The horrors of 20th century capitalism threw up numerous challenges by workers and peasants, who rose up in their millions to fight the system. Inspired by the successful 1917 Russian Revolution, they repeatedly created their own institutions of collective power and in doing so demonstrated not just how to organise their struggles in the present but also how to build a world free of capitalists, landlords and generals.
But these revolutionary movements quickly confronted counter-revolutionary forces, both in the repressive machinery of the state and in the workers’ movement itself – trade union and political leaders with no interest in seeing workers take power. Defeating such forces required that at least the leading militants be organised in revolutionary parties dedicated to seeing the struggle through. The victorious Russian revolution brought hundreds of thousands of working class militants together in new Communist parties dedicated to working class emancipation, but tragically the revolution’s defeat at the hands of the dictator Joseph Stalin turned these parties into vehicles for betrayal.
From Britain to China, from Hungary to Australia, this book tells the story of these inspiring working class struggles and uprisings and recounts the fights within the workers movement over strategies and tactics to take the struggles forward.
Cuprins
Introduction
BIRTH OF A NEW INTERNATIONAL, 1914 to 1923
1. Reformist Betrayal, Revolutionary Hope
2. The Creation of Mass Revolutionary Parties
3. The Fight Against Ultra Leftism
4. Germany: An Opportunity Lost
THE DEGENERATION OF THE INTERNATIONAL, 1923 to 1928
5. Counter-Revolution in Russia
6. The British General Strike
7. The Chinese Revolution
THE COMINTERN’S ULTRA LEFTIST TURN, 1928 TO 1933
8. ‘Social Fascism’: the Path to Nazi Victory in Germany
9. Communism in Australia During the Great Depression
POPULAR FRONT – GRAVEYARD OF STRUGGLES, 1935 to 1945
10. The Popular Front in France
11. The Spanish Revolution: Anarchism Put to the Test
12. Sit-Down Fever! US Workers’ Struggle and the Roosevelt Administration
13. Saluting the Flag: Australian Communists During WWII
14. Anti-Fascist Resistance in Italy and Greece
STALINISM AND ANTI-STALINISM AFTER WORLD WAR II
15. Post-War Upsurge in Australia and the Cmmunist Challenge
16. The Communists Come to Power in China
17. Anti-Stalinist Revolts in Eastern Europe
Acronyms and Abbreviations
Endnotes
Despre autor
Mick Armstrong has been a socialist political activist and organiser in Australia since the early 1970s. He writes regularly for the Marxist Left Review and Red Flag newspaper and is author of a range of books and pamphlets, including From Little Things Big Things Grow: Strategies for Building Revolutionary Socialist Organisations (2007). Mick is a founder member of Socialist Alternative.
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