People of the Revolution and the USSR

Activity(set)
Any Political and party leadership 3 Social movements and organizing 4 Scholarship and theory 10 Science and technology 1 Literature and arts 1
Affiliation

Most people

Any Communist Party of Germany (KPD) 1 Communist Party of Italy / Italian Communist Party (PCdI/PCI) 1 Italian Socialist Party (PSI) 1

All 3 affiliations

Germany

Communist Party of Germany (KPD) 1

Italy

Communist Party of Italy / Italian Communist Party (PCdI/PCI) 1 Italian Socialist Party (PSI) 1
Position(set)
Any Imperial establishment and White movement 13 Counter-revolutionary forces 20 Left critics of Bolshevism 26 Socialist-bloc reform leader 28 Dissident 11 Non-Bolshevik socialists 64 Narodniks 4 Jacobins and French revolutionary radicals 9 Fascists and Nazis 10 National liberation and anti-colonial movements 23 Western Marxist theorists 3 Marxism and communism 382 Liberalism and republicanism 15 Conservatism and Christian democracy 15 Monarchy and royalism 4 Agrarianism and peasant parties 4 Nationalism 18
Citizenship
Any Germany 1 Italy 1 Peru 1
Background
Any Germany 1 Italy 1 Peru 1
Era
Any

People of the wider world

The revolutionary wave and the world war1917–1945 3
Political and party leadership Western Marxist theorists Clear all

Karl Korsch

Karl Korsch
Communist Party of Germany (KPD) Western Marxist theorists Germany Germany 1886–1961 ○ Brain disease

Co-founder of Western Marxism, the German philosopher who challenged Marxist orthodoxy with Marxism and Philosophy

“If we get a few more of these Professors spinning out their theories, we shall be lost.” — Zinoviev at the 5th Comintern Congress, 1924, attacking Korsch and Lukács

German Marxist philosopher and revolutionary who, alongside Lukács, laid the foundations of Western Marxism. In Marxism and Philosophy (1923) he applied the materialist conception of history to Marxism itself, arguing for the revolutionary recovery of the Hegelian dialectic, a move that drew fierce denunciation from the Comintern. Served as Justice Minister in the 1923 Thuringian workers' government and as a KPD Reichstag deputy before his expulsion as a left-oppositionist. Fled the Nazis for American exile, where his scholarship left a deep imprint on Brecht, Benjamin, and the Frankfurt School.

Career timeline
  • 1906–1910Studies law and philosophy at Munich, Geneva, Berlin; doctorate in law, University of Jena
  • 1912–1914Legal research in London; joins the Fabian Society
  • 1914–1918German Army service — refuses to carry weapons; awarded the Iron Cross twice for bravery
  • 1917Joins USPD; elected delegate to soldiers' soviet
  • 1920Joins KPD with the USPD left wing; lecturer at University of Jena
  • 1923.03Publishes Marxism and Philosophy; becomes target of fierce Comintern criticism
  • 1923.10–11Justice Minister, Thuringian workers' government — collapses after 27 days under Reichswehr intervention
  • 1924–1928KPD Reichstag deputy; delegate to 5th Comintern Congress
  • 1926.04Expelled from KPD; forms the Resolute Lefts (Entschiedene Linke) opposition faction
  • 1933Flees Germany the night of the Reichstag fire; passes through Denmark and England
  • 1936–1961US exile — Tulane University, Institute for Social Research; teaches Marxism to Brecht
  • 1938Publishes Karl Marx; deeply influences Benjamin's Arcades Project
  • 1950Ten Theses on Marxism Today — declares break with orthodox Marxism

Antonio Gramsci

Antonio Gramsci
Communist Party of Italy / Italian Communist Party (PCdI/PCI) Western Marxist theorists Italy Italy 1891–1937 ○ Illness

The brain a prison was meant to stop: theorist of hegemony

“The old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear.” — Prison Notebooks

Italian Marxist philosopher who theorized hegemony: the insight that rule is maintained not by force alone but through consent organized in civil society. From a fascist prison he wrote the Prison Notebooks, laying foundations for Western Marxism.

Career timeline
  • 1919Founds L'Ordine Nuovo; the Turin factory-council movement
  • 1921Among the founders of the Italian Communist Party
  • 1924–1926Party secretary and deputy
  • 1926Arrested — 'we must stop this brain for twenty years'
  • 1929–1935Writes the thirty-three Prison Notebooks
  • 1937Dies days after his release
  • 1948–1951Prison writings first published posthumously in six thematic volumes as Prison Notebooks

José Carlos Mariátegui

José Carlos Mariátegui
Western Marxist theorists Peru Peru 1894–1930 ○ Illness

The autodidact who rewrote Marxism for the Andes

“Socialism in Latin America must be a heroic creation, neither copy nor imitation.” — Amauta, 1928

Peruvian Marxist thinker. After encountering Gramsci's thought in Italy, he creatively recast Marxism for Andean reality. His Seven Essays reframed the Indian question as a land question, and in 1928 he founded the Peruvian Socialist Party. He died at thirty-five.

Career timeline
  • 1919–1923Years in Italy; the factory councils and Gramsci's circle
  • 1926Founds the journal Amauta
  • 1928The Seven Essays: land and the Indian question in Marxist terms
  • 1928–1929Founds the Peruvian Socialist Party and the CGTP
  • 1930Dies at thirty-five