own government is attacked, then they cannot refuse their help. For in a war it is the government which suffers least and the people which suffers most.

If the war becomes a war of conquest, as in 1870, after Sedan, Socialists must oppose all conquest.

When, in 1870, the Franco-German War broke out, Liebknecht and myself did not vote when supplies were asked for the war, because we knew that this war was a necessary consequence of the policy of Bismarck, to which we were opposed, and we were convinced that the candidature of a Hohenzollern prince to the Spanish throne was only a pretext invented by Bismarck to force Napoleon to declare a war which the German Chancellor ardently desired. On the other hand, we thought that if we voted against supplies we should appear to approve the Napoleonic policy.

But when the peace we hoped for was not agreed to after Sedan, and war went on because Alsace-Lorraine was wanted by Bismarck, then not only did we, as Socialists, oppose the continuation of the war, but in the Reichstag we unanimously voted against the credits which were asked for in order to continue the war. It was then proposed to seize some French territory which had, it is true, been formerly German, and where the majority still spoke German. But for more than a century the culture and the life of that people were French, and if the inhabitants had been consulted they would doubtless unanimously have desired to remain French. Each nation or part of a nation should he allowed to decide its own destinies. As a rule, it happens that the conquered nation remains in the conquering nation though not assimilating with them. The best example of this is the division of Poland. Though the last partition of Poland took place nearly 110 years ago, the aspirations of the Polish nations towards national independence, in the three conquering nations, are stronger than ever. An energetic nation, which has been injured in its language, in its civilisation, and therefore in its material interests, will always try to recover its national independence, because that alone guarantees the originality of its civilisation. Exceptions like that of Republican and Democratic Switzerland, where Germans, Frenchmen, and Italians live side by side at peace, simply confirms the rule. For in Switzerland no nation is dominated or oppressed by another. On the other hand, in Austria, where there is almost absolute rule, all the nationalities are fighting one against the other, because each one wishes to rule, and the reactionary government only goes on owing to this quarrel of nationalities. If this is correct, it follows that if a war leads to a nation losing part of its territory or being oppressed by another nation, Socialists should, in spite of their hatred of war, devote their strength to the defence of the fatherland, if their national existence is threatened. Let us take the following example. If Germany were to attack France, in order to acquire territory (though it is only fair to say that no one wishes to do this), not only should we refuse to vote supplies, but we should think it quite right that all our French comrades should help in thrusting back the German invader.

The normal development of the Socialist movement must be based certainly on the independence of a country. As long as a nation is oppressed, its members will not advocate the class-war, or will only do so in a modified form.

I think that I have shown what should be the policy pursued nationally and internationally by Socialists, and how they should act in time of war.

A. BEBEL.

August Bebel

On Homosexuality and the Penal Code

On Homosexuality and the Penal Code Date: 13 January 1898Translation: from the German © 1978 by John Lauritsen; August Bebel : The First Politician To Speak Out For Homosexual Rights; Used by permissionSource/Published: Gay News (London) issue 136 (1978) under the title, "The Man Who Spoke Out: 80th Anniversary of a Landmark in Gay Ri...

Fish in water. – Since the comprehensive apparatus of distribution of highly concentrated industry has dissolved the circulation-sphere, this latter begins an astonishing post-existence. While the economic basis for the occupation of go-betweens disappears, the private life of innumerable people becomes that of agents and go-betweens, indeed the realm of the private is wholly swallowed up by a mysterious enterprise [Geschäftigkeit: business, activity, busyness], which bears all the marks of the commercial kind, only in a situation where nothing is really being done. Those who are afraid, from the unemployed to professionals who in the next moment may come to feel the wrath of those whose investments they represent, believe they can win over the ubiquitous company executive only through sensitivity, assiduousness, accessibility, by one way or another, through the qualities of traders, and soon there is no relationship which is not seen in terms of other relationships, no impulse which is not subjected to prior censorship, in order not to deviate from approval. The concept of relationships, a category of mediation and circulation, never prospered best in the actual circulation-sphere, in the market, but in closed, monopoly-like hierarchies. Now that the entire society is becoming hierarchal, opaque relationships adhere everywhere, wherever there was still the appearance [Schein] of freedom. The irrationality of the system is expressed not less in the economic fate of particular individuals [Einzelnen] than in the parasitic psychology of such. Earlier, when there was still something like the disreputable bourgeois separation of occupation and private life, whose passing one would almost like to regret, whoever pursued goals in their private life was eyed with distrust, as a loutish gatecrasher. Today whoever engages in something private, which does not have a discernible goal, appears as arrogant, foreign and improper. Whoever isn’t “out” for something [wer nichts “will”: literally, whoever doesn’t want, wish, intend to do something] is almost suspect: no-one trusts anyone else to help them get by, without legitimating themselves through counter-claims. Myriads of people make their living out of a condition, which follows the liquidation of occupations. These are the nice people, the popular ones, who are friends with all, the just ones, who excuse every sort of meanness as “human” [in English in original] and incorruptibly defame every non-normalized impulse as “sentimental” [in English in original]. They are indispensable thanks to their knowledge of all the channels and back doors of power, they guess its most secret judgments and live off the dexterous communication of such. They are to be found in all political camps, even there, where the rejection of the system is taken for granted and for that reason a lax and cunning conformism of its own has developed. Often they win over people through a certain benevolence, through the sympathetic sharing of the life of others: selflessness as speculation. They are clever, witty, sensible and flexible; they have polished the old trader-spirit with the achievements of the day-before-yesterday’s psychology. They are ready for anything, even love, yet always faithlessly. They betray not from instinctual drives, but from principle: they value even themselves as a profit, which they do not wish to share with anyone else. They are bound to the Spirit [Geist] with affinity and hate: they are a temptation for the thoughtful, but also their worst enemies. For they are the ones who subtly apprehend and despoil the last hiding-places of resistance, the hours which remain free from the demands of the machinery. Their belated individualism poisons what still remains of the individuated [Individuum: individual, the individuated].

For Marcel Proust. – The son of well-to-do parents who, whether out of talent or weakness, chooses a so-called intellectual occupation as an artist or scholar, has special difficulties with those who bear the distasteful title of colleagues. It is not merely that his independence is envied, that the seriousness of his intentions is doubted and that he is presumed to be a secret envoy of the established powers. Such mistrust is borne out of resentment, yet would usually find its confirmation. However the actual resistances lie elsewhere. The occupation with intellectual [geistigen] things has meanwhile become “practical,” a business with a strict division of labor, with branches and numerus clausus [Latin: restricted entry]. Those who are materially independent, who choose out of repugnance towards the shame of earning money, are not inclined to recognize this. For this he is punished. He is no “professional” [in English in original], ranks in the hierarchy of competitors as a dilettante, regardless of how much he knows about his subject, and must, if he wishes to pursue a career, display a professional tunnel vision even narrower than that of the most narrow-minded expert. The suspension of the division of labor to which he is driven, and which the economic state of affairs allows him, within certain limits, to realize, is considered especially scandalous: this betrays the aversion to sanction the hustle and bustle dictated by society, and high and mighty competence does not permit such idiosyncrasies. The departmentalization of the Spirit [Geist] is a means of abolishing such there, where it is not ex officio or contractually obligated. It does its work all the more surely, as those who continually reject the division of labor – if only in the sense that they enjoy their work – reveal, by this selfsame measure, their vulnerabilities, which are inseparable from the moments of their superiority. Thus is the social order [Ordnung] assured: this one must play along, because one could not otherwise live, and that one, who could indeed live, is kept outside, because they don’t want to play along. It is as if the class which the independent intellectual deserted from revenges itself, by forcibly pushing through its demands precisely where the deserter sought refuge.

Theodor Adorno

Interested parties explain the culture industry in technological terms. It is alleged that because millions participate in it, certain reproduction processes are necessary that inevitably require identical needs in innumerable places to be satisfied with identical goods. The technical contrast between the few production centers and the large number of widely dispersed consumption points is said to demand organisation and planning by management. Furthermore, it is claimed that standards were based in the first place on consumers’ needs, and for that reason were accepted with so little resistance. The result is the circle of manipulation and retroactive need in which the unity of the system grows ever stronger. No mention is made of the fact that the basis on which technology acquires power over society is the power of those whose economic hold over society is greatest. A technological rationale is the rationale of domination itself. It is the coercive nature of society alienated from itself. Automobiles, bombs, and movies keep the whole thing together until their leveling element shows its strength in the very wrong which it furthered. It has made the technology of the culture industry no more than the achievement of standardisation and mass production, sacrificing whatever involved a distinction between the logic of the work and that of the social system.

www.marxists.org

Freedom only for the members of the government, only for the members of the Party - though they are quite numerous - is no freedom at all.

Rosa Luxemburg

Moishe Postone
Critique and Historical Transformation (PDF for printing)

www.platypus1917.org

A page dedicated in history of Communist politics and ideas against the society of the Capital

International Communist Milieu

He was a leading member of the Frankfurt School of critical theory, whose work has come to be associated with thinkers such as Ernst Bloch, Walter Benjamin, Max Horkheimer and Herbert Marcuse, for whom the work of Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx and G.W.F. Hegel were essential to a critique of modern society. He is widely regarded as one of the 20th century's foremost thinkers on aesthetics and philosophy, as well as one of its preeminent essayists. As a critic of both fascism and what he called the culture industry, his writings—such as Dialectic of Enlightenment, Minima Moralia and Negative Dialectics—strongly influenced the European New Left.

Theodor W. Adorno Theodor W. Adorno (September 11, 1903 – August 6, 1969) was a German sociologist, philosopher and musicologist known for his critical theory of society. He was a leading member of the Frankfurt School of critical theory, whose work has come to be associated with thinkers such as Ernst Bloch, Walter…

https://libcom.org/history/stjepan-filipovic-everlasting-symbol-anti-facism

Stjepan Filipović: everlasting symbol of anti-fascism Short account of the ex*****on of Croatian communist partisan Stjepan Filipović by the N**is in 1942, which was made famous by his final act of defiance.

A Proud Yugoslav Partizan