Leon Trotsky: Letter to an Austrian Comrade

June 17, 1933

[Writing of Leon Trotsky, Vol. 5, 1932-33, New York 1972, p. 282 f., title: “On the Difficulties of Our Work”]

Dear Comrade,

You complain that the work of the Austrian Opposition is advancing too slowly. You observe completely correctly that one of the reasons is insufficiently systematic work — the absence of good organization, that is, a spirit of precision and willingness to carry things out. By way of example, you cite irregular attendance at meetings, impermissible lateness, etc. I wholly sympathize with you in this for I believe that there is nothing worse than dilettantism and lack of order in any serious business, more so in revolutionary affairs.

In Austria, the matter in this respect is least happy. For reasons which there is no need to go into here, the Austrian Social Democracy has the following of the overwhelming majority of the proletariat until this very day. The Communist Party did not have an independent role in the class struggle but was only an opposition to Austro-Marxism. But an opposition which proceeds from a false theoretical base is doomed to rot away. The Communist Party grouped around itself not a few elements of Viennese bohemia and to a significant degree was impregnated by its morals.

The Austrian Opposition has adopted too much from the official Communist Party. The lengthy struggle of two Opposition cliques — very similar to each other and in many aspects only caricatures of the Communist Party — could only repel serious workers from the Left Opposition in general. Only an influx of real industrial workers can give the Opposition stability and furnish the necessary discipline and systematic work.

The Austrian Communist Party has not gone underground but has departed from the political scene forever; it will not rise again. Even the Social Democracy will in the near future be demoralized. If the Left Opposition wants to fulfill its historic role it will have to find a way to the young Social Democratic workers.

Some wiseacres shrug their shoulders contemptuously at the Social Democratic Opposition: after all, there are only a few of them, insulted petty officials, discontented careerists, and so on. Such words should come directly from the party administration of the Austrian Social Democracy! Of course the present representatives of the Social Democratic Opposition are few, weak, and for the most part without character. Nonetheless, in the current political situation they have great symptomatic significance. Through them, in a refracted and weakened form, the anxieties of the best Austrian workers are manifested. How can you reach these workers if you contemptuously brush aside these new oppositionists? In any event, for the Left Opposition there is no other way than to make a sharp break with the tradition of bohemian cells which have turned sour, and to transfer all its attention to the industrial plants.

The task in Austria cannot be easy in the coming period. The workers have been too cruelly deceived by the Social Democracy; the Communist Party has compromised itself too much in their eyes; the squabbling between the Opposition groups only manages to arouse disgust in them — no wonder they are in no way disposed to trust the Left Opposition in advance. It is necessary to succeed in winning their confidence by persistent and systematic everyday work. In doing this work, a selection of personnel will take place in the group which takes the initiative. The skeptics and dilettantes will very soon fall behind and leave — so much the better! The serious revolutionaries will attract the young workers and together with them will found a real proletarian organization which will be able to allocate its forces, appreciate time, and work systematically. There is no other formula.

I wish you success with all my heart.

L. Trotsky