Weitlingism

Weitlingism was a utopian communist political current which was characterized by egalitarianism and conspiracy that emerged in the early period of German workers’ movement. A school which arose in the 1830s and 1840s, was named after its chief representative, Weitling whose representative works include: Humanity: How it is and How it Should Be (1838) and Guarantees of Harmony and Freedom (1842). Marx highly appraised Weitling’s Guarantees of Harmony and Freedom: “Where can the bourgeoisie, its philosophers and literati included, boast of work dealing with the political emancipation, comparable with Weitling’s Guarantees of Harmony and Freedom? If one compares the dry and timid mediocrity of German political literature with this fiery and brilliant debut of the German workers, if one compares these halting but gigantic first steps of the proletariat with the mincing gait of the full-grown German bourgeoisie, one cannot help predicting that the proletarian Cinderella will develop into a prodigy of strength.” It was for this reason that Marx and Engels commented on his book Guarantees of Harmony and Freedom: “The German proletariat is the theorist of the European proletariat, just as the British proletariat is its national economist and the French proletariat is its politician.” In 1885, Engels once again affirmed the evaluation of Weitling by Marx.

Heavily influenced by the ideas of the French Babeuf, Cabet and Blanqui and also influenced by the British and French doctrines of utopian socialism and communism, Weitling put forward his own doctrine of communism. From the point of view of the naïve, bankrupt craftsmen of Germany, he sharply exposed and criticized the evils of capitalist society, holding that private property was the root cause of all evils, that the proletariat could not count on the mercy of the capitalists to emancipate itself, and that only through a violent revolution could it emancipate itself and set up a new and ideal social system. He advocated the establishment of an ideal society based on naïve fraternity of man and with community of property, labor for all, equality in all respects, egalitarian distribution and communal sharing. Weitling’s ideas have transcended other utopian socialists. However, the fact that he represented small craftsmen who had just become proletarians made him more inclined to the lumpenproletarian violent revolution, advocating conspiratorial uprisings and the creation of so-called armies of 20-40 thousand lumpenproletarians who would eliminate private ownership by looting and plundering, thus immediately realizing a communism based on communal ownership and sharing.

After 1844, Marx and Engels began to gradually reflect on utopian socialism, criticize Hegel’s philosophy of right, study political economy, and formed the theory of scientific socialism, so it was inevitable it would come into conflict with Weitling’s utopian socialism. Marx and Engels held that it was science, not utopia, that the proletariat needed, and that the proletarian revolutionary movement was a class movement guided by scientific theories, not a conspiratorial action of blind utopias, not to mention a one-step realization of communism. The socialist revolution is first and foremost a bourgeois revolution. After the bourgeoisie takes control of political power, it cultivates political, economic, and social conditions for the development of the working class, gradually generating the strength and conditions for socialist revolution. The stirring up of hope with prophetic prophecies followed by stirring up fervor with religious sentiments à la Weitling thus led to rogue violent activities of workers and finally resulted in the destruction of the workers' movement.