Page - 144 - in Otto Bauer (1881–1938) - Thinker and Politician

144 chapter 4 uniteallofhumancivilisationwasirreconcilablewiththetrendinestablishing small independentnationstates.49 It should come as no surprise, then, that Marx and Engels only took a marginal interest in the problems of theHabsburg state.50 In two articles,51 Engels tookupanambiguouspositiononthenational struggles inAustria. In his1848article, ‘DerAnfangderEndesinÖsterreich’(‘TheBeginningoftheEnd inAustria’),52hedescribedthemonarchyasabulwarkofreactionandnational oppression,predictingits imminentfallduetotheoppressednations’growing hatred of their German tyrant. A year later inDemocratic Pan-Slavism,53 he denied so-callednon-historical nations the right to exist as political entities, claiming that they lacked the economic, geographic, historical, andpolitical conditions for an independent political existence.54 This position could be interpreted asEngels’s approval of the subjugationof less developednations andcondemnationoftheiremancipatoryambitions. MarxandEngels’sconceptionofthenationalquestiondeterminedtheviews ofSecondInternationaltheorists.Their leaders–includingKarlKautsky, Jules Guesde and Rosa Luxemburg – feared that highlighting the national ques- tionwould divert attention away from class antagonisms. Like the classical Marxists, they assumed that the national question would inevitably disap- pear once the social question hadbeen solved, and that socialist revolution woulddecide this in thenear future.ManySecondInternationalactivistsdis- regardedprogressiveaspectsoftheemergentnationalidentities,andmanyhad 49 ‘Naturally, in full accordance with the Victorian stereotype, civilisationwas identified withWesterncivilisation,whosemainpillarswere theUnitedStates and the “advanced countries”ofEurope’–Walicki 1995,p. 155. 50 In 1860,Marx regardedAustria as a damagainst the flood of Russian imperialism.He wrote: ‘The sole factor that has justifiedAustria’s existence as a state since themiddle of the 18thcentury, [hasbeen] its resistance toRussianprogress in theEast–ahelpless, inconsistent, cowardlybut toughresistance’–Marx 1982,p. 131.Apart fromKonrad1976, pp.9–14,Hanischexplains theattitudeof theclassicalMarxists toward thenationalities questionas follows: ‘Fromthe 1840s onward,Marx andEngelswere convinced that the monarchy had to be smashed. The “great nations” that lived in the territories of the Habsburgempire–thePoles, theHungarians, theItalians–hadtoconstitutethemselves as independentrepublics’ (ourtranslation)–Hanisch1978b,p.339. 51 HelmutKonradcitestheseinKonrad1976,pp.9–11. 52 Engels 1975,pp.530–6. 53 SeeEngels 1977,pp.362–78. 54 According to Konrad, Engels’s negative view of the Czech and Yugoslavian positions during the 1848 revolution led to his change ofmind–hewent on to refer to themas counter-revolutionary.