Eduard Bernstein On The German Revolution: Selected Historical Writings

Description

This book presents two major texts and selected shorter writings by the social-democratic thinker and politician Eduard Bernstein, translated into English in full for the first time: The German Revolution: A History of the Emergence and First Working Period of the German Republic; How A Revolution Perished; and articles from Vorwärts and other socialist periodicals. Written in the aftermath of the 1918 German Revolution and the end of WWI, they address the overthrow of autocratic rule in Germany, and provide a live chronicle and retrospective assessment of the Weimar Republic’s foundation. Bernstein gives a detailed chronology of the German Revolution and its intellectual, economic, and political context, and offers a historical analogy in his account of the 1848 French Revolution, which differs in key respects from that of Karl Marx in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon. Drawing on his own experience of the events he describes, he revisits the socialist debate over ‘reform or revolution’ that he himself had provoked at the turn of the 20th century, and consciously seeks to wrest ownership of the Revolution’s legacy away from the Spartacist and communist left. In these works, Bernstein exhorts social democrats to rally behind the nascent Republic and resist the siren-calls of its militant opponents on radical left and right, and he engages with themes of party unity, political violence, democracy, and the role of ideology that have echoed through left theory and strategy ever since. Front Matter ....Pages i-vii Introduction (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 1-31 Front Matter ....Pages 33-33 Preface (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 35-37 Prologue (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 39-42 The Reich Leadership Before the Revolution (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 43-48 The Dawning of the Revolution (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 49-55 Government and Social Democracy from the Start of October to 9 November 1918 (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 57-69 9 November 1918 in Berlin (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 71-84 The Initial Form of the German Republic (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 85-99 The Revolution in the Individual States (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 101-118 Struggles of Socialists Against Socialists (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 119-139 The First Congress of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Councils in Germany (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 141-164 The Sailors’ Uprising in Berlin, Christmas 1918 (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 165-193 The Independent Social Democrats’ Departure from the Rat der Volksbeauftragten (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 195-202 The Communist Uprising in Berlin, January 1919 (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 203-250 The Murder of Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 251-259 The General Situation in the First Months of the Republic (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 261-290 The Nationalversammlung Elections, Conclusion of the First Stage of the Revolution (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 291-295 Front Matter ....Pages 297-297 History and Legend (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 299-303 Why the Second French Republic Perished (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 305-339 A Users’ Guide for the Present (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 341-357 Front Matter ....Pages 359-359 Eduard Bernstein for Unity (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 361-365 Bernstein’s Return to the Party (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 367-367 The Independents’ Attempt at Mediation (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 369-370 On the Question of Unity (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 371-374 Auf Wiedersehen! (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 375-380 Lassalle and Bolshevism (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 381-384 The Timescale of the Revolution (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 385-387 An Easter of Hope (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 389-394 Eduard Bernstein Against the USPD (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 395-396 The Bankruptcy of Bolshevism (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 397-400 The Communists (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 401-403 The Election Campaign (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 405-406 The Decision (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 407-410 20 February and the Republic (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 411-414 Four Years On (Marius S. Ostrowski)....Pages 415-417 Back Matter ....Pages 419-429