The Allgemeine Arbeiter-Union – Einheitsorganisation (AAUE or AAU-E; English: General Workers' Union – Unified Organization) was an anti-parliamentarian

council communist Council communism or councilism is a current of communist thought that emerged in the 1920s. Inspired by the November Revolution, council communism was opposed to state socialism and advocated workers' councils and council democracy. Co ...

organisation established in

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

in October 1921. It was a split from the

General Workers' Union of Germany The General Workers' Union of Germany (; AAUD) was a factory organisation formed following the German Revolution of 1918–1919 in opposition to the traditional trade unions. The AAUD was formed by the left communists in the Communist Workers' ...

(AAUD).

History

Otto Rühle Karl Heinrich Otto Rühle (; 23 October 1874 – 24 June 1943) was a German Marxist active in opposition to both the First World War, First and Second World Wars as well as a Council communism, council communist theorist. Early years Otto was ...

was involved in setting up the AAUE as an organisation which combined the political and economic aspirations of communist workers in a single (einheits) organisation. This occurred following his trip to

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

as a representative of the

Communist Workers' Party of Germany The Communist Workers' Party of Germany (; KAPD) was an anti-parliamentarian and left communist party that was active in Germany during the Weimar Republic. It was founded in 1920 in Heidelberg as a split from the Communist Party of Germany (KP ...

(KAPD) at the Second World Congress of the

Communist International The Communist International, abbreviated as Comintern and also known as the Third International, was a political international which existed from 1919 to 1943 and advocated world communism. Emerging from the collapse of the Second Internationa ...

. He travelled around Russia before the Congress and formed a very negative view of the

Bolshevik The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

regime. He advocated a very different way to realise a communist revolution which came to be adopted by the AAUE: :"Everyone must become in his consciousness a living bearer of the revolutionary struggle and creative member of the communist build-up. The necessary freedom therefore will however never be won in the coercive system of centralism, the chains of bureaucratic-militaristic control, under the burden of a leader-dictatorship and its inevitable accompaniments: arbitrariness, personality cult, authority, corruption, violence. Therefore transformation of the party-conception into a federative community-conception on the line of councilist ideas. Therefore: supersession of external commitments and compulsion through internal readiness and willingness. Therefore: elevation of communism from the demagogic prattle of the paper cliché to the height of one of the most internally captivating and fulfilling experiences of the whole world."

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Allgemeine Arbeiter-Union - Einheitsorganisation Communist organisations in Germany Council communist organizations Labor history of Germany Labor in Germany Left communism in Germany