Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

Born in Frankenberg, Saxonia, in 1903, Helmut Rüdiger grew up in Chemnitz and studied German literature and art history in Leipzig and Munich. The German Revolution of 1918–19 led him to an intense study of Gustav Landauer 's writings. In 1922 he joined the anarchosyndicalist Freie Arbeiter-Union Deutschlands (Free Workers' Union of Germany, FAUD). In 1928, following Augustin Souchy , he became first editor of the FAUD newspaper Der Syndikalist . Elected head of the organization's executive commission in 1932, Rüdiger left Germany for Spain that same year in frustration at internal disputes. During the Spanish Revolution he was head of the German propaganda division of the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT) , and in 1936 he was elected secretary of the International Workers' Association. In 1938 he fled Spain and settled in Stockholm, where he joined the Sveriges Arbetares Centralorganisation (Central Organization of the Workers of Sweden, SAC). There he became one of the most important theoreticians of a “revisionist” syndicalism. Revisiting the sectarian experience of anarchosyndicalism as well as the decline of the syndicalist movement in general, he proposed not to rebuild syndicalist unions but to work inside existing ones. In the 1940s and 1950s, Rüdiger emphasized the significance of communal independence for a new model of federalistic libertarian socialism. ... log in or subscribe to read full text