Eduard Bernstein

German political theorist

Written by: Pierre Robert Angel

SHARE

READ

VIEW HISTORY

EDIT

FEEDBACK

Eduard BernsteinGerman political theorist

Born
January 6, 1850
Berlin, Germany
Died
December 18, 1932
Berlin, Germany

Eduard Bernstein, (born Jan. 6, 1850, Berlindied Dec. 18, 1932, Berlin), Social Democratic propagandist, political theorist, and
historian, one of the firstSocialists to attempt a revision of Karl Marxs tenets, such as abandoning the ideas of the imminent collapse
of the capitalist economy and the seizure of power by the proletariat. Although he was not a distinguished theoretician, Bernstein,
called the father of revisionism, envisaged a type of social democracy that combined private initiative with social reform.

Bernstein was born into a Jewish family that had come to the capital of Prussia from Danzig. His father was a railroad engineer, and
his uncle Aaron Bernstein was the editor of the Berliner Volks-Zeitung, a newspaper widely read in progressive working-class
circles. It was thus not surprising that at a young age Eduard shared the aspirations of many educated Germans for national unity
and democracy. Of an engaging and candid disposition, he retained the goodwill of his superiors when, in 1872, as a young bank
clerk, he announced that he had joined the Social Democratic Party. The turbulent years after Prussias 1871 defeat of France also
contributed to the formation of his political beliefs. Yet the ever-genial Bernstein tended to be attracted more to socialism of an
undogmatic, pragmatic kind than to radical Marxism. He preferred the democratic and pacifist Social Democrats to the somewhat
authoritarian Allgemeiner Deutscher Arbeiterverein (General German Workers Association).
In joining the party, he became associated with the German socialist organ, Die Zukunft (The Future). The economic crisis of 1873,
which continued into the 1890s, reinforced his belief in the fragility ofcapitalism. It was, however, Chancellor Otto von Bismarcks
anti-socialist laws that finally impelled him toward a more radical position. Exiled from Germany, he emigrated to Switzerland,
abandoning the ethical socialism of Karl Hchberg, the wealthy patron of Die Zukunft. With Marxs consent, he became the editor
of the Zrich edition of Der Sozialdemokrat, a periodical that was the rallying centre of the underground socialist party. Expelled from
Switzerland at the request of Bismarck in 1888, Bernstein continued the publication of the periodical in London. There he became a
close friend ofFriedrich Engels, Marxs collaborator and patron, and also came to know intimately the leaders of the influential
Fabian Society, which advocated a gradualist development of socialism. Bernstein set forth his revised views in a series of articles
and in a letter to the Social Democratic Party meeting at Stuttgart in 1898. In the following year he published Die Voraussetzungen
des Sozialismus und die Aufgaben der Sozialdemokratie (The Preconditions of Socialism and the Tasks of Social Democracy; Eng.
trans., Evolutionary Socialism).
When Bernstein returned to Germany in 1901, he became the theoretician of the growing revisionist school of the reformist labour
movement. He held that socialism is the final result of the liberalism inherent in human aspiration, not the mere product of a revolt
against the capitalist middle class. He no longer believed in capitalisms imminent collapse, nor did he any longer regard the
bourgeoisie as exclusively parasitic and oppressive. He also believed that the concentration of productive industry was not taking
place in all fields as thoroughly or as fast as Marx had predicted. Citing such reforms as factory legislation and the freeing of labour
unions from legal restrictions, he pointed out that, under pressure from the socialist movement, a reaction had set in against the
exploitive inclinations of capital. Thus, he argued, the prospects for lasting success lay in steady advance rather than violent
upheaval.
In 1902 Bernstein was elected a member of the Reichstag, or Parliament, to which he was reelected several times. He remained a
member of the Reichstag up to 1928. Eventually revisionism became Social Democratic ideology, while the dogmatic Marxism of the
socialist theoretician Karl Kautsky and the eclectic Marxism of the German labour leader August Bebel faded into the background.
Bernstein, however, who was opposed to violence between nations as well as between classes, lent his voice to that of the left to
fight against militarism. During World War I, although a leading member of his partys right wing, he sided with the Independent
Socialists (Unabhngige Sozialdemocratische Partei Deutschlands; USPD) to protest his partys support of the war. As soon as

peace was restored, however, he returned to his old party and opposed those who wanted to transform the political revolution of
November 1918 into a social revolution. He believed that the establishment of the parliamentary republic opened the way to
uninterrupted progress, and after the war he served as secretary of state for economy and finance in 1919.
Social Democracy had finally become the great popular and reformist movement he had desired for more than 20 years, and, as an
adviser respected by his party, he inspired much of its program. If he helped to discourage the Germans from following the Russian
example of 1917, he could not dissuade them from imitating the Italian fascist model of 1922. He regarded the bloody outrages of
the Nazis and their predecessors as the thoughtless actions of unbalanced minds; he was unable to comprehend the nature of
National Socialism and remained powerless to prevent its seizure of power. Less than six weeks after his death, the democratic
state on which he had set all his hopes was to give way to the dictatorship of Adolf Hitler.