"German/Dutch" Communist Left


Below are links to historic texts of the German and Dutch Communist Lefts (Council Communists) and historical or analytical writings on their movement. The term "German/Dutch Left" here means the specific Left Communist current originating in that part of Northern Europe, and not just the work of individuals of those two nationalities.

See the introduction to the Antagonism Press pamphlet Bordiga versus Pannekoek, published October 2001 for a discussion of the German/Dutch and Italian Lefts


Texts by Left Communists

Anton Pannekoek

Trade Unions (1936)
Party and Working Class (1936)
General Remarks on the Question of Organization (1938)
Party and Class - Партия и класс - Parti ve Sınıf
The Failure of the Working Class (1946)
Marxism and Darwinism
The Personal Act

Otto Rühle

The Psyche of the Proletarian Child (1925)
The struggle against Fascism begins with the struggle against Bolshevism (1939)
From the Bourgeois to the Proletarian Revolution (1924)
Report from Moscow (1920)
Speech in the Reichstag
The Revolution Is Not A Party Affair

Paul Mattick

Moscow-Fascism in Spain (August 1937)
The New Capitalism and the Old Class Struggle
on Workers Councils - Interview Feb 1975
Lotta Continua Interview - October 1977
On Anton Pannekoek - from New Politics (1960)
Reform and Revolution section from "Marxism: Last Refuge of the Bourgeoisie?"
1. Introduction
2. Capitalism and Socialism
3. Reform and Revolution
4. Limits of Reform
5. Lenin's Revolution
6. The Idea of the Commune
7. State and Counter-Revolution
8. The German Revolution
9. Ideology and Class Consciousness

Herman Gorter

Why we need the Fourth Communist Workers' International By Herman Gorter
Open Letter to Comrade Lenin
Yoldaş Lenin'e Açık Mektup - ("Open Letter to Comrade Lenin" in Turkish)

Henk Canne Meijer

The Rise of a New Labor Movement (1935)
The Origins of the Movement for Workers Councils in Germany (1938)

Sylvia Pankhurst

Capitalism or Communism for Russia? - Workers' Dreadnought, 31 May 1924
What is behind the label? A plea for clearness - Workers' Dreadnought, 3 November 1923
Women members of Parliament - Workers' Dreadnought, 15 December 1923
The truth about the Fascisti - Workers' Dreadnought, 4 November 1922
To Lenin, ... - Workers' Dreadnought, 4 November 1922
Our Point of View - Workers' Dreadnought, 24 September 1921
Freedom of discussion - Workers' Dreadnought, 17 September 1921
Soviet Russia as I saw it in 1920: the Congress in the Kremlin - Workers' Dreadnought, 16 April 1921
Co-operative housekeeping - Workers' Dreadnought, 28 August 1920
Towards a Communist party - Workers' Dreadnought, 21 February 1920
A constitution for British soviets. Points for a communist programme - Workers' Dreadnought, 19 June 1920
You are called to the war - The Workers' Dreadnought, 19 April 1919
Look to the future - The Workers' dreadnought, 16 February 1918
The election - The Workers' Dreadnought, 14 December 1918
The Lenin revolution: what it means to democracy - The Workers' Dreadnought, 17 November 1917
Communism versus Reforms
The Future Society

Others

The Function of Intellectuals in Society and Their Task in the Proletarian Revolution - F. W. Seiwert and F. Pfemfert
On Proletarian Culture - A. R.
The 1920 Programme of the KAPD

and again, prefaced by the ICC
A life for the Revolution ! or A Brief Autobiography of a Proletarian Revolutionary by Jan Appel
The Wilhelmshaven Revolt - Ikarus (Ernst Schneider)
Fundamental Principles of Communist Production and Distribution - Group of International Communists (GIK) 1930
In The Freest State In The World - Ret Marut (B.Traven)


History and Analysis

Council Communism - Richard Gombin
An introduction to 'Left Communism' in Germany from 1914 to 1923 - Dave Grahame
Revolutionary Traditions: Council Communism - By Steve Wright (1991)
Note on Pannekoek and Bordiga from The Eclipse and Re-Emergence of the Communist Movement
The Workers' Councils in the theory of the Dutch-German Communist Left
The KAPD - by CWO

Links to sites with texts of the "German/Dutch" Left

Many of the links on this page are to one or other of these sites.

Collective Action Notes
For Communism
Subversion
"Left Wing" Communism - an infantile disorder?


antagonism
1