An
expression used to indicate an
action taken against no specific
person but
rether against the world
Answers
Answer:
IN recent times there has been an increasing number of cases in which pacifists have taken up a strongly sympathetic attitude towards the Communist Parties. Not only is this attempt at a new orientation to be perceived amongst the ordinary members of pacifist organisations, but the discussion of principles in the directing circles of peace societies has had to take the form of choosing between purely pacifist and more or less Communist methods of attaining the pacifist object.
For this reason it seems to the writer of these lines that the membership of the Communist Party of Great Britain should recognise that it is opportune at this time (which more than any previous period demands an intelligible and honest position) to examine this problem of the highest importance—the problem of pacifism and Communism—from the standpoint of revolutionary Socialism, and to engage pacifists in discussion. I am well aware of the fact that limitations of space forbid consideration of all the philosophical, social, juridical and ethical problems which present themselves in this sphere. It is only possible in an essay of this kind to discuss, in the first place, problems of a purely political nature, and to make an attempt to solve them from the standpoint of Communism.
The ultimate aim of pacifist endeavour is to bring about a state of affairs in which war will not exist. And thus we are already at the heart of the problem of pacifism and Communism.
It must be understood to begin with that the characteristic of the ultimate condition of humanity—the absence of war—which is desired by pacifists is likewise a characteristic of the ultimate condition of humanity which is desired by Communists. (By “the ultimate condition of humanity” is here understood, of course, only the political goal which pacifists and Communists respectively have set themselves.) Every struggle against the Communists and their parties conducted with arguments which absolutely repudiate the social system desired by Communists denies the aims of revolutionary Communism, and is therefore in the highest degree a sordid struggle.
If we accept as given the fact that the ultimate aim of pacifists and that of Communists is to realise a condition of society in which there will be no more war, the more difficult part of our inquiry of course remains: to determine what are the divergencies of principle between the aims and methods of pacifism and those of Communism, where the reasons for these divergencies are to be sought, and what theoretical and practical possibilities exist for one of the two tendencies—pacifism and Communism—to convince the other of the righteousness and exclusive practicability of its policy.
AIMS OF PACIFISM
First as to the divergencies of aim. Pacifism would be satisfied with a state of affairs in which there would be no war, i.e., with a state of affairs in which it would no longer be possible to compel a human being to kill or to be killed. In this formulation of the goal of pacifist policy (in which the emphasis lies on “would be satisfied”) we have already all the difference between the aim of pacifism and that of Communism. All other differences concerning the goal can be traced from that already pointed out. For if pacifism as a criterion of its aim is satisfied with a complete absence of war, it has to be said from the Communist standpoint that though this warless condition will indeed be consummated by the Communist form of society, that is not the only, nor, indeed, from the point of view of principle, the most important, viewpoint of Communist policy.
The goal of pacifism is a warless society, but under exactly the same form of production, in the same social and juridical conditions as at present. The goal of Communism is the Communist society, that is, a society without exploitation, the society in which the demand for the complete abolition of private property in the means of production will be realised. This (Communist) condition of human society consummates the condition of permanent warlessness.
We Communists know that in the sight of history we are the true pacifists, because we know that it is not sufficient to prevent an isolated war to-day or to-morrow. (Here it may be emphasised that we, in individual cases, participate in and support, as a matter of course, any policy calculated to prevent war.) But we know that it is not sufficient—even from the standpoint of striving only for the pacifist goal, it is not sufficient—to make prevention of individual wars the sole or even the chief line of active policy. War must be made impossible by destroying its deepest and best hidden roots.
Since Rosa Luxemburg’s time we know the connection between economy and bloodshed with the same exactitude that the medical man knows the process of the circulation of the blood.
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