First Socialist Schism: Bakunin vs. Marx in the International Working Men's Association

by Wolfgang Eckhardt

The First Socialist Schism chronicles the conflicts in the International Working Men’s Association (the First International, 1864–1877), which represents an important milestone in the history of political ideas and socialist theory. In defending their autonomy, federations in the International became aware of what separated them from the social democratic movement that relied on the establishment of national labor parties and the conquest of political power. This can be seen as a decisive moment in the history of political the split between centralist party politics and the federalist grassroots movement. The separate movements in the International—which would later develop into social democracy, communism, and anarchism—found their greatest advocates in Mikhail Bakunin and Karl Marx. However, the significance of this alleged clash of titans is largely a modern invention. It was not the rivalry between two arch-enemies or a personal vendetta based on mutual resentment that made the conflict between Bakunin and Marx so important but rather that it heralded the first socialist schism between parliamentary party politics aiming to conquer political power and social-revolutionary concepts. Instead of focusing exclusively on what Marx and Bakunin said, many other contributions to this debate are examined, making this the first reconstruction of a dispute that gripped the entire organization. This book also provides the first detailed account of the International’s Congress of The Hague (September, 1872); including the background, the sequence of events, and international reaction. The book sets new standards when it comes to source material, taking into account documents from numerous archives and libraries that have previously gone unnoticed or were completely unknown.

Genres: History, Politics, Nonfiction, Philosophy, Economics

624 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2015

Reviews

[Ian Downey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic book, one of the best I've ever read. It's scholarly, yes (with 182 pages of bibliography, notes, and index); it's largely a sourcebook, a series of huge verbatim block quotes, sometimes several pages long, excerpted from the original historical documents, written by the principle characters, strung along together into a narrative.

But it reads like fascinating page-turner of a novel, almost a gossipy soap-opera. I could not stop reading it, and now that it's over, I miss it. I almost want to read it all over again.

Of course, that's not the point of the book at all - just the opposite. Wolfgang Eckhardt's central thesis is that the split in the International Workingmen's Association was not simply a personal conflict between two titanic personalities, Karl Marx and Mikhail Bakunin, but a complex political struggle among many different factions, vying over serious questions of internal organization and policy, including, most importantly, the question of whether to form national political parties and participate in democratic, parliamentary elections (Marx said yes, Bakunin said no; but there were many complex shades and nuances to this question, and many positions taken by different federations and individuals within the IWMA).

But along the way, the story gets so juicy that you can't help being sucked into the drama of it all. Long story short, there are some pretty shady aspects of both sides. Both were scheming, in a fairly machiavellian way, against each other. And there were third parties, like the notorious Becker, who were playing both sides off of each other for their own purposes. In addition, nationalistic feelings and ethnic tensions entered into the conflict - and Bakunin notoriously resorted to anti-Semitism. But there's no question that the vast majority of bad behavior here is on the side of Marx, Engels, and the partisans of the General Council, who committed one act of slimy dishonesty after another... until the whole thing blew up in their faces.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough. It is as philosophically enriching as it is addictive to read.

[Max · Rating 5 out of 5]

Juicy.

[Asa · Rating 4 out of 5]

So many people from the left claim they want to settle the differences on the left. To do this you've got to back to the beginning. You've got to go beyond propaganda which still overwhelms the left. If you really want to know why Marx and Bakunin didn't get along, do you want to know where the rift between anarchists and marxists started? Do you have the wherewithal to really want to know the truth? Read this and find out. Incredibly well-researched. The details in document authentication is mind-blowing. Here you'll find allegations of authoritarianism, Machiavellian strategizing, and power politics. But the thing is it's backed up, again and again and again with impeccable investigation. The research is so detailed, it's like a DNA analysis. The truth shall prevail.

We are doomed to repeat past mistakes if we do not know the past.

[celestine · Rating 2 out of 5]

Long on my reading list in my days of exploring all of the niche intra-left arguments but I think this book might have finally cured me of that. Meticulously researched, I would say to a kind of disturbing degree, and for what? The book is certainly a hit piece against Marx and Engels and does everything it can to brush Bakunin's dark sides under the rug. Throughout its overly detailed recap of the final years of the First International, it presents Marx and Engels as malicious plotters and Bakunin as uninterested and hardly involved in this admittedly frustrating quarrel that led to the end of the International, but I'm sure all of Bakunin's missing letters around this time frame have nothing to do with any of it. But frankly none of that really matters at all, and I would agree with the author that the real thing that should have been focused on in this split was that of the difference of principles in the International as opposed to these two rival personalities (which I'm sure has nothing to do with Bakunin's famous issues) and in the final chapter the author points to the meandering 'authoritarian' International having its final meeting in 1876 but glosses over the fact that the 'federalist' International had its own final meeting in 1877. The lack of support of the 'authoritarians' and their dissolution (only a year prior to the anarchists'!) is proof to the author of the failure of the ideas of Marx and Engels, which is baffling to consider having written in the 2000s after a century of proponents of Marxism in power, but then again the author does offer a bit of anticommunist diatribe in the Conclusion. Today the working class in the developed countries becomes envious of the prosperity of China, and this prosperity is manifested under a banner of Marxism-Leninism whether or not anyone on the left would like to admit it. Where has the 'social-revolutionary' idea (as the author describes anarchism) gotten anyone? I've read some Bookchin to fairly consider alternate theories of the modern age and this book made me realize it's the same shit Bakunin and his ilk propagated here, so, nothing new and unlike Marxism totally unproven to the working class in its utility as an ideology to guide it to victory.

All that said I also think that this book pointed to another thing I am sick and tired of, which is intra-left polemicizing. These squabbles being the focus of every working class journal of the time reminds me of the Sino-Soviet split, another time the working class's interest in revolution was wasted by differences of tactics and strategy despite ostensibly similar goals. In this sense I'll accept criticism of Marx and Engels choosing to let the International burn instead of finding the patience to deal with a bunch of anarchists who could hardly ever agree on their own oppositional opinions. But really I just think when making these ideological differences your main personality the working class understandably looks elsewhere for leadership.

[Philip · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nice book on the history of the now First International and how intrigue and wanting to dominate and impose your ideology has dire consequences in what should've been a diverse multinational federation for worker's liberation.

[Jarvis · Rating 5 out of 5]

My only significant criticism is that I'd have prefered if it focused on some of the other dynamics at play.

This is possibly my favorite book lol But I woulda liked to see the author go into things like the workers' changing relationship to the nation state and national identity as a factor in the dissolution of the International.