Antifa () is a political movement in Germany composed of multiple militant groups and individuals on the political left, who describe themselves as anti-fascist; its primary activity has been combating fascism: initially Nazism, and later neo-Nazism. The antifa movement in Germany has existed in different eras and incarnations, dating back to Antifaschistische Aktion, from which the moniker antifa came.
Antifaschistische Aktion was set up by the then-Stalinist Communist Party of Germany (KPD) during the late history of the Weimar Republic. After the forced dissolution in the wake of Machtergreifung ('power seizure') in 1933, the movement went underground. In the postwar era, Antifaschistische Aktion inspired a variety of different autonomous movements, groups and individuals in Germany as well as other countries which widely adopted variants of its aesthetics and some of its tactics.
Known as the wider antifa movement, the contemporary antifa groups have no direct organisational connection to Antifaschistische Aktion.Grunenberg, Antonia (1993). Antifaschismus – ein deutscher Mythos. Freiburg: Rowohlt. . The contemporary antifa movement has its roots in the West German Außerparlamentarische Opposition left-wing student movement and largely adopted the aesthetics of the first movement while being ideologically somewhat dissimilar. The first antifa groups in this tradition were founded by the Maoist Communist League in the early 1970s. From the late 1980s, West Germany's squatter scene and left-wing autonomism movement were the main contributors to the new antifa movement and in contrast to the earlier movement had a more anarcho-communist leaning. The contemporary movement has splintered into different groups and factions, including one anti-imperialist and anti-Zionist faction and one anti-German faction who strongly oppose each other, mainly over their views on Israel.
German government institutions such as the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and the Federal Agency for Civic Education describe the contemporary antifa movement as part of the extreme left and as partially violent. Antifa groups are monitored by the federal office in the context of its legal mandate to combat extremism. The federal office states that the underlying goal of the antifa movement is "the struggle against the liberal democratic basic order" and capitalism. In the 1980s, the movement was accused by German authorities of engaging in terrorist acts of violence. According to the these agencies, the use of the epithet fascist against opponents and the view of capitalism as a form of fascism are central to the movement.
Antifaschistische Aktion
Antifaschistische Aktion was established by the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) based on the principle of a communist front and its establishment was announced in the party's newspaper Die Rote Fahne (The Red Flag) in 1932. It functioned as an integral part of the KPD during its entire existence from 1932 to 1933. A member of the Comintern, the KPD under the leadership of Ernst Thälmann was loyal to the Soviet government headed by Joseph Stalin to the extent that the party had been directly controlled and funded by the Soviet leadership in Moscow since 1928. The KPD described Antifaschistische Aktion as a "red united front under the leadership of the only anti-fascist party, the KPD".
During the Comintern's Third Period (1928–1931), the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) was included by the KPD in the category of "fascists" based on the theory of "social fascism" supported by the Comintern in the early 1930s, according to which social democracy was a variant of fascism and even more dangerous and insidious than open fascism. The KPD doctrine held that the communist party was "the only anti-fascist party" while all other parties were "fascist".
The KPD in the Third Period did not view fascism as a specific political movement, but primarily as the final stage of capitalism and the KPD's anti-fascism was therefore synonymous with anti-capitalism. Throughout this period, the KPD regarded the centre-left SPD as its main adversary.
Consequently, anti-fascism and anti-fascist action in the language of the Third Period KPD also included the struggle against the social democrats. In the early 1930s, the KPD had stated that "fighting fascism means fighting the SPD just as much as it means fighting Hitler and the parties of Brüning". While some KPD members initially believed Antifaschistische Aktion should include other leftists, this opinion was quickly suppressed by the KPD leadership which made it clear that Antifaschistische Aktion would also oppose the SPD and that "Anti-Fascist Action means untiring daily exposure of the shameless, treacherous role of the SPD and ADGB leaders who are the direct filthy helpers of fascism".
Occasionally between late 1931 and late 1932, the KPD cooperated with the Nazis in attacking the SPD. In 1931, the KPD under the leadership of Ernst Thälmann internally used the slogan "After Hitler, our turn!", strongly believing that a united front against Nazis was not needed and that a Nazi dictatorship would ultimately crumble due to flawed economic policies and lead the KPD to power in Germany when the people realized that their economic policies were superior.Jane Degras, The Communist International 1919–1943: documents. 3. 1929–1943, Routledge (UK), , p. 121.CLR James "After Hitler, Our Turn" World Revolution 1917–1936: The Rise and Fall of the Communist International Furnell and Sons, 1937
The relationship between the KPD and the SPD was characterised by mutual hostility. The SPD had itself adopted the position that both the Nazis and the KPD posed an equal danger to liberal democracyAdelheid von Saldern, The Challenge of Modernity: German Social and Cultural Studies, 1890–1960, University of Michigan Press (2002), , p. 78 and SPD leader Kurt Schumacher famously described the KPD as "red-painted Nazis" in 1930. The SPD-dominated Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold described itself as a "protection organization of the Republic and democracy in the fight against the swastika and the Soviet star" and both the Reichsbanner and the Iron Front opposed both the Nazis and the anti-fascist KPD.Franz Osterroth, Dieter Schuster: Chronik der deutschen Sozialdemokratie. 2. Vom Beginn der Weimarer Republik bis zum Ende des Zweiten Weltkrieges; Berlin, 1980.
In 1929, the KPD's paramilitary organisation, Roter Frontkämpferbund (Alliance of Red Front-Fighters), an effective predecessor of Antifaschistische Aktion, had been banned as extremist by the governing SPD.Kurt G. P. Schuster: Der rote Frontkämpferbund 1924–1929. Droste, Düsseldorf 1975, . In December 1929, the KPD founded Antifaschistische Junge Garde as a successor to Roter Frontkämpferbund, which was banned.Patricia Swett, Pamela E. Swett (2004), Neighbors and Enemies: The Culture of Radicalism in Berlin, 1929–1933 (p. 163), Cambridge University Press
Despite this animosity between party leaderships, on the ground there was considerable co-operation against the Nazis between rank and file activists of the KPD, SPD and other left groups such as in local anti-fascist committees and militias, particularly in 1932 as the fascists gained ground and calls for a united front by Leon Trotsky, August Thalheimer and other left leaders became more urgent. It was in this context that the KPD began to emphasise the specific threat of Nazism, leading to the formation of Antifaschistische Aktion and later the turn away from the "social fascism" doctrine.
The 1932 congress organised by KPD dedicated energy to attacking the SPD. It featured a large Antifaschistische Aktion logo flanked by imagery that showed the KPD fighting the capitalists next to imagery openly mocking the SPD.. Especially p. 9 and pp. 120–144 (ch. "Anti-Faschismus als Staatsdoktrin: Die DDR") The two-flag logo, designed by Association of Revolutionary Visual Artists members and , remains a widely used symbol of militant anti-fascism.
How many people belonged to is difficult to determine because there were no membership cards. Rather, it developed out of the practical participation. The Red Mass Self-Defence (RMSS) units were absorbed into , forming the nuclei of the latter's Unity Committees, organised on a micro-local basis, e.g. in apartment buildings, factories or allotments.
As well as being involved in political streetfights, the RMSS and used their militant approach to develop a comprehensive network of self-defence for communities targeted by the Nazis such as in "tenant protection" (), action against evictions. Initially, the RMSS units had minimal formal membership, but in the second half of 1932 local executive boards were created to co-ordinate the activities of the KPD, the Kampfbund, the RMSS and the now illegal Roter Frontkämpferbund, with the RMSS given a more distinct and almost paramilitary defence role, often co-operating on an ad hoc basis with the Reichsbanner. At a local level, worked with other left groups, including joint assemblies and demonstrations with SPD and other socialist groups, but the national KPD leadership continued to describe social democracy as the "main enemy".
After the forced dissolution in the wake of the Machtergreifung in 1933, the movement went underground. Theodore Draper argued that "the so-called theory of social fascism and the practice based on it constituted one of the chief factors contributing to the victory of German fascism in January 1933".
Post-war committees After the defeat of Nazi Germany, groups called Antifaschistische Aktion, Antifaschistische Ausschüsse, or Antifaschistische Kommittees, all typically abbreviated to antifa, spontaneously re-emerged in Germany in 1944, mainly involving veterans of pre-war KPD, KPO and SPD politicsKahn, David (1950). Betrayal: Our Occupation of Germany. Beacon Service Co.Office of Military Government Control Office, Germany (Territory under Allied occupation, U.S. Zone) (1945). Information Bulletin. (1–22): 13–15.Krieger, Leonard (December 1949). "The Inter-Regnum in Germany: March-August 1945". Political Science Quarterly. 64 (4): 507–532 as well as some members of other democratic political parties and Christians who opposed the Nazi régime. Communists tended to make up at least half of the committees.
In the western zones, these anti-fascist committees began to recede by the late summer of 1945, marginalized by Allied bans on political organization and by re-emerging divisions between communists and others and the emerging state doctrine of anti-communism in what became West Germany.Creuzberger, Stefan; Hoffmann, Dierk, eds. (2014). "Geistige Gefahr" und "Immunisierung der Gesellschaft": Antikommunismus und politische Kultur in der frühen Bundesrepublik (in German). De Gruyter Oldenbourg. In East Germany, the antifa groups were absorbed into the new Stalinist state.
Cold War East Germany
In the Soviet occupation zone which later became East Germany, the Soviet occupation authorities pressured the KPD and the remaining Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) to merge into the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) while those within the SPD who resisted the Stalinization were persecuted and often fled to the western zones. The repression in the Soviet occupation zone and the onset of the Cold War quickly exacerbated the conflict between the SED and the SPD. The term anti-fascism was widely used by Marxist–Leninists to smear their opponents, including democratic socialists, social democrats and other anti-Stalinist leftists.