In the film, The Baader Meinhof Complex, just as the character Horst Harold had predicted, the Red Army Faction regenerated and evolved. Andreas makes a point of saying that, compared to the second and third generations of the faction, they’re actions seem relatively mild. The first generation, under the orders of Andreas, Gudrun, and Ulrike, was guided by a different central policy and a different morality. Andreas and Gudrun, having initiated the once distant and skeptical Ulrike, become the intellectuals. When the movie begins, Ulrike, as a journalist, appears to be the revolutionary intellectual of the movement, but she quickly leaves behind her “intellectual masturbation” for action. Driving down the road, Andreas hands Peter a gun. “Only a gun makes things fun,” he says to Peter. Peter goes on to become a part of the generation that hijacks the civilian flight, motivated to finish what Andreas and Gudrun started. Motivated by a myth.

But the myth here is more than a myth of righteousness, as Horst seems to suggest in the film: it is a myth of roles. The elephant in the room appears to be the thought that intellectuals are as much products of revolutionary moments as they are catalysts. There appears to be a notion of the intellectual as a progressive but constant variable in the equation of revolutionary change, an assumption that the intellectual can see a single, correct outcome of a series of still unknown events, and maintains that vision to the end. More specifically, there is an assumption that the intellectual has the ability to maintain that vision to the end. The intellectual ceases to be human, organic or otherwise. Gudrun is a symbol of this in her search for a “new morality” for the faction. Ulrike Meinhof, once a journalist well-known for her bold writing, becomes a criminal, known for her bold action. The film suggests that fear and panic turned her away from the pen and towards the gun, as well as a need for approval from Gudrun, especially in the scene where they help Andreas escape. She stands at the wall for a moment, stunned, then escapes alongside the others, deviating from the original plan, and essentially “outing” herself as a member of the faction, ending her career as a journalist, and destroying her family. As much of an intellectual character as she was in the film, she clearly didn’t consider those repercussions, and likely didn’t know. The intellectual becomes human.

Professor Malekzadeh asked if this isn’t too much Freud? How can fucking and shooting be seen as the same thing? Isn’t this almost psychopathic? Perhaps, but I think that avoids answering the question that Horst tries to answer:

“What motivates them?”

“A myth.”

In my opinion, I feel as though the impact that these two leave behind is what matters the most in distinguishing them. This is because often times when they start out, they are both seeking the same purpose which is a fight for the betterment of one’s society but when the story is more glorifying and less full of horror we tend to call it a revolution. Being from a country that experienced one of the worst civil wars in history but has seen a complete shift in its society, this makes me wonder if so many people hadn’t died and also in the manner which people had killed each other….would we define what happened as a civil war or a revolution?

The line between what separates a civil war from a revolutionary war is often unclear, as civil wars often maintain some of the same characteristics as revolutionary wars.  In the context of American history, why is the war that followed America’s declaration of independence from Britain referred to as the American Revolution, when the war that followed the Confederacy’s declaration of independence from the Union referred to as the American Civil War? Both the American Revolution and the American Civil War were technically secessionist wars. The Confederacy, like the 13 American colonies, adopted new and unique constitutions when seceding. Additionally, in the Revolutionary War, the Continental Army not only fought the British military, but also the Provincial Corps, a sizable army comprised of American Loyalists. Who decides what an internal armed conflict is labeled as, the press, the government, the victors of the war, or possibly external nations?

The meaning of a revolutionary war, and the meaning of a civil war, both carry different implications, the former being venerable, attractive, and progressive, and the latter being vile, unappealing, and degenerative. Ultimately, in conflicts that involve prolonged armed internal struggles between a government and its people, how a conflict gets portrayed has less to do with the specific aspects of the war itself, and more to do with the agendas of those who maintain the intellectual and political power over the press, both during the war itself, and following it. To call an armed internal struggle a civil war, denies rebels with a sense of legitimacy during the war. In the Baader Meinhof Complex, the members of the RAF saw their war against “the fascists and the imperialists” as revolutionary. While the RAF’s goal was to start a revolution, those who maintained control over the international press, and the German press, labeled the RAF as rebels, thugs, and terrorists. Historically, the opinions and the values of the RAF never reached the mainstream political consciousness of the West German state, and no massive revolution was ever able to transpire to topple the government. Germany maintained control of the media, both during their struggle against the RAF and after the RAF’s defeat; therefore, the actions of the RAF have continued to be labeled in derogatory terms.

America ultimately was able to spark a massive armed insurrection against Great Britain, and was able to successfully secede. Since the Founding Father’s had a fairly autonomous government, civil society, and control over the internal press prior to the revolution, when the Founders declared their independence in 1776, they were able to manage the image of the war. Obviously, the Founding Fathers were able to establish a government, and successfully fend off the British military. The American victory in the Revolutionary War meant that American’s would be able to control the historical image of the war as well. In the case of the Confederacy, while the South was able to spark a massive armed secessionist war, they were unable to win, and therefore the Union was able to manage the historical image of the war. If the Confederacy had won, would they have looked back on their secession from the North in revolutionary terms? Although the answer to this question is unclear, it is clear that those in power of the government and the press, often utilize words as propaganda, and as a way of managing their current and historical image.

Revolutions inherently hinge on the work of intellectuals, but that does not mean that intellectual work is always hinged on the revolutionary path. Regardless of whether this type of “ideological masturbation” is welcomed or not, intellectuals play a unique role in that they have the power to directly influence action. Whereas in the case of Gramsci and some of the other authors we studied, intellectuals are vital in acting as the link between the people and governmental power—having one foot in the working-class realm and the other in the political realm—Fanon and others see intellectual involvement as detrimental to furthering the progression of the movement.

I think it would be blasphemous to claim that a movement could survive—let alone thrive—without a base layer of intellectual work that bolsters it. Without a specific, clear set of values laid out, there is too much possibility for interpretation on the part of the masses. In other words, the intellectual work acts a bit like training wheels, keeping those who are involved in the revolution from falling off the bike and ensuring that they are on the right path towards the ultimate goal. Without these training wheels, people too often would stray—into other’s lanes and off the road altogether—due to a lack of guidance.

For this reason, intellectual leadership is not only important, but present in every revolution we have studied. It must be in order for something to even be able to attach the “revolution” name to it. In some cases, these leaders have been very apparent, and in others, rather under-the-radar. Baader, for example, although not depicted as the most scholarly gifted individual, actually lays out a successful intellectual groundwork through his own actions that help steer the decisions of his fellow RAF members. By consistently acting recklessly, living without fear, and being willing to die, Baader constructs a non-tangible set of values that his counterparts follow. Baader, although one of the most critical of Ulrike’s academic work, ironically inhabits the very role of the intellectual in his group.

I wonder why intellectuals working on revolutionary change seem to inevitably either lose touch with the masses and fall into the place of the dictator they tried to overthrow or they fight a losing battle for change that the masses seem to never get behind. I’ll suggest that the unfortunate state of the conscious revolutionary is a result of the fast-paced and necessarily spontaneous nature of revolutions and how it’s very difficult to keep the intellectual, authoritative work of the revolution in line with the views of all areas of the masses.

As we saw in The Baader Meinhof Complex film and we’ve seen in revolutionary cases like the Iranian and Haitian revolutions, the beginnings of revolutions seem to always be pure and righteous. It’s the slave standing up against the master’s torment. It’s the man refusing to obey the police officer. The activist who needs to take a stand against blatantly cruel acts from their government. We’ve seen that revolutions seem to be triggered by spontaneous action, usually in line with general dissatisfaction from the masses, and that carefully planned and prepared-for revolutions often fail to occur. Somehow, in a short period of time, there are enough people in the masses who feel the same way about an issue and in some quick early movements, decide to move together in protest. The revolution seems to fall apart, however, once the beginnings are already set in motion and someone needs to decide where it goes. The role of the intellectual in this case, when choosing the correct action to move forward, is to either survey the masses and master what the masses want (which takes time—enough for the spark of the beginnings to die off) or take the responsibility of deciding where the revolution goes into their own hands (which necessarily implies that the work of the revolution cannot still be in the interests of the entire community—unless there is a quick execution of effective propaganda to the masses). When the intellectual revolutionary takes on the responsibility of leading the revolution, it loses its purity; no longer is the revolution a beautiful concurrence of values and interests of a mass, but it becomes the result of planning by an individual—an individual that cannot possibly read the minds or understand the backgrounds of thousands, and an individual who is subject to fears and desires and impulses as any other human being. Therefore, if a revolution is able to continue past its harmonious and just beginnings, it must be led by an individual who will inevitably lead the movement in a direction that the masses no longer support, thus leaving the intellectual leader in a position very similar to the oppressive regime the revolution sought to overthrow.

I think that the question that should be asked on the issue of the intellectual in revolution rather than must movements be rooted in a coherent set of ideas and values is, can anyone (i.e. the subaltern) create that coherent set of ethos?

I think the gangs of horny, sociopathic, seemingly immature gangs we see in Baader Meinhof are a perfect example of the fact that a revolution, a successful one at least, must be rooted in coherent values. In the end of Baader Meinhof the new era of “revolutionaries” are disconnected with the leaders and the group seems to be more of a nihilistic terrorism rather than a revolution, shown in the ending scenes. We’ve talked about the revolution being revolved around consolidating a movement through tactics of participation. However, it is not just the crowd that facilitates a successful revolution, but rather the uniting mission, the strengthening initiative that forms the crowd in the first place. However, as we’ve read, the issue is not wether or not these movements need a set of ethos but rather who has the skill set, the ability to create this mission? For Gramsci, he made (in my opinion) the elitist assumption that the masses needed the intellectual. Whereas minds like Fanon or MKV suggest that the intellectual is not an asset to the consolidation of revolutions. For instance Fanon claims that the intellectual is only fully educated once he’s taken a walk amongst the people and learned from them.

All in all I think that it’s dangerous to generalize that each revolution needs the same recipe to be successful as each context has different circumstances. However, in my mind, violence complicates revolution in making the uprising a zero-sum game, as we will learn reading Erica Chenoweth. In these circumstances, I think the risk is higher and thus the need for strategic tactics is heightened. In a community such as Haiti, where the slave community was steeped in battle not theory, the intellectual (in the form of the free colored individuals), was needed to form a sovereign nation. However, in a context of MKV’s argument, the masses had the “organic” mediation of the school teachers to provide the role of the intellectual. The intellectual is needed as there will always be a need for a totalizing vision, however, where that intellectual takes form depends on the context of the movement.

Distinguishing between civil wars and revolutions is tough because implicit in the question of how they differ is that they always differ. Danielle’s point in class that all “revolutions are civil wars but not all civil wars are revolutions” was incredibly poignant and encapsulated where I fall on the issue. If I accept the argument many of my peers are putting forward, that revolutions have an ideological underpinning, then certainly many civil wars constitute revolutions.

It is hard to divorce the belligerents in some of the most famous civil wars from their ideologies. How many times do we hear about how the American Civil War was a “battle for state’s rights,” “the abolition of slavery,” “to preserve the Union,” or any other statement that one might find in a textbook? Invariably, talking about the conflict forces us to understand the ideologies that created it in the first place. In the case of the United States, victory was achieved by the North whose actions and policies advocated for a significant departure from the way the government used to conceive of rights and their relationship to the state. Certainly, this would constitute a revolution (since government changed and an ideology was involved).

Besides ideas, civil wars can be fought over stuff too. Does this not make them revolutionary? Part of me thinks not since there is a desire for something is not explicitly linked to an ideology. But fighting for access to something or to prevent a group of people from getting something is inherently the product of an ideology that privileges a resource. If two factions fight over access to a water source (a civil war we may very much see in the future), then the logical extensions of the simplistic formulation of the belligerents’ positions are that some people deserve access to something and others do not. This sounds a lot like a boiled down version of any political justification for revolution.

Perhaps because of convention there should remain a basic distinction between the two, but for the purposes of an in depth examination, they seem ever more similar.

For me, there is no one set model of a revolution, but rather revolutions can occur along a spectrum, each with its own subset of a laundry list of ingredients, though all, regardless of particulars, seek to radically upend the existing framework of cultural, social, economic and/or political relations in favor of another — whether or not the revolution actually does so, is a matter of its success or failure. The following is a very basic definition of the extreme points of the revolutionary spectrum, and so is neither fully comprehensive nor fully fleshed out, but I think hits at what I see as the main points defining the boundaries of the revolutionary spectrum.

At one extreme is revolution as a particular and distinct strain of a social movement, either imposed top-down by elites or brought about from the bottom-up through public participation (how much can vary), in which there is no violence and which does not necessarily, but can, involve transitions of power (through nonviolent means). Revolutionary social movements nevertheless aim to radically transform the existing regime infrastructure and broader society through peaceful means. At the other end of the spectrum, is revolution as a particular form of civil war (a revolutionary civil war, some might say), whereby there is extreme, all-consuming violence (perhaps total warfare) between various groups contending to be sole sovereigns over a regime – which will be subject to radical transformation as a group is able to consolidate (or re-consolidate) their hegemony over the other contending groups. The rate of (active) popular participation in the extreme case of the revolutionary social movement is likely to be less than in the extreme case of the revolutionary civil war. While there are other variables that surely come into play – demographics of the revolutionaries, urban or rural-based, particular historical conditions, current context of the pre-revolutionary state (i.e. how “transitioned” is it – agrarian, semi-agrarian, semi-industrialized; weak state, strong state; etc.), etc. – these are, in my mind at least, variables of revolutions that likely effect the direction and nature of the revolution, but not the definition of what revolution is itself.

I began to toy with the differentiating factors between a revolution and a civil war in class and want to tease out the importance of civic involvement in these two phenomena. The largest, and most crucial, distinction between a revolution and civil war in my opinion is the factor of choice. In the simplest of terms, one can opt to become part of a revolution while civil wars engulf a civic society potentially against their will. This being said, a movement’s vitality can depend on critical mass participation. I think it is necessarily true to say that the choice or option to participate in a transformative movement greatly varies participation in numbers. Depending on the nature of the revolution, individuals can be offset with exposing oneself in front of the institution they’re trying to change. Civil wars, on the other hand, are more demanding of civic participation because of the nature of direct conflict and the necessity to fight for survival. I also believe that revolutions have a greater degree of fervor. We often associate revolutionary movements emerging from the peripheries of society because of their more radical approaches to instating change whereas I typically associate civil wars with a battle to find the means for survival.

(Note:  This week’s blog gives you a choice—please pick from one of the two prompts below, and as always, keep it short and informal!  Engagement and conversation above all!)

Look again at your index cards.  Flip back and forth between its two sides.  Continue the incredible discussion that we started in class:  What distinguishes civil wars from revolutions?  If both phenomena have the capacity to produce transformations of polities and societies, why bother with separate terms, other than the assumption that one is somehow “better” than the other? 

“…No. 1 is all for potash; therefore B. and the thirty had to be liquidated as saboteurs.  In a nationally centralized agriculture the alternative of nitrate of potash is of enormous importance:  it can decide the issue of the next war.  If N. 1 was in the right, history will absolve him, and the execution of the thirty-one men will be a mere bagatelle.  If he was wrong…

…But how can the present decide what will be judged truth in the future?  We are doing the work of prophets without their gift.  We replaced vision by logical deduction; but although we all started from the same point of departure, we came to divergent results.  Proof disproved proof and finally we had to recur to faith—to axiomatic faith in the rightness of one’s own reasoning.”

We’ve encountered a rather grim picture these past few weeks of where “good ideas” might carry movements and struggles for freedom, whether it be the self-abnegation of Rubashov or the veritable orgy of violence and decadence of the Baader Meinhof gang.  Whereas Gramsci and Stuart Hall demand the inclusion of the intellectual in movement politics, and Mary Kay Vaughan demonstrates that even poorly educated rural school teachers can serve as “organic” mediators between an emerging state and members of society, a wide variety of authors, from Fanon to Havel and Miłosz, or most recently (and acutely), Mao, regard intellectuals as obstacles to change, even, in the case of Mao, counter-revolutionary.  Consider how revolutions might be tied to intellectual leadership, to the totalizing visions of a vanguard.  Must movements be rooted in a coherent set of ideas and values to be successful?  Gudrun Ensslin at one point tells Ulrike Meinhof that they must adopt a “new morality.”  What happens when this new morality encounters success, specifically, the formation of the state?  What happens when the inevitable divergencies from the glorious path begin to occur…?