Review: Anton Pannekoek Workers'
Councils
Oakland: AK Press, 2003
For many years, at least in the English speaking milieu, Anton
Pannekoek was one of the most important, but least read theorists of
the communist left. While the Internet has gone considerable
distances to rectifying this problem, outside of small run
publications, little of Pannekoek's work is in print. The
re-publication of Pannekoek's classic book Workers' Councils then, is
a welcome correction. That said, there are serious problems with this
edition of the book, which obscure the value of Pannekoek's work.
Readers unfamiliar with Pannekoek may be surprised with the
content of Workers Councils. Today there are few leftist
organizations that do not call for workers' councils and for workers'
control. However, a closer inspection reveals that the "control" is
either a self-managed alienation, or more commonly, under the
benevolent rule of the party organization - a state capitalist
solution. Ken Coates, one of those interviewed for this book argued
in an anthology entitled Workers' Control published in 1968, "it
seems sensible for us to speak of 'workers' control' to indicate the
aggressive encroachment of Trade Unions on management powers in a
capitalist framework, and of 'workers self management' to indicate
attempts to administer a socialist economy democratically."
The tradition to which Pannekoek belonged saw a different content
for the phrase. Pannekoek's Workers' Councils is the summation of
Pannekoek's life and theory. Written during the Second World War, it
is in keeping with the Dutch-German left tradition. Pannekoek's book
was a work of history and of political analysis. It was not just a
blueprint to be taken up, by rather an analysis and explanation of
the workers' movement and some ideas as to its future.
The AK Press edition contains the complete text of Pannekoek's
book along with a series of interviews conducted by the editor Robert
Barsky and a bibliography for further reading. Such a list could be
extremely useful for those new to Pannekoek's work, but while the
bibliography includes scores of academic listings on "workers'
control" it misses such important books as those by Phillipe
Bourrinet and Peter Rachleff on council communism. More than that,
the edition itself has a number of problems. A number of careless
errors creep into the book. The "introduction by Noam Chomsky"
mentioned prominently on the cover is in fact an interview. The
Russian Revolution of 1905 is referred to as taking place in 1705.
Worst of all, the IWW is identified as the International Workers of
the World, rather than the Industrial. But while these mistakes are
annoying, they are minor compared to the interviews which precede the
text.
Three of the interviews were conducted by Barsky. The fourth is
with Paul Mattick and was recorded in 1975 (it was published with the
Echanges edition of Workers' Councils). Barsky has argued that
Pannekoek's book speaks for itself and that the inclusion of the
interviews was to allow "other voices" to speak. Fair enough, but in
that case the expectation would be that the material would compliment
Pannekoek's thought not contradict it - in this case, it seems the
main point was to associate Pannekoek with the Trotskyist notion of
"Workers' Control."
Noam Chomsky is arguable the best-known critic of US policy alive
today and has a readership of millions. He has often spoken
favourably of Pannekoek, as well as Rosa Luxemburg and Paul Mattick's
work. Readers may then be surprised reading Chomsky's interview when
he argues without qualification that anarcho-syndicalism and council
communism are basically the same. Given that anarcho-syndicalists see
as key to their strategy the building of revolutionary unions, while
council communists have pointed out that such a formation would
quickly be recuperated, Chomsky's error is considerable.
Chomsky also argues that the unions are working class
organizations and that Pannekoek's criticism of them was
"historically specific," suggesting that today unions play a
different role. But Pannekoek's comment that the unions "are the
apparatus by means of which monopolistic capital imposes its
conditions on the entire working class" (p. 61) is truer today than
when the words were written. And while in workers Councils, Pannekoek
does discuss workers' committees, such organizations were never
unions.
But Chomsky goes further. He argues that "there are major
entities that are technically under workers control, like United
Airlines . . ." What does technically mean? How does this
technicality express itself? Pannekoek and other council communist
writers were very clear that nationalization did not equal socialism.
If anything the interview demonstrates the gulf between Pannekoek and
the increasingly liberal Chomsky.
And if Chomsky's interview is odd, what can be said of the
inclusion of the interview with Ken Coates? Coates was a supporter of
the Trotskyist United Secretariat of the Fourth International for
decades and a member of the European parliament for ten years. By
and large Coates' comments are limited to his own experience and work
within the European Parliament and the British "Institute for Workers
control." Coates concedes Pannekoek's point that the unions often
replicated and reinforced the institutions of capital they, on paper,
opposed, but then goes on to write of Pannekoek's "impatience" with
the trade unions. This comment echoes Lenin's dismissal of the
"ultra-radicalism" of the Left in Left-Wing Communism: An Infantile
Disorder. As much as Coates' would like to have it, Pannekoek's
rejection of the trade unions was based on their social role, not the
conservatism of their leaders.
The interview with Peter Hitchcock also raises questions as to the
relevance of the interview. Hitchcock quotes Pannekoek to the effect
that "The C.P. of China had been instructed from Moscow that the
Chinese revolution was a middle class revolution" and suggests that
Pannekoek was dismissing the C.P. as "dupes with no agency of their
own." Perhaps Hitchcock is unaware of the slaughter of Chinese
workers and communists in 1927, as the C.P.'s alliance
Moscow-directed alliance with the Guomingdang came to an end. If the
early Chinese communists had their own agenda, they certainly
subordinated it to Moscow. Did Hitchcock actually read Pannekoek?
Further in the section on China Pannekoek notes that the Chinese CP
did have its own agenda, which did not involve communism, but this
emerged after this debacle in Shanghai. Pannekoek was also quick to
note noted that self-rule from the colonial empires as proposed by
the European powers would first benefit the new ruling classes (p.
177)
Of the four interviews, Paul Mattick's is the only one, which
displays sympathy with Pannekoek's approach. Mattick was a comrade
and collaborator of Pannekoek's, and while they had important
differences on numerous questions, their worldview was much closer
than the "different voices" in the AK Press edition.
At a superficial glance, Pannekoek's book may appear dated.
Capitalism now seems very different from when Pannekoek wrote.
Moreover, the council communists, and Pannekoek too, generally tried
to avoid laying down dogmas, but rather aimed at situation specific
analysis in terms of tactics (while at the same time recognizing the
role things like parliaments and unions played in the mystification
of bourgeois society). Nevertheless, unlike much of the "left" today,
Pannekoek saw the working class as the revolutionary subject. Despite
the dubious nature of the interviews in this book, it is a real
pleasure to see it back in print and available to a radical audience.
Originally published in red & Black notes #18 (fall 2003)
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