From Communism to Work Democracy

From Communism to Work Democracy is the first book devoted solely to Wilhelm Reich’s social and political thought and activities. It is an intellectual history tracing Reich’s evolution from a 1920s-style communism to work democracy, a form of anarchism, all shaped by his understanding of Marxism. ‘Communism’ refers to the radical social policies adopted in the Soviet Union following the Russian Revolution, and to the political parties in both Austria and Germany to which Reich belonged (1927–33). Expelled from the Comintern in December 1933, by late 1936 Reich came to treat ‘Communism’ as synonymous with Stalinism. His later ‘anti-Communism’ was a critique of the Soviet Union as described in The Mass Psychology of Fascism (1946). In the 1950s he underwent a criminal prosecution by the United States’ government, leading to the burning of his books and his death in prison.