TERRORISM AND COMMUNISM.

— By Karl Kautsky. (George Allen and Unwin. Ltd.)

Investigating and comparing the French Revolution with the Russia of to-day, Karl Kautsky's work, "Terrorism and Communism" contains a sweeping indictment of Bolshevist methods. Yet his leanings towards revolution are shown by the following extract: "The success of the revolution will depend not a little on whether or not it discovers the right methods of carrying the revolutionary message to the proletariat. To examine methods is at the present moment our highest duty. To help with this examination, and thus to further the revolution is the object of this present work."
The author almost despairs of drawing useful comparisons between the French Revolution and that of Russian origin, and he was at one time tempted to put the results of his investigations of each in separate volumes. He proceeds: "The working class is not always, and in all circumstances, mature enough to take over control. It must everywhere go through a period of development in order to become capable. Furthermore, it cannot choose the moment when it shall come into power. If the working class does not take over control, then it must not simply destroy the means of production which it finds in existence. It must rather seek to carry on what is already existent, to develop it further in accordance with the needs of the proletariat, and to liberate the elements of the new society, all which in different circumstances require different treatment, it will thus at any given moment more easily find what is attainable the more clearly it understands the actual conditions and takes them into account."
The discussion of the position after the downfall of Napoleon— when the Parisian workers were the most enlightened in the world, and were living at the very heart of it—is specially interesting in view of present day conditions. The possibilities of a proletarian revolution arose at that time in much the same way as in current times, and Marx gave it a good deal of serious thought. It is explained that the world's history does not depend on our mere will power. It can just as little postpone the coming of revolution as it can hasten it. "Marx did not regard it as the chief duty of the Paris commune at that time to do away with all capitalistic means of production. He wrote to Kugelmann about this on April 12, 1871: "If you will turn up the last chapter of my 18th Brumiere, you will find that I proposed the next attempt for the French Revolution, to undertake that they should not endeavour to wrest the bureaucratic military machine out of the hands of one man and give it to another, but smash it up completely. This is the necessary condition of every real popular revolution on the Continent. This is also what our heroic comrades on the Continent are attempting." There is no word of Socialism in this letter. Marx proclaims that the chief duty of the Commune is to destroy the power then in the hands of the bureaucrats, the militarists."
Dealing with the study of Bolshevism and its origin, the view is taken that the world war made the working-class take a backward step, both morally and intellectually. The war also encouraged primitive ideas in the working-classes by developing the military way of thinking, that form of thinking which, as it is, lies very near the surface in the thoughts of the average unintelligent man, who imagine that mere power is the determining factor in the world's history—as if one needed only the necessary force and recklessness to accomplish everything that one undertakes. Marx and Engels have always attacked and opposed this conception. Engels was not of the view so much upheld to-day, that one should never show up the mistakes of a movement, because one might, by doing so, weaken the force of the revolution.
"In the case of the Bolsheviks," the author continues, "Marxism had no power in the situation. The mass psychology overruled them, and they allowed themselves to be carried away by it. Doubtless, in consequence of this, they have become the rulers of Russia. It is quite another question what will, and must be, the end of it all. By making the blind will of the masses the motive force of the revolution they throw overboard the Marxist system, to the victorious ascendancy of which they had, in a large measure, contributed."
The conclusions reached are contained in the following passage: "We of the present day have no 'ready-made Utopias to introduce by popular decisions.' What is now happening is the liberating of those elements that mark the beginning of socialist development. If we care to call that the world-revolution, because this is happening throughout the world, then we are certainly confronted with a world-revolution.  It will not proceed on the lines of a dictatorship, nor by means of cannons and guns, not through the destruction of one's political and social adversaries, but only through democracy and humanity. In this way alone can we hope to arrive at those higher form of life, the working out of which belongs to the future task of the proletariat."

Daily Mail (Brisbane, Qld. : 1903 - 1926), Saturday 5 February 1921, page 9