Rudolf Rocker (1873-1958)

Rudolf Rocker (March 25, 1873 - September 19, 1958) was an anarcho-syndicalist writer, historian and prominent activist. Image File history File links Rudolf_Rocker. ... Image File history File links Rudolf_Rocker. ... March 25 is the 84th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (85th in leap years). ... 1873 (MDCCCLXXIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... September 19 is the 262nd day of the year (263rd in leap years). ... 1958 (MCMLVIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Anarcho-syndicalism is a branch of anarchism which focuses on the labour movement. ...

Life and Work

Rudolf Rocker was born in Mainz, Germany in 1873. Under the influence of his uncle, he became a socialist in his youth and joined the Social Democratic Party. He found it to be too dogmatic and was expelled from the party in 1890 for his support for a leftwing opposition group Die Jungen. In 1891, he first came in contact with anarchist ideas. Mainz is a city in Germany and the capital of the German federal state of Rhineland-Palatinate. ... 1873 (MDCCCLXXIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... Socialism is a social and economic system (or the political philosophy advocating such a system) in which the economic means of production are owned and controlled collectively by the people. ... SPD redirects here. ... 1890 (MDCCCXC) was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar). ... 1891 (MDCCCXCI) was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ... Anarchism is the name of a political philosophy or a group of doctrines and attitudes that are centered on rejection of any form of compulsory government (such as the state)[1] and support its elimination. ...

Whitechapel

He started engaging political work in 1892, but then had to leave Germany in 1893. He emigrated to Paris, where he remained until 1895 when he moved to Whitechapel, London. He lived in the Jewish community, even though he was not himself Jewish by birth, and met his lifelong companion Milly Witcop (1877-1953). He was deeply involved in the anarchist movement in Whitechapel and even got to known Peter Kropotkin, the famous Russian anarchist theorist. He dedicated himself to the organisation of Jewish immigrant workers in London's East End. He was known as "the anarchist rabbi". 1892 (MDCCCXCII) was a leap year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... 1893 (MDCCCXCIII) was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ... City flag City coat of arms Motto: Fluctuat nec mergitur (Latin: Tossed by the waves, she does not sink) Location Coordinates Time Zone CET (GMT +1) Administration Country France Région ÃŽle-de-France Département Paris (75) Subdivisions 20 arrondissements Mayor Bertrand Delanoë  (PS) (since 2001) City Statistics Land... 1895 (MDCCCXCV) was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Thursday of the 12-day-slower Julian calendar). ... Whitechapel is a place in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, United Kingdom. ... London (pronounced ) is the capital city of England and the United Kingdom. ... The word Jew ( Hebrew: יהודי) is used in a wide number of ways, but generally refers to a follower of the Jewish faith, a child of a Jewish mother, or someone of Jewish descent with a connection to Jewish culture or ethnicity and often a combination... Peter Kropotkin Prince Peter Alexeevich Kropotkin (In Russian Пётр Алексе́евич Кропо́ткин) (December 9, 1842 - February 8, 1921) was one of Russias foremost anarchists and one of the first advocates of what he called anarchist communism: the model of society he advocated for most of his life was that of a communalist society... The word Jew ( Hebrew: יהודי) is used in a wide number of ways, but generally refers to a follower of the Jewish faith, a child of a Jewish mother, or someone of Jewish descent with a connection to Jewish culture or ethnicity and often a combination... The East End of London, known locally as the East End, is an area, with no formal authority or boundaries, that spans a number of administative districts of London in England. ...

Rocker began to write for the Yiddish newspaper Dos Fraye Vort (The Free Word), even though he did not speak the language at the time. He wrote in German and others translated his texts. While working for this newspaper, he learned the Yiddish language. Yiddish (Yid. ...

Later he was the editor of the newspaper Arbayter Fraynd (Workers' Friend) and briefly the theoretical magazine Germinal. Arbayter Fraynd would became the organ of a federation of Jewish anarchists, which was founded in Whitechapel in 1902. Rocker represented the federation at the International Anarchist Congress in Amsterdam in 1907. He led the 1912 London garment workers strike.^[1] The Arbayter Fraynd[1] (Workers Friend), was a London-based weekly Yiddish radical paper founded in 1885 by socialist Morris Winchevsky. ... 1902 (MCMII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... Amsterdam Location Flag Country Netherlands Province North Holland Population 741,329 (1 August 2006) Demonym Amsterdammer Coordinates Website www. ... 1907 (MCMVII) was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Wednesday of the 13-day-slower Julian calendar). ...

Return to Germany

Rocker opposed both sides in the First World War, he was interned as an enemy alien in 1914, and Arbeiter Fraynd was suppressed. The Jewish anarchist movement in Britain never fully recovered from these blows. 1914 (MCMXIV) was a common year starting on Thursday. ...

In 1918 Rocker was deported from Britain to the Netherlands and eventually returned to Germany. He became a major figure in the German and international anarcho-syndicalist movement, helping to organize the International Congress in Berlin in 1922 that lead to the formation of the International Workers Association (IWA). Rocker was opposed to anarchist support for the Bolshevik Revolution after 1917 and led the libertarian socialist opposition to the growing Nazi movement in Germany. 1918 (MCMXVIII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar (see link for calendar) or a common year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar. ... Anarcho-syndicalist flag. ... Berlin is the capital city and one of the sixteen states of the Federal Republic of Germany. ... 1922 (MCMXXII) was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ... The International Workers Association (IWA) (Spanish: AIT - Asociación Internacional de los Trabajadores) is an international anarcho-syndicalist federation of various labour unions from different countries. ... Bolsheviks (Russian: IPA , derived from bolshinstvo, majority) were members of the Bolshevik faction of the Marxist Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split apart from the Menshevik faction[1] at the Second Party Congress in 1903 and ultimately became the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. ... 1917 (MCMXVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar (see link for calendar) or a common year starting on Tuesday of the 13-day slower Julian calendar. ... Libertarian socialism is a political philosophy dedicated to opposing coercive forms of authority and social hierarchy, in particular the institutions of capitalism and the state. ... National Socialism redirects here. ...

New York

In 1933, Rocker left Germany again to escape persecution by the new Nazi regime. Settling in the United States, he continued to work as a speaker and writer, directing his efforts against "the twin evils of Fascism and Communism". He spent the last 20 years of his life as a leading figure in the Mohegan community at Crompond, New York, and was the best-known anarchist in the country until his death. He supported the Allies in the Second World War, which caused a breach with some old comrades, but he continued to receive more admiration and affection than any veteran of the movement since Kropotkin or Malatesta. 1933 (MCMXXXIII) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will take you to calendar). ... Fascism (IPA: ) is a radical political ideology that combines elements of corporatism, authoritarianism, nationalism, militarism, anti-liberalism and anti-communism. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... The Mohegans are a Native American tribe originally from southeastern Connecticut. ... Official language(s) English de facto Capital Albany Largest city New York City Area  Ranked 27th  - Total 54,520 sq mi (141,205 km²)  - Width {{{WidthUS}}} miles (455 km)  - Length 330 miles (530 km)  - % water 13. ... Mushroom cloud from the nuclear explosion over Nagasaki rising 18 km into the air. ... Peter Kropotkin Prince Peter Alexeevich Kropotkin (In Russian Пётр Алексе́евич Кропо́ткин) (December 9, 1842 - February 8, 1921) was one of Russias foremost anarchists and one of the first advocates of what he called anarchist communism: the model of society he advocated for most of his life was that of a communalist society... Errico Malatesta Errico Malatesta (December 14, 1853 – July 22, 1932) was an anarchist with an unshakable belief, which he shared with his friend Peter Kropotkin, that the anarchist revolution would occur soon. ...

Writing

Rocker was a very prolific speaker and writer in both Yiddish and German, and he produced a great many articles and pamphlets and several books. Many of his writings were translated into Spanish and widely circulated in Latin America, but not many appeared in English. Apart from a few pamphlets, three books were published in the United States - Nationalism and Culture (1937), an essay in literary criticism called The Six (1938) and a popular survey of Pioneers of American Freedom (1949). Image File history File links Anarcho-Syndicalism-Rocker. ... Image File history File links Anarcho-Syndicalism-Rocker. ... Latin America consists of the countries of South America and some of North America (including Central America and some the islands of the Caribbean) whose inhabitants mostly speak Romance languages, although Native American languages are also spoken. ... 1937 (MCMXXXVII) was a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1938 (MCMXXXVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1949 (MCMXLIX) was a common year starting on Saturday (the link is to a full 1949 calendar). ...

Two more were published in Britain, Anarcho-Syndicalism (1938), and the section of his autobiography entitled The London Years (1956). In 2004 and 2005, both books were re-published by AK Press. Some others were translated into English, but not published, like Behind Barbed Wire and Bars, an account of his internment during the First World War. 1938 (MCMXXXVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1956 (MCMLVI) was a leap year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... AK Press is a collectively owned and operated independent publisher and book distributor that specialises in radical and anarchist literature. ... Japanese internment camp in Canada, during World War II Internment is the imprisonment or confinement of people, commonly in large groups, without due process of law and a trial. ...

Quotes

• "I am an Anarchist not because I believe Anarchism is the final goal, but because there is no such thing as a final goal." - The London Years

• "Anarchism is no patent solution for all human problems, no Utopia of a perfect social order, as it has so often been called, since on principle it rejects all absolute schemes and concepts. It does not believe in any absolute truth, or in definite final goals for human development, but in an unlimited perfectibility of social arrangements and human living conditions, which are always straining after higher forms of expression, and to which for this reason one can assign no definite terminus nor set any fixed goal". - Anarchism: Its aims and purposes

• "Political rights do not exist because they have been legally set down on a piece of paper, but only when they have become the ingrown habit of a people, and when any attempt to impair them will meet with the violent resistance of the populace". - Anarcho-Syndicalism

References

1. ^ Fermin Rocker eastlondonhistory.com retrieved 8 September 2006

Further Reading

• East End Jewish Radicals 1875-1914 - William J Fishman (2004)

External links

• Rudolf Rocker Page at the Anarchist Encyclopedia
• Rudolf Rocker Archive at libcom.org
• Anarcho-Syndicalism (full text), by Rudolf Rocker
• Obituary Fermin Rocker (Rudolf & Milly's youngest son) Guardian Oct 26, 2004 accessed 11 Nov 2006