Preface
The intentions of this book are explicitly political. Whilst the author is a historian, the goal of writing this book was never to produce an academic assessment of Rosa Luxemburg’s life. Rather, it is an examination of Rosa Luxemburg’s revolutionary legacy as expressed through her own writings and actions. Its purpose is to arm a new generation with the treasure trove of ideas and revolutionary theory that her life and works encompass. These are ideas that can help us understand the world so that we can change it for the better.
The biographical facts about Rosa Luxemburg in this book are primarily drawn from two sources: Paul Frölich’s Rosa Luxemburg: Ideas in Action and J. P. Nettl’s Rosa Luxemburg.
Paul Frölich was a leading member of the Spartacus League and the German Communist Party. While Rosa Luxemburg was alive, Frölich belonged to the ultra-left wing of the party. Expelled from the Communist Party in 1928, he was subsequently involved in a series of political groups. His biography of Rosa Luxemburg was written in the late 1930s from exile in France, where he had fled after Hitler’s seizure of power in Germany. The book contains first-hand accounts of Luxemburg, particularly in the final period of her life. Nevertheless, the biography is somewhat superficial with regard to political conclusions and is characterised by a few inaccuracies.
J. P. Nettl was professor of political science and sociology at the University of Pennsylvania. In 1966, he published a two-volume biography of Rosa Luxemburg. Nettl’s biography is well researched and is more reliable with regard to dates, names and other facts than Frölich’s. Where there have been discrepancies between the two, I have referred to Nettl. I have used the 1969 single-volume edition with a preface by Hannah Arendt. Nettl’s biography contains a wealth of information about Luxemburg’s life and writings, and Nettl remains, as far as I know, one of the few people to have undertaken a thorough study of her writings in Polish. His research provides us with new and valuable insight into her ideas and activities in the Polish and Russian movements. Nettl, however, was not a revolutionary. He is therefore incapable of really understanding Luxemburg politically. This is evident for instance when he describes her move to Germany as a step towards furthering her “career”. Luxemburg was not in the least concerned with any such “careers”. She moved to Germany because she believed that was where she could do the most to further the world socialist revolution. Furthermore, Nettl is an anti-Leninist and this leads to him to draw politically questionable, and often completely incorrect conclusions, when discussing the debates between Luxemburg and Lenin. He argues for instance that Luxemburg was opposed to the “dictatorship of the proletariat”, a claim directly contradicted by her own writings.
I have attempted throughout this book to allow Rosa Luxemburg’s revolutionary ideas to speak for themselves. I have therefore decided to include many quotes of hers, several of which are quite lengthy. This may make this book a more challenging read, but it will hopefully allow Luxemburg’s ideas to reach the reader in her own words.
To grasp Luxemburg’s ideas, one must consider them in their context and in their process of development. She revised her opinion on multiple occasions as events unfolded, so a number of quotes are followed by long explanations.
Furthermore, although this is a book about Rosa Luxemburg, the reader will notice that Lenin plays a fairly prominent role. When Luxemburg is falsely portrayed as anti-Bolshevik and even as non-revolutionary, it is most often her polemics against Lenin that are used to justify this. In order to counter the misrepresentation of these polemics, it has been necessary to dive into them and present both points of view. I have attempted to do this as objectively as possible.
However, no biography is ever truly ‘neutral’. This is doubly true in the case of a biography concerning a revolutionary individual like Rosa Luxemburg. I do not claim to be non-partisan. Quite the contrary, I wish to make no secret of the fact that I stand on the same side of the barricades as Rosa Luxemburg. This does not exclude an objective reproduction of her life, her actions, and the times she lived in. In fact it could be argued that it compels us to be more objective. Rosa Luxemburg cared not for “uncritical admiration and eager imitation”, but instead insisted upon a critical evaluation of all ideas and movements. In this spirit, the present book is not an uncritical tribute to the ‘icon’ of Rosa Luxemburg. Rather, it is an attempt to portray both her strengths and weaknesses. Whether or not I have succeeded in this attempt, I leave for the reader to decide.
* * *
A special thanks to Hamid Alizadeh and Jonas Foldager for their comments and edits.