Council Communism
"The answer to the question of the purpose of the theory of value is quite different for the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. The bourgeoisie asks about the prices of commodities, the proletariat about the organisation of society."
Council Communism, also called Dutch-German Left Communism[3], or simply Councilism[4], is a particular strain of left communism that emphasizes the role of worker's councils in organizing both the revolution itself and as a foundation of post-capitalist society. This direct proletarian control over production and distribution (Where the councils take control over the economy) is seen by Council Communists as the true character of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
Beliefs
Council communists differ widely on the specifics, but they all agree that, generally, the association of free and equal producers can only be achieved by the system of workers councils.
Council Communism, at its core, believes in the establishment of a dictatorship of the proletariat by means of a network of workers' councils. Council Communism rejects 
social democratic methods like participation in parliaments and trade unions. Historically, council communists like Herman Gorter, Anton Pannekoek and the KAPD believed that the party is needed in the conquest of political power by the workers along with the idea that the communist party must have a thoroughly worked out programmatic basis and must be organized and disciplined in its entirety from below, as a unified will. However, some of the more recent councilists (like Ruhle and Mattick) would end up rejecting the party, believing it to be useless in the proletarian struggle and believing that the proletariat can do the revolution by itself without needing any forms of organization other than the soviets.
Council Communists/Dutch-German Left Communists differ from 
Italian Left Communists on the idea of the party. This can be seen in Pannekoek's Party and Class[5] and Bordiga's work with the same name[6]. While the Dutch-Germans generally hold the position of "proletarian dictatorship above the party", the Italians do the exact opposite, emphasizing on the need for party dictatorship.
In spite of this difference, both agree that the Communists are the avant-garde/vanguard of the working class, and that the conquest of political power by the proletariat is a necessity, a principle even, for moving towards communism.
Personality
Council Communism, like the name, implies that they really like councils and will usually insist other leftists to get into a Council together before deciding anything.
How to Draw
- Draw a ball with eyes
- Make it red
- In the middle draw a black circle with a red star in it
- Around the circle draw 9 black bars forming a circle.
You're done
| Color Name | HEX | RGB | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Red | #d40100 | 212, 1, 0 | |
| Black | #202020 | 32, 32, 32 | |
Relationships
Friends
Marxism - If only more people understood what you said.
Marxist Feminism - No democracy can exist unless everyone has an equal voice.
Fully Automated Luxury Gay Space Communism - It is time for mankind to ensure itself of material abundance by establishing a free, self-managed world-society of productive labor, thereby freeing its mental powers for perfecting its knowledge of nature and the universe.
Situationism - My based son who uses fancy jargon and criticizes consumerism.
Libertarian Socialism - Great comrade in arms, he likes workers' control and advice just like I do.
Frenemies
Spartacism - Indeed a true revolutionary leader and communist, however, you are an economist and an entryist.
Trotskyism - We consider Trotsky the most able spokesman for Bolshevism, and he should have been Lenin’s successor. By his revolutionary fervor Trotsky captivated all the dissidents that Stalinism had thrown out of the Communist Parties, and in inoculating them with the Bolshevik virus it rendered them almost incapable of understanding the great new tasks of the proletarian revolution.
Anarcho-Communism - We fight the Anarchists most energetically, in spite of the fact that they call themselves enemies of capitalism, because they are enemies of the working class movement; because their propaganda always threatens to destroy organization and discipline, the chief weapons of the proletariat in its struggles, and tends to divert the workers from the most important part of their struggle, the conquest of the power of the State. For some inexplicable reason, many of your followers seem to think that I want an immediately stateless, classless, moneyless society.
Anarcho-Collectivism - Bakunin was a great revolutionary and his conflict with Marx is much more complex than modern Marxists believe, yet I think we should both moderate each other's opinions.
Guild Socialism - Reactionary! Well, I mean our end goals are similar, but your dislike of Marx and promotion of corporatist economics separates us
Enemies
Syndicalism - Trade unions are useless in the struggle against capital!
Social Darwinism - You have falsified actual Darwinist theory!
Liberalism - Your democracy is only a tyranny of the minority!
Social Democracy - Social democracy and communism are opposed with respect to their immediate practical aims: the first seeks the reorganization of the old bourgeois State; the second, a new political system.
Ho Chi Minh Thought - You cracked down on us and the Trotskyists! Luckily enough Ngo Van was able to flee from the scene.
Nazism - Cope harder, you can't unburn the Reichstag.Wait, it was restored in 1999.
Kautskyism - You forgot your Marxism at home.
Marxism–Leninism - You are merely a natural conclusion of Blanquism.
Leninism - The renegade Kautsky of course has his own disciples.
The intellectuals - Social organization does not depend on qualities of the intellect of a minority. What intellectuals bring along to social organization is only the haughty prejudices of the capitalist class!
National Bolshevism - No to National-Communism!
Further Information
Literature
- The Radical Tradition: A Study in Modern Revolutionary Thought by Richard Gombin.
- Worker's Councils by Anton Pannekoek
- Fundamental Principles of Communist Production and Distribution by the GIK
- Open Letter to Comrade Lenin by Hermann Gorter
- The German Revolution - First Stage by Anton Pannekoek
- The Revolution is Not a Party Affair by Otto Rühle
- The Council Communist Reader by Radical Reprints
- Marx and Keynes by Paul Mattick
Wikipedia
Videos
Gallery
Portraits
-
-
-
-
-
By
Chara
Comics and Artwork
- ↑ https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/ch06.htm#s3
- ↑ https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0920203x05058504
- ↑ https://libcom.org/files/dutchleft.pdf
- ↑ https://marx200.org/en/marxismus-denkt-ein-zwei-viele-marx/councilism-1920s
- ↑ https://www.marxists.org/archive/pannekoe/1936/party-class.htm
- ↑ https://www.marxists.org/archive/bordiga/works/1921/party-class.htm
