Date: Wed, 14 Feb 1996 06:02:12 -0800
From: Collective Action Notes <cansv-AT-igc.apc.org>
Subject: RE: OTTO RUHLE


My apologies for interjecting this so late, but I have had
problems posting to marxism from within a mail manager program.

Otto Ruhle's biography of Marx is a popular work in the best sense
of the word.  Ruhle was attempting more to introduce Marx's life
and ideas to a broader non-political audience than writing an
academic treatise. In his biography, Ruhle mixes in standard
biographical data, situates this information in the context of the
political and economic development which was occurring in Marx's
lifetime and then intersperses long selections from Marx's own
writings. I can't compare it to any other Marx biography for the
simple reason that I haven't read any of them.

But Ruhle's political life is in many ways far more interesting
than his biography of Marx. Ruhle was associated with the far left
wing of German social democracy and was elected to parliament when
he denounced the war. After the murder of Luxemburg and Liebnecht,
Ruhle gravitated to the ultra-left wing of the CP and was
expelled, along with the then-majority of the Party by Paul Levi's
wing. As a representative of this ultra-left party - the Communist
Workers Party - went to Moscow as a delegate to the Comintern
where he met with Lenin and in disgust at the increasing
bureacratization, abruptly left the meeting and returned to
Germany,  saying the Russian Revolution had set up a Party
dictatorship over the masses.  Ruhle was associated with the
'unitary' wing of the factory councils movement, which opposed the
separation of party and factory committee functions and the
factory groups with which he was associated - the AAUD-E were
influenced by the IWW. In the early 20's, the AAUD-E had around 20
thousand members. He also wrote several popular brochures arguing
that 'the Revolution is not a party affair', denouncing the role
of the party as being a bourgeois form imported into the workers
movement.  In the mid-twenties, Ruhle rejoined the SPD after the
revolutionary wave had died down.  He reemerged in the 30's as a
sympathizer of the council communist movement, which had descend
out of the German 'ultra left' and wrote for their publications.
He also was a member of the Dewey Commission, which exonerated
Trotsky.  In the late 30's, Ruhle emigrated to Mexico, where under
a pseudonym, he became a painter and attracted some interest in
the art world.  Very little of his work has been translated into
English. Probably the best overall examination of his life and
work in English can be found in the chapter devoted to Ruhle in
Paul Mattick's "Anti-Bolshevik Communism." The Spunk archives has
a few of his shorter pieces available on-line.  Ruhle and his wife
Alice had a long time interest in psychological issues and some of
his work in this area paralleled Reich. In fact, his biography of
Marx was criticized within the council communist movement because
he had incorporated some of these concerns in his assessments of
Marx, which were far from reverential.

- Curtis Price


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