Propaganda indeed

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“Come to me, you oppressed!” An American cartoon from 1919, at the time of the red fear , shows the cliché of a bearded (European) anarchist with a bomb and a dagger who tries to blow up the Statue of Liberty: The propaganda was indeed in to the public a synonym for anarchist attacks

The propaganda of the deed (or propaganda by deed , from French propagande par le fait ) is a concept for her role in the anarchist movement became known in the late 19th century. Actions and deeds with exemplary character should "wake up" society and create sympathy among the population in order to serve as a means for political and social change. With the accumulation of anarchist bombings and regicide, the term propaganda indeed became a popular synonym for anarchist assassinations , and the anarchist movement was often referred to as violent and terrorist .

The term experienced a renaissance among other things in the late 1960s in the course of the 68er movement with the urban guerrillas and especially the RAF .

Concept history

Justification of the concept

Paul Brousse , founder of the propaganda deed

The Italian revolutionary Carlo Pisacane was one of the first to formulate the idea that would later become known as Propaganda of Action . In his Political Testament in 1857 he wrote that ideas arise from deeds and not the other way around. Mikhail Bakunin later remarked in his letters to a Frenchman about the current crisis of 1870: "We have to spread our principles not with words but with deeds, because this is the most popular, strongest and most irresistible form of propaganda." The Italian anarchists grew in the middle of the 1870s the conviction that they themselves had to intervene in the course of events in order to accelerate the approach of the revolution and to put the stamp of their ideas on the revolution. This was to be achieved through small uprisings and insurrectional attempts, which was later referred to as insurrectionalism .

The concept and expression "propaganda de facto" come from the French anarchist and later possibilist Paul Brousse . The concept received a lot of attention and dissemination in anarchist circles through a newspaper article of the same name from August 1877. Brousse cited the Paris Commune , the Matese uprising in Italy and a workers' demonstration in Bern on March 18, 1877, in which a red flag was used for the first time, as examples of the factual propaganda . In addition to the previous theoretical propagation of anarchist ideas, he also called for propaganda of action , with which one should make it clear to people in practice what one wants to achieve.

At the congress of the Jura Federation in La Chaux-de-Fonds that same month, a resolution on the propaganda of the deed was approved on the initiative of Brousse:

“Considering that the means of propaganda change with the milieu in which the sections operate and respecting the principle of autonomy proclaimed in the program, the Congress leaves the choice of the most appropriate means of propaganda to each group. But he recommends the following means for the attention of the sections: Propaganda for the cities through the book, the newspaper, the pamphlet; for the country the entry of devoted socialists into migrant professions; for everywhere, as soon as the strength of the organization allows it, the propaganda through the act . "

- Resolution of the Congress of the Jura Federation of La Chaux-de-Fonds 1878

Different definitions of "propaganda of deed"

From 1881 violence was also seen as a means of propaganda. Le Révolté wrote on March 5, 1881:

“If you want to be happy, act against everyone and everyone as you wish that one should act against yourself - but this cannot be carried out as long as exploitation and oppression, hypocrisy and sophisms form the basis of our social organization. [...] As long as we have a caste of idlers, endured by our work on the pretext that they are necessary to direct us, these idlers will always form a plague den for public morality. [...] That is inevitable and the writings of the moralists will not change that. We have the plague in our house, we have to destroy its cause and if it has to be done with fire and iron, we must not hesitate. It is about the salvation of humanity. "

- Le Révolté : The Need for Revolution (March 5, 1881)

From the 1880s onwards, the phrase “propaganda of the deed” was used inside and outside the anarchist movement to denote individual bomb attacks and assassinations of heads of state or tyrants. However, as early as 1887, important personalities of the anarchist movement distanced themselves from such individual acts. Peter Kropotkin wrote e.g. B. that year in Le Révolté :

"It is an illusion to believe that a few kilos of dynamite will be enough to win against a coalition of exploiters."

- Le Révolté (1887)

Quite a number of anarchists advocated abandoning these types of tactics in favor of joint revolutionary action, e.g. B. through the trade union movement . The anarcho-syndicalist Fernand Pelloutier advocated renewed anarchist participation in the labor movement in 1895 on the basis that anarchism can do quite well without “the individual bomber”.

Some anarchists such as B. Johann Most campaigned for the publication of acts of violence in retaliation against counterrevolutionaries, because "we not only preach acts in and of themselves, but also as propaganda." Most exerted an early influence on the American anarchists Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman .

Italian anarchists Luigi Galleani and Errico Malatesta were among the theorists who advocated the propaganda for the deed . Malatesta described the propaganda for the act as violent communal uprisings designed to spark the impending revolution. For the German anarchist Gustav Landauer , the propaganda actually meant the creation of libertarian social structures and communities without any use of violence, which served as an example for others to transform society. In weak statesmen, weaker people! he wrote that the state was not something that could be smashed or destroyed. “The state is a relationship, […] is a way in which people relate to one another; and one destroys it by entering into different relationships, by behaving differently to one another. "

The propaganda of the act thus included the theft, particularly bank robberies called “expropriations”, as well as riots and general strikes . This was intended to create the conditions for an uprising or even a revolution. Hence the propaganda of the deed was justified as a valid means and counterweight to state repression in the class struggle . The reaction of the state has usually included crackdowns on the whole labor movement .

The concept of direct action itself remained at the center of the socialist libertarian movement, particularly in the anarcho-syndicalist movement through the idea of ​​the "revolutionary strike" inspired by the "considerations on violence" of the French theorist Georges Sorel (1908).

Anarchist assassinations

Assassination attempt by Michele Angiolillo on the Spanish Prime Minister Antonio Cánovas del Castillo on August 8, 1897

Numerous heads of state were assassinated between 1878 and 1926 by members of the anarchist movement. Regicide was celebrated by sympathizers as a popular victory over counter-revolutionary forces.

The disunity of the French socialist movement, which was divided into many groups, and the execution and exile of many Communards in penal colonies in the course of the suppression of the Paris Commune favored individual actions, which in France, for example, led to the Ère des attentats (Eng .: era of assassinations ) between 1892 and 1894.

US President William McKinley's assassin , Leon Czolgosz , claimed to have been influenced by the anarchist and feminist Emma Goldman , although Goldman denied any connection with him and he was a member of the Republicans and never belonged to an anarchist association.

Due to the large number of mostly anarchist assassinations during this time, often with bombs, the image of the violent, bomb-throwing anarchist has remained in the minds of most people to this day. This notion was supported by incidents such as the 1886 Haymarket Riot , in which anarchists were accused of throwing a bomb at police officers trying to break up a public meeting in Chicago .

List of anarchist attacks

→ Main article: List of anarchist attacks

Illegalism

The illegalist Bonnot gang carried out several robberies in 1911 and 1912

→ Main article: Illegalism

The propaganda of the deed is also related to “illegalism”, an anarchist philosophy that arose mainly in France, Italy, Belgium and Switzerland in the early 20th century as an extreme practical implementation of anarchist individuality. The illegalists openly pursued crime as a way of life. Influenced by the theorist Max Stirner and his idea of ​​"egoism", the illegalists broke with anarchists like Clément Duval and Marius Jacob , who justified the theft with the theory of " individual reappropriation ".

The illegalists took the view that their actions did not need a moral basis - illegal acts were carried out not in the name of a higher ideal, but in pursuit of their own wishes. The French Bonnot gang was the best known group to practice illegalism.

In 1886, the anarchist Clément Duval created a form of propaganda for deed by stealing 15,000 francs from the mansion of a Parisian in-crowd before accidentally setting the house on fire. He was caught and sentenced to death two weeks later, shouting, "Long live anarchy!" As he was dragged out of the courtroom! The sentence was later commuted to labor camps on Devil's Island , French Guiana . In the anarchist newspaper "Révolte" Duval made the well-known statement: "Theft only exists through the exploitation of people [...] if society denies you the right to exist, you have to take it away [...] the policeman arrested me in the name of the law, I hit him in the name of freedom ”.

New forms of propaganda indeed

The vast majority of anarchists refrained from violent forms of propaganda in the early 20th century. There were various reasons for this, but one of the most important factors is the level of organization of the labor movement, especially the new meaning of anarcho-syndicalism . Even so, the idea of ​​propaganda indeed remained popular in anarchist circles and influenced various social and cultural movements of the 20th century, including underground culture.

The idea of ​​the Situationists in the 1950s to create "situations" had parallels to the propaganda of the deed. The autonomous movement and urban guerrillas in different countries adopted the concept in the 1970s. During this time, ideas of culture jamming , fun guerrilla , guerrilla communication and other types of non-violent and sometimes at the same time artistic and political actions became popular as new forms of “ direct action ”. The living theater of the 1970s connected z. B. direct actions with artistic intentions, like André Breton and the Surrealists' movement before that .

Turmoil and rebellion in creating the conditions for overthrow are still of great importance in the movement of anarcho-syndicalism, the autonomous and today's media-conscious black blocs in the anti-globalization movement . In the early years of the 21st century, a Swedish group called the Invisible Party carried out various direct actions related to the tradition of propaganda of deed.

The idea of ​​propaganda for the deed received renewed attention in the 1970s and 1980s, particularly among urban guerrillas and the Italian Autonomists , who played a major role in the formation of the squatter and social center movement.

Since some of the most radical autonomous or other left-wing activists not only practiced direct action (theft, squatting, bank robberies - called expropriations - etc.), but also carried out murder and bombing, “propaganda of the deed” became synonymous with terrorism again. So kidnapped and murdered z. B. the RAF the President of the German Employers' Association Hanns Martin Schleyer (until 1945 high-ranking member of the SS ), and they targeted NATO centers.

Left militant groups that emerged in developed countries in the 1970s, such as B. the Red Brigades in Italy, the RAF in the Federal Republic or the less important Action Directe in France, were part of larger social movements. Even if they did not call themselves anarchists, they followed the principle of propaganda for action.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Bakunin, Michail : Letter to a Frenchman on the Present Crisis . 1870.
  2. ↑ Brousse, Paul : Propaganda by the deed . In: Robert Graham (Ed.): Anarchism. A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Montreal / New York / London 2005, p. 150 ff.
  3. ↑ Max Nettlau : History of Anarchy, Volume III. Anarchists and social revolutionaries . Impuls Verlag, Leipzig 1978, p. 43 ff.
  4. ↑ Max Nettlau : History of Anarchy, Volume III. Anarchists and social revolutionaries . Impuls Verlag, Leipzig 1978, p. 20 ff.
  5. ^ Robert Graham (Ed.): Anarchism. A Documentary History of Libertarian Ideas. Montreal / New York / London 2005.
  6. ^ Johann Most : Action as Propaganda . July 25, 1885.
  7. ↑ Alexander Berkman : Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist . 1912.
  8. ↑ Errico Malatesta : Violence as a social factor . 1895.
  9. ↑ Gustav Landauer : The anarchism in Germany . 1893.
  10. ↑ Gustav Landauer : Weak statesmen, weaker people! (June 1910). In: Gustav Landauer, Martin Buber (Ed.): Beginnen. Essays on Socialism. Cologne 1924.
  11. ↑ The historian Benedict Anderson wrote:

    “In March 1871, the commune took power in the abandoned city and held it for two months. Then Versailles seized the opportunity to attack and had around 20,000 Communards and sympathizers executed, in one week of horror. This number was higher than those killed during Robespierre's regime of terror in 1793-94. More than 7,500 were jailed or in areas such as New Caledonia , deported . Thousands fled to Belgium, England, Italy, Spain and the USA. In 1872, strict laws were passed that precluded any form of organization on the left. Not until 1880 was there a general amnesty for exiled and imprisoned Communards. In the meantime, the Third Republic found itself strong enough to renew Louis Napoleon's imperialist expansion - in Indochina, Africa and Oceania. Many leading French intellectuals and artists had participated in the commune or expressed sympathy: Courbet was, so to speak, minister of culture, Rimbaud and Pissarro were active supporters. The merciless prostration of 1871 and the following years was probably the key factor that led to the alienation of this milieu from the Third Republic and aroused their sympathy for the victims ”. (in Benedict Anderson: In the World-Shadow of Bismarck and Nobel , New Left Review . July-August 2004. Archived from the original on June 12, 2006. Retrieved February 16, 2007.  )

Web links

Commons : Propaganda  de facto - collection of images, videos and audio files