Anton Pannekoek (1873-1960), the Dutch astronomer and Marxist
revolutionary, was a key theoretician of council communism-a Marxist
alternative to both Leninism and Social Democracy that instead
emphasized working-class self-emancipation through workers' councils.
The
first half of this book walks the reader through the fundamentals of
council communism and the conditions that led to the development of
these ideas. The second half of the book demonstrates the rich depth of
Pannekoek's thinking, with penetrating essays and insightful letters on
revolutionary organization, state capitalism, Marxism, the limitations
of trade unions and political parties, the potential of wildcat strikes,
public vs. common ownership, the necessity of combining organization
and freedom, the deceptiveness of parliamentarism, workers' councils,
the vital importance of working-class self-emancipation, and more.
With the recent resurgence in the naïve hope that Democratic Socialism
and trade unionism can act as radical methods to meaningfully confront
or even overthrow capitalism, Pannekoek's council communist ideas
encourage workers to think for themselves rather than submit to the
dead-end traditions of the old movement and embrace the collective
self-activity that can build a new movement capable of overcoming the
struggles we face ahead.
