Omar Hassan
The mass strike debate (1910-1913) rocked the German socialist left to its core. Hitherto political allies and outstanding representatives of their era, Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Kautsky fought a pitched battle over the immediate necessity of mass upheavals to lead the battle for democratic rights in Germany. The debate split the radical left, and demonstrated the fault lines within pre-war Social Democracy. It raised a number of questions: Was it necessary for workers to learn through struggle, or through the ballot box? What role could organisation play in leading such a struggle? Was there really an irreducible difference between the Eastern tactics of struggle and those of the West? Themes that appeared in the strategic debates throughout the twentieth century were already anticipated in this pathbreaking confrontation.