'The knife in the hands of the children'? Debating the political mass strike and political citizenship in Imperial Germany

摘要

German trade union leader Ludwig Rexhuser compared workers who might use the political mass strike to children one could not trust with a knife. No other worker leader so openly disparaged the masses, and some embraced worker activism. Nonetheless, pre-1914 German Social Democrats, in debating the mass strike, differed sharply over whether and which workers could be trusted with political agency, how workers could attain political maturity, and what tactics citizens might or should legitimately use. The contested nature of political citizenship within Germany's most democratic movement illuminates just how complex democracy and democratization have proven in practice.