46. ‘Review of Rosa Luxemburg, The Accumulation of Capital: A Contribution to the Economic Explanation of Imperialism’ (1914)

Abstract

Unlike Rudolf Hilferding's Finance Capital, which was greeted with almost universal acclaim (with exception of revisionist right wing of Social Democracy), Rosa Luxemburg's Accumulation of Capital was favourably reviewed only by tiny fraction of SPD left wingers that later grouped around Berlin Internationale group, notably Julian Marchlewski-Karski, Franz Mehring and Paul Lensch. Most reviewers dismissed her main argument as erroneous; they included prominent representatives of centre-fraction in Germany and Austria, such as Gustav Eckstein and Otto Bauer, but also some of main figures of international left wing - notably Anton Pannekoek and Lenin. Franz Mehring's review in Grunbergs Archiv was little more than a summary of controversy over Luxemburg's work, though he distinctly took her side, describing her book as the most significant phenomenon in socialist literature since Marx and Engels took up pen. Keywords:Finance Capital; imperialism; Rosa Luxemburg; Rudolf Hilferding; Social Democracy