Minutes of the Discussion Circle Rhineland in Cologne on the
Question of Violence:
Is violence a scourge, a necessary evil or an act of liberation?
A: The presentation has given important insights. Unfortunately the last circle meeting did not more precisely define what aspects of the question should be discussed. The presentation has given a very good basis for the discussion.
S: A question. Should we examine first of all what is violence? Is it part of human nature? I think it is part of life, life is not possible without breaking or damaging something. There was violence before there was class society. Primitive communism must have been quite violent. Enemy clans or tribes were destroyed or chased away. Not exploited however since this was economically possible.
I: Greet the presentation which is a good initiate and excellent content. Difficult to find a lot of Marxist sources on the question. It is true that we did not narrow down the question, but this was also because we wanted to have a very fundamental discussion. And I greet the historic method. We cannot treat violence in the abstract. Violence is not always bad, although this idea often shocks people. The presentation links the appearance of violence to class society, but we should not idealise primitive communism, since the solidarity which was real and necessary was only within the tribe. There were struggles of life and death about hunting grounds, for instance. What T said about the necessity of violence, even the act of birth is an act, perhaps not of violence, but a certain coercion (force)
S: How to proceed in the discussion? A first question is if life without violence is possible at all?
E: Agree with what has been said about the quality of the presentation. It poses a number of questions. That violence has different aspects. For the bourgeoisie, a strike is an act of violence. There is one formulation in the presentation which I used to agree with, but not really anymore: that violence is not part of human nature. It sounds as if there was no violence before class society. Like other mammals, human beings act against threats with aggression. There were wars between different tribes. Hunters need a bigger territorial radius as ploughing farmers. There were wars about hunting grounds. And we see that aggression is a natural impulse which we already find among small children.
I: What view of human nature do we have? Are human beings good or bad by nature? Do we come to the world as a tabula rasa or not? The presentation seems to say that there is no genetic capacity towards violence. There is another extreme view which is much worse, that all the violence of today is conditioned genetically, which is what the Nazis said, and which legitimises war and wants to show that nothing can change. If you assume that violence only appeared with class society, why did it appear. In reality human beings have both social and anti-social impulses. In primitive society old and sick people were killed, this was inevitable to avoid the death of the tribe as a whole.
A: I want o take this up. The presentation does not say that violence is not in human nature. But he says that the violence of class society is not a product of genetic conditioning. It wants to differentiate between different kinds of violence, saying that there is also productive violence.
S: I thing that human beings have both destructive and constructive impulses, it depends on society which sides are developed. The most terrible crimes can be made possible which under other conditions would be impossible. Human beings are also the product of their historical period. In primitive society it was a matter of course to abandon the sick, not so today. The question is the human being is good or bad is not the right question. We have to ask how man can live so that the constructive qualities can flourish.
I: People say communism is a nice idea, but human nature is bad. The presentation quotes Anti-Dühring, how does history develop? At school there are the great rulers who determine history through their free will. Dühring was a law professor and said that violence is the motor of history, economics is secondary. He gives Robinson Crusoe as proof. Engels replies that Crusoe can exploit Friday only because the productive forces are developed enough for Friday to feed Friday and Robinson. The exploiters use violence, but violence is not the motor of history. This brings us back to the question of communism. Decisive is the economic development, leading to a class which produces socially, which carries the principle of solidarity within itself.
E: Violence began as a struggle for existence. It will die away to the extent that the struggle for existence will no longer be possible. The impulses are as such not good or bad, including the aggression impulse, but also altruism. The latter is also strongly developed among the more developed animals, putting the general interest above ones individual interest. It is the bourgeoisie which believes that human beings are evil. The development of civilisation is able to counter aggression. Bit by bit the accumulation of culture can counter violence, but with the development and above all the decadence and decomposition of capitalism more and more eruptions of violence break through and even wipe out civilisation.
A: You were saying the civilisation to date is a very thin layer. Often the aggression takes the form of self destruction, against oneself, even if it is often not noticed, with all he suffering which goes with it.
AR (participator from France): Welcome the work of the circle, all the more important in view of the importance of Germany. I am favourably surprised by the quality of the presentation, but also of the discussion here. The question of violence in history, for instance in primitive communism. There is also the struggle of humanity against the animals. Connected to this discussion here are psychological questions, such as the phenomenon of self destruction as a product of a class society, and which are developing more and more with the decadence and the decomposition of capitalism. What it will be like in the struggle of the class for communism could be another aspect of the discussion.
Q: Agree with the discussion and the introduction. Very good. How and when did violence appear in history. Agree that human and animals have aggressive impulses. But this does not explain why violence as a social phenomena comes into being in history. It is correct that violence in history did not start with exploitation. There was violence before exploitation. But the introduction says that violence already existed beforehand and that came into being with the separation of agricultural societies and hunter societies. Hunters as well as peasants were there before class society and they know violence. Cde agrees that violence comes into being, like the bible says, the story of Cain and Abel – one being a farmer, one a hunter. This is supposed to be the first murder in history, because one brother kills the other. This shows that the Jews in ancient times knew about the time of primitive communism. When the Mongol (normades) came to Europe in the Middle Ages, they were pushed back. This shows that this conflict is old but also lasted for a long time. Also when Europeans went and found new colonies, there they also found different forms of society. The introduction is correct here. Perhaps the presentation does not go back far enough. The first men were vegetarians and the fled into the trees to hide from wild animals. They seem to have been collectors (fruit, berries etc.) It seems that they were not very violent. Less aggressive as humans today. Research says that the fact that humans felt the trees and conquered the ground and this was a great step. It was only possible to do so by creating weapons. Hereby violence against animals and later against each other is a product of culture. In bourgeoisie Science in the 19th century there was the idea that violence is merely a primitive impulse and that the first humans were very violent and only in the course of history people became less and less violent. Therefore the shock was great when the 20th century saw world wars and incredible violence. There then was the idea that civilisation was not able to control the violent impulse of man. But in fact violence is a product of culture.
Violence in primitive communism compared to it in class society. Back then they used to kill animal in order to survive. In this context they created totems. Every tribe had its own totem animal. Every tribe had 2 tasks towards its totem: 1) worship its totem animal 2) only each tribe family was allowed to kill its totem but not eat it, they gave it to the other parts of the tribe. Parts of this can be explained by Freud (psychology). Will not talk about this here but rather from what was said in Marxism. It shows, I think: 1) IT was difficult for the people to kill the animals ( bad consciousness), because people were not separated from the animals. You can also see this with children today. So they had to do ceremonies in order to say sorry to the animals. The fact that they were not allowed to eat the animals themselves has to do with their guilty consciousness. This in fact helped to maintain the communist principle, that is, that the whole food/ meat was distributed collectively in the whole tribe. Very important. The totem family had the job to make sure that its totem animal would not die/ disappear. So when you look at violence in primitive society we can see that the use of violence was not easily done, they did not use violence more then necessary. There is no need to believe that whenever tribes met, that they killed each other. Morgan’s research showed that they tried to avoid each other and whenever they met a stranger they were very kind.
Giving birth is a natural act and gives pain but it might not help in the discussion for question of violence because it is a natural act.
Hunters developed war tactics, tricks of war. This shows that the first acts of violence were not brutal but tried to get what they needed with a minimum of violence but high effectiveness. Brutal violence developed much later. In the early phase of ancient Greece or Rom Slaves had to work more than the family but their life was not so terrible yet. Some were part of the family. It only changed when Slaves become a value that their exploitation became worse and unbearable. Product of civilisation.
Some people follow from this: We need to turn back history and leave civilisation. But this is a undialectical way of thinking. This development of violence and its acceleration will become more and more until humans find it unbearable and then overthrow this society. This does not mean that the proletarian revolution will come without violence. Communism will the product of a great longing for freedom and no violence.
Last point: Hunting and having a guilty consciousness. This brings a rawness of humans. It seems that it was a great advancement in human development (Brain) to eat animal meat but nevertheless it came along with killing animals and so humans became raw. Bebel writes about the possibility of someday developing meat without killing animals.
E: This means then that through killing animals the break was loosened for man to kill.
Q: One question: One sentence in introduction, a quote from Engels: “No socialism without ancient slavery”. It would be interesting to discuss this, why is slavery a precondition for communism. But not the main question here.
S: I would have thought more like Dühring that violence played a very important role also in primitive communism. Have to rethink. But does this mean that development of violence is a product of culture. But does this mean that it is correct after all what is says in the presentation about that there is no genetical reason for violence?
A: The two things do not exclude each other mutually: Violence is a genetic potential, but whether or not it develops depends on the social environment.
E:The comrade developed that violence developed with civilisation. On the other hand there are murder wishes of children which are kept in check by culture. Are these two things in contradiction? While posing this question, I am fully in agreement with the idea developed that the early societies were much less violent and also lived much more in harmony with nature, that the violence they practised was not without measure.
A: What is the cause of the wish of children to see their rivals deal (murder fantasies)? Perhaps in a larger community it is less jealous?
E: Very young children have to be socialised first.
S: B said that the two aspects, nature and nurture, are not opposed necessarily. I said a book by Freud explaining that the little child has an unlimited need of the mother, and that this is the source of jealousy and the aggressive impulses towards its rivals. My experiences with children seem to confirm this.
I: Back to primitive society. It was shown that at the beginning society was not so violent and that people hesitated even to kill the animals they lived from. The violence was above all the product of scarcity. The members of primitive society were not yet really individuals. Freud also explains that individuals could not yet exist. Human beings saw themselves as part of nature, as brothers and sisters with the whole of nature even. A one year old child does not recognise itself in the mirror, not yet distinguishing itself from the parents as an individual. With the development of class society there is more violence. At the beginning the Romans were free peasants, only later did slavery become the general basis of society. But at the same time it was an historical progress. It sounds mad, but the development of exploitation and violence have created the preconditions for a free society. The historic link between primitive communism, class society and modern communism is like the theses, antitheses and synthesis, where we will go back to the origins, the lack of violence and the unity with nature, but at a higher level, with real consciousness.
E: In this sense primitive communism was the childhood of humanity, class society is like the adolescence, the difficult and often aggressive years, whereas the task facing humanity now is to become really mature and adult like.
Q: On the question of genetics. Of course, very thing that humans have experienced so far, there are genetical traits for it. Animals have not produced trade or slavery etc. In so far it is correct to say that capitalism reflects a part of human nature. But it is also true that overcoming it and fighting for communism from the proletariat is part of human nature. The idea that human beings are bad might be related to the fact that the development of history came by the “bad” parts of man being dominant. Hegel said: People think it is great to say man is good but it is even greater to say man is bad. Of course these terms are relative. But there are impulses in man that are social and others are anti-social. The social ones are in a way the good ones. They try to keep the anti-social impulses under control. This is reflected in morality. Therefore every society has a moral, even capitalism. Often the bad impulses are rewarded in history. For instance the rich live better because they exploit people, therefore are rewarded by stressing their bad, anti-social impulses. Anti-social impulses will also exist in communism. Freud says that the first crime came from an anti-social impulse: jealousy. Murdering the father. Old problem of man. We know that there were old rules in tribes in order to control jealousy. Rules to prevent father murder. Rules like this would only be introduced if there is a longing to kill out of jealousy. Freud says that man is not indifferent towards nature. Especially towards humans whom you love/ like very much and do not want to share them with anybody. This is part of human nature. This was one aspect that Freud named to prove that communism is not possible. But there was a misconception on his side. Engels explains that communism does know personal belongings. Production means will become pubic but everybody will have their own belongings, also my home, my family, my letter etc. Everything that it personal. It is the opposite to capitalism. There is a false conception of communism fostered by Stalinism or 68 movement, as if everybody has to be the same or share everybody (lovers, children etc.) There will exist a communist family. Marxism has understood already that humans has social and anti-social impulses will exist in communism. Maybe even murder out of jealousy. It is true that children can be cruel because of jealousy for instance.
I: A question: Many leftists worship violence as good in itself. But what is the position of the proletariat on the question of violence and its use.
S: I think there may be agreement here that blind destruction has nothing to do with the proletariat or with revolutionary violence today. But what has been said is that the ruling classes never surrender their power without a fight. The working class has often been naïve about this. I have been reading about the revolution 1918 in Finland, and with this I am reading a lot about the question of violence. The violence of the bourgeoisie in the civil war greatly succeeded that of the working class. But these events show how important the question of violence in the class struggle is, what are its conditions and principles, and its limits. We are against the use of violence within the class. But are we in favour of red terror (I think not)?
E: The idea of red terror is linked to the desperation due to the isolation of the Russian Revolution. They hoped with the use of terror against the opponents of the revolution to hold out until the world revolution would come. There is a violence in the revolution which is to a certain extent is inevitable, the elementary explosions of hatred within the exploited masses. There were situations where the workers got into a kind of exaltation of hatred. But the workers must remember that kind of revolution they are making.
I: The bourgeoisie presents the Russian Revolution as something extremely violent. John Reed shows a very different picture, or Trotsky’s book about the events between Fe and Oct 1917. It is absolutely amazing how little violence was used. The outbursts of violence came with the civil war when Russia was encircled and attacked from all sides, a kind of conventional civil war. But the socialist revolution is above all the first really conscious revolution in history. In the bourgeois revolution the guillotine played a central role, in the socialist revolution consciousness is central, and solidarity, not greed, envy or the thirst for revenge. We discussed in he circle before about Kronstadt, the tragedy of proletarians shooting at proletarians. IN the French suburbs we saw young workers burning the cars of other workers, or attacking the students demonstration. That can create a difficult situation; it is not always possible to defend oneself with dialogue. Much more difficult than when you are attacked by the police. There can be difficult situations.
S: There can be dangerous moments, even when the class knows that its violence is a political violence. It is necessary that the workers deepen these questions. After the bourgeoisie massacres the workers it always says: brother must never again shoot at brother. But we say: the revolution must take place.
E: The taking of power in Russia was very little violent. On the day of the insurrection there were less people dying than on a normal day in St Petersburg, according to Trotsky. The comrade asked how to react when attacked by young workers at happened in France. But were these youth really members of the working class. OK they were the children of workers, but are they not becoming part of the lumpen proletariat. And when it becomes the case, we have to use violence against them. History shows we have to defend ourselves with violence against the lumpen proletariat. When the sailors occupied buildings in Berlin in 1918 and the army came with artillery, the population came and stood between the artillery And the sailors, so that they could not fire, thus also winning over the soldiers.
AR: Agree in principle with what has been said. I understand the concern of the comrades saying we must not be naïve towards the violence of the bourgeoisie. In Russia the workers let free generals who then continued the fight against the revolution. But not the same revolution as that of the bourgeoisie, here it is the exploited class taking political power. One of its forces is its consciousness, its capacity to put forward its project, which is opposed to the barbarism of this society. Important examples from the student struggles in France, where we saw a high level of consciousness about the question of violence, but also at Vigo in Spain. The bourgeoisie wanted to draw the students into violence confrontations at he Sorbonne and tried to accuse the students of having burnt the precious books of that institute, which was a lie and he work of a minority not belonging to the students. But the students had the intelligence not to go onto this terrain. Its means of struggle were the general assemblies were open to all who supported the movement, including the ICC comrades. Here was a culture of debate. As we saw in Kronstadt, the need to confront conflicts within the class by the means of debate and not by violence. In France the bourgeoisie sent the civil war police, the CRS, against the anti CPE movement. They wanted to provoke violence, but he young workers refused the invitation. There were mass demonstrations and even the government had to admit that the students were not looking for violence. They started to pretend that the police were there to protect the students against the youth from the suburbs. But these were thus exaggerated for this purpose, and secondly the students were able to protect themselves by dialogue, sending delegations to discuss with them. And at the demonstrations themselves the students even began debating with the CRS and making them feel unsure, remembering them that heir own children were suffering from the cuts. This is a completely different approach to the blind violence in the suburbs. In Vigo the young people and in particularly the girls also played a very important role. The demonstrators went to the biggest factory, that of Citroen, who were hesitating to join the struggle. What happened? The trade unionists tried to throw things at the Citroen workers, with the result that they did not join the movement, but a few days later hey did so of their own accord. Fundamental for the development and the victory of the revolution will be he capacity to discuss and convince, within the class, but even towards the other non exploiting layers, whereas it is the bourgeoisie which tries to trap the class by drawing it onto the terrain of violent blind confrontations.
S: We are very happy to have you from France here to discuss with us. Thank you very much!
Q: Violence and revolution. The introduction already said that the ruling class never gives up power voluntarily. Therefore the workers will have to use violence to succeed. The proletariat has to be careful not to be too naïve or too generous. In the Russian Revolution a lot of Generals were let free but they then fought against the revolution.
But it is even more important to see that violence does not belong to the nature of the proletariat. The reason lies in the goal of the working class – this is world wide freedom. The working class is fighting for a world were violence does not play a role in society. Marxism is against idealising violence – totally. This is important to stress because a lot of leftists idealize violence. Here we can go back to the debate between Engels and Dühring. Dühring but also Mao thought that violence is the essence of history and therefore the most important thing. The bourgeoisie always tries to get the class struggle to the level of violent/ military confrontation: Reasons: 1) Most of the time the bourgeoisie. is stronger on military level. 2) Working class is only stronger when it is class conscious and stands together, it can be stronger than the bourgeoisie, when they start discussing and perhaps convincing the soldiers not to use their weapons. This is what the bourgeoisie fears. So, if there is a military confrontation at a early stage this can have different reasons: a) proletariat is not class conscious enough yet. B) Military provoked proletariat in fighting too early (like Berlin 1918). Workers need to know that their strength lays elsewhere. Problem with Trotsky was that he theoretizised a weakness and tried to make a strong principle out of it. This does not mean that there cannot be confrontation. But if it happens that workers fight against the interests of the class of example lynching people, this happens because the bourgeoisie Influence is still strong within parts of the workers, but it is not a principle of the proletariat.
In Hungary parts of the secret service were hung by some parts of angry workers. But some tried to prevent this as not right. These acts of violence also remembered a lot of people to what happened after 1945, where people who collaborated with the Nazi- bourgeoisie regime where killed in countries what were occupied by the Nazi during the war. IT was similar in Hungary against Stalinism. Yet there was a weakness, lack of perspective, bourgeoisie Ideology was strong (nationalism). Rosa Luxemburg already argued against “red terror”. She said even if you are forced to use violence, this is always a danger. 1) that the violence will lead to a brutalism and clouding of class consciousness 2) this violence can develop of life of its own.
If we go back to the first question of the discussion today: Violence cannot merely be an evil, it cannot be an act of liberation itself, it is only one means of it but also two sides of one sword. It is a necessity but a necessity that we need be careful about. IT is a means that has to be in line with the goal.
I: In this sense, the atomic bomb is not a weapon which the proletariat can use. Nor the weapon of terrorism which is the expression of classes without a future.
Our presidium has left, but time obliges us to come to a conclusion. We would like to finish off with balance sheet of today’s discussion and propositions for the next discussion.
I: I think it was a very good discussions. Engels gave us elements, but a lot of questions remained open, and it is not easy to appropriate the Marxist position. It was good that we went back to the origins of violence and of society. We rejected that humanity is bad, showing hat the use of violence is even not easy. Important the discussion about the events in France and the lessons of the revolutionary wave, where we were able to learn from the concrete experience of the class struggle.
A: Very good discussion giving a coherence, and an historical vision, a real clarification showing that violence is not the proof hat humanity is bad. This helped us to see how violence evolved in history and how the question is posed for the proletariat. This helped us to see the need to deal with the question of violence in the most conscious possible manner.
E: It was very instructive to learn about the development of violence in history in connection with the development of culture. We dealt with the role of morality and education in the sublimation of aggression. The second part on the class struggle of the proletariat was able to build on this, in fact confirming what I had already thought, for instance that we do not propagate or theorise red terror, we should not make of a tragic necessity at a certain moment a virtue. A practical question which remains open for me, concerning France: I still fear that the bourgeoisie will try to use such youth for instance or other expressions of decomposition against the class struggle. I was really indignant when I saw on TV that youth were attacking students. There may be situations where we have to protect ourselves through defensive physical actions. Violence is not an evil in itself, it is a necessity imposed on the class, but as Rosa showed us, we have to know the dangers connected with its use.
AR: I am impressed and enthusiastic by the circle, by the depth of the discussion, which is incredible, going back even to before primitive communism and on to today, the class struggle in France and the perspective of the revolution and communism.
I: In the name of the whole circle we want to express how happy we were to have a participation from a comrade in France, from whom we have learnt a lot, from her profound contributions particularly about the class struggle in France and Spain and their general implications for the whole class. Lovely to have had you here!
Next subject, the date is the third weekend in December. Any suggestions? There already were propositions such as to discuss the Stalinist regimes, but also the German revolution. Concerning the latter, when we intervened about the events in France, people said this is possible in France, but for historical reasons there could never be a revolutionary struggle in German. And when we replied: What about the German revolution? People said: What German revolution? They had never heard of it! And that is here in Germany!
AR: That will be a good suggest.
Q: The formulation could be : Was there a German revolution?
AR: This will be very important for everybody, for instance in relation to the fraternisations which are hidden or presented as having been a flash in the pan as in the film: Merry Christmas.
I: I could try and make the presentation, but only if nobody else is willing to. I would actually prefer for someone else to prepare it, as I am very busy.
S: I bet we can find somebody else.
I: There are sources such as the three books from Richard Müller as well as a series of articles from the left communist organisation ICC. If anyone has further suggestions for our reading list, please send an email to the discussion circle. Take care and see you soon.