Ernst Niekisch (May 23, 1889-May 27, 1967) was the most prominent German exponent of National Bolshevism.

Born in Trebnitz (Silesia), and brought up in Nördlingen, he became a school teacher by profession. He joined the SPD in 1917 and was instrumental in the setting up of a short-lived Bavarian Soviet Republic the following year. He left the SPD soon after and joined the USPD for a time, before returning.

During the 1920s he stressed the importance of nationalism and attempted to turn the SPD in that direction. He was vehemently opposed to the Dawes Plan, the Locarno Treaties and the general pacifism of the SPD, so much so that he was expelled from the party in 1926.

Upon his expulsion Niekisch joined and took control of the insignificant Old Socialist Party of Saxony which he converted to his own nationalist form of socialism, launching his own journal Widerstand (Opposition). Niekisch and his folowers adopted the name of "National Bolsheviks" and looked to the Soviet Union as a continuation of both Russian nationalism and the old state of Prussia. The movement took the slogan of "Sparta-Potsdam-Moscow".

Although anti-Semitic and in favour of a totalitarian state, Niekisch rejected Adolf Hitler as he felt he lacked any real socialism. After a time in the underground he was arrested in 1937 and was sentenced to life imprisonment two years later for 'literary high treason'. He was released in 1945, by which time he was blind.

Embittered against nationalism by his war-time experiences he turned to orthodox Marxism and lectured in sociology in Humboldt University in East Germany until 1953 when, disillusioned by the brutal suppresion of the workers' uprising, he moved to West Berlin. He died on May 23,1967.

Works

• Das Reich der Niederen Dämonen (Berlin, 1957)
• Geheimes Reich (1937)
• Hitler Ein deutsches Verhängnis (1932)

References

• Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890 edited by Philip Rees , (1991, ISBN 0130893013)
• The Appeal of Fascism: A Study of Intellectuals and Fascism 1919-1945 by Alastair Hamilton (London, 1971, ISBN 0218514263)
• The Beast Reawakens by Martin A. Lee (1997, ISBN 0316519596)