File spoon-archives/marxism.archive/marxism_1994/marxism.Jul12-Aug17.94, message 146


Date: Wed, 27 Jul 1994 23:54:33 -0400 (EDT)
From: Alex Trotter <uburoi-AT-panix.com>
Subject: Re: Bordgist current



To put it in a nutshell, the ultralefts and councilists were communist 
tendencies that had their origins in the extreme left wing of Social 
Democracy and, like Rosa Luxemburg, detached themselves from both the 
Social Democrats and the Bolsheviks in the period 1917-18. The council 
communists were in favor of the absolute power of workers' councils, 
unmediated by political parties or unions. They were present mostly in 
Germany and Holland. Anton Pannekoek, an astronomer, was the most well 
known. In Germany there was an ultraleft *party* called the KAPD ("German 
Communist Workers' Party") that split out of disillusionment with the 
Moscow-dominated KPD (German Communist Party). Even though it was a 
party, it was opposed to the extreme centralization of power practiced by 
the Bolsheviks. The Bordigist current is named after Amadeo Bordiga, who 
was one of the founders of the Italian Communist Party, and who later led 
one of the more radical factions of that organization which eventually 
splintered off. Bordiga also favored a party, but again distinguished 
from both Socialist and Communist models and adapted to revolution in the 
West, not countries like Russia. Bordigism exists today as a tiny and 
well-splintered sectarian movement, mainly in Italy, but also in France 
and Belgium, and there may be such a tendency in Britain as well, though 
I don't know that for certain. Another group claiming the heritage of the 
KAPD and other ultraleft tendencies is the International Communist 
Current (ICC). They too are partyists, and subscribe to Luxemburg's 
theory of catastrophism and capitalist "decadence." As for the council 
communists, in the post-WWII period there has been Cornelius Castoriadis 
aka Paul Chaulieu aka Paul Cardan, who formed a group in London called 
Solidarity. He gave up on Marxism and is now a Lacanian psychoanalyst in 
Paris, I believe. You mentioned Paul Mattick--did you know that he was a 
council communist? Also, council communism became the basis for the 
*political program* of the Situationist International, a group everyone 
should be familiar with. 
	These various tendencies, though all sharing at least some things 
in common, have been quite contentious with each other. The ICC, for 
example, regards Camatte as a bete noire, and they frequently attack 
Mattick's economic theory. Camatte attacks the Bordigist party he once 
belonged to as a political racket akin to the Mafia. And so on.
About Camatte--more on him later. I'm getting tired now.
	Just one more note--it's not surprising that you haven't heard 
anything about these tendencies; not much attention is paid to them in 
academic circles (except maybe the Situationists, and that only in the 
last few years). The ultralefts were all "third-camp internationalists" 
during WWII, meaning they adhered to the plague-on-both-your-houses 
position and refused to support the cause of bourgeois democracy against 
fascism. I doubt anything written by Bordiga has been published in 
English. These currents belong very much to the secret history of the 
20th century.

--Alex Trotter


On Wed, 27 Jul 1994, donna jones wrote:

> I would like to know more about the Bordigist current, Cammatte, council
> communists and other ultra-leftists.  What was Cammatte's break over
> Marxism about; what about '68 led to his break; how is this the epoch of
> real domination; is the Bordigst current a branch of analytical marxism? 
> d jones
> 
> 


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