THE JOURNAL OF REGIONAL HISTORY V.10 No.1
Willi Münzenberg (1889–1940): Politico-Ideological Portrait of the Red Millionaire
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The article is devoted to the biography of Willi Münzenberg, a little-known figure of the international communist movement. The authors of the article focused on the formation of the German communist and the factors that contributed to his conversion to socialism. The article highlights four major campaigns that made Münzenberg famous and rich. First of all, attention is paid to his activity as the leader of the Workers International Relief (Mezhrabpom in Russian), one of the world’s largest organizations that provided support to the workers of the USSR, Ireland, Japan, England, etc. The authors of the article proved that by concentrating in his hands the enormous funds that the Mezhrabpom received from various workers’ organizations and the Comintern, Münzenberg managed to launch a campaign for shaping a positive image of the USSR by involving intellectuals to propaganda and creating various media projects, including periodicals and cinema. Another W. Münzenberg’s major project under analysis was the German newspaper Sowjet-Rußland im Bild. The publication’s emphasis was identified, as were some of the authors of its materials. W. Münzenberg’s third project involved the organization of the World Anti-Imperialist Congress in Brussels in 1927 and the birth of the League Against Imperialism. The authors concluded that the transnational network that had been created by Münzenberg earlier due to the Mezhrabpom’s support enabled him to engage the public on the issue of colonialism and imperialism. The organization of the World Congress against War and Fascism in Amsterdam in March 1932 was the culmination of the Red Millionaire’s international activities. The conclusion the authors have made is that despite being initiated in the bosom of the Comintern, in many respects, Münzenberg’s international activities went beyond its auspices and the German communist himself was primarily a propagandist for the international communist movement, which facilitated the strengthening of the USSR’s image worldwide.
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Gruber, H. “Willi Münzenberg’s German Communist Propaganda Empire 1921–1933.” The Journal of Modern History, vol. 38, no. 3 (1966): 278–97.
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Mel'nichanskii, G.N. Professional'nye soyuzy SSSR i Antiimperialisticheskaya liga [Trade Unions of the USSR and the Anti-Imperialist League]. Moscow: Knigoizdatel'stvo VTsSPS, 1929. (In Russian)
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Petersson, F. “Hub of the Anti-Imperialist Movement: The League Against Imperialism and Berlin, 1927–1933.” Interventions, vol. 16, no. 1 (2014): 49–71.
Petersson, F. “In Control of Solidarity? Willi Münzenberg, the Workers’ International Relief and League Against Imperialism, 1921–1935.” Comintern Working Paper, no. 8 (2007). Accessed March 15, 2024.
BCnzenberg_the_Workers_International_Relief_and_League_against_Imperialism_1921_1935
Petersson, F. “La Ligue anti-impérialiste: Un espace transnational restreint, 1927–1937.” Monde(s), no. 10 (2016): 129–50.
Petersson, F. “The Labour and Socialist International and ‘the Colonial Problem’: Mobilisation by Necessity or Force, 1925–1928.” In The Internationalisation of the Labour Question Ideological Antagonism, Workers’ Movements and the ILO since 1919, edited by S. Bellucci, and H. Weiss, 119–44. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020.
Petersson, F. “‘We Are neither Visionaries nor Utopian Dreamers’: Willi Münzenberg, the League Against Imperialism, and the Comintern, 1925–1933.” Doctoral thesis, Åbo Akademi University, 2013.
Petersson, F. “Willi Münzenberg, la Ligue contre l’Impérialisme et le Comintern: Entretien avec Fredrik Petersson.” Période. Accessed March 27, 2024.
Sorkin, G.Z. Antiimperialisticheskaya liga 1927–1935. Istoricheskii ocherk [Anti-Imperialist League, 1927–1935. A historical essay]. Moscow: Nauka, 1965. (In Russian)
Weimar Communism as Mass Movement: 1918–1933, edited by R. Hoffrogge, N. LaPorte, and Ch. Heath. London: Lawrence and Wishart, 2017.
Wichers, H. “Willi Münzenberg.” Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS). Accessed February 25, 2024.
“Willi Münzenberg – der rote Medienmacher,” Jacobin, November 7, 2021. Accessed
August 16, 2024.
Willi Münzenberg (1889–1940). Ein deutscher Kommunist im Spannungsfeld zwischen Stalinismus und Antifaschismus, Herausgegeben von T. Schlie, and S. Roche. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1995.
“Willi Münzenberg. 1889–1940.” LeMO – Lebendiges Museum Online. Accessed January 29, 2024.
Willmann, H. Geschichte der Arbeiter-Illustrierten Zeitung 1921–1938. Berlin: Dietz, 1974.
“Young Communist International (1919–1943).” Marxisthistory.org. Accessed April 17, 2024.
Antoshin, A.V. “Periodicheskaya pechat' Britanskoi Zapadnoi Afriki na zaklyuchitel'nom etape kolonial'noi epokhi” [Periodicals of British West Africa during the final stage of the colonial era]. Izvestiya Ural'skogo federal'nogo universiteta. Seriya 1: Problemy obrazovaniya, nauki i kul'tury, vol. 27, no. 4 (2021): 66–71. (In Russian)
Antoshin, A.V. “Vozvrashchennye iz nebytiya: lyudi Kominterna v tvorchestve A.B. Davidsona” [Returned from oblivion: People of the Comintern in the works of A.B. Davidson]. In Imagines mundi: al'manakh issledovanii vseobshchei istorii XVI–XX vv. № 10. Seriya: Al'bionika [Imagines mundi: Almanac of studies of general history of the 16th–20th centuries. No. 10. Albionica series], iss. 5, edited by N.N. Baranov, 204–09. Yekaterinburg: Bank kul'turnoi informatsii, 2019. (In Russian)
Bavaj, R. “‘Revolutionierung der Augen’: Politische Massenmobilisierung in der Weimarer Republik und der Münzenberg-Konzern.” In Politische Kultur und Medienwirklichkeiten in den 1920er Jahren, Herausgegeben von U. Daniel, I. Marszolek, W. Pyta, and T. Welskopp, 82–100. Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag, 2010.
Biokhronika Lenina [Lenin’s Bio-Chronicle]. Tom III (1912–1917) [Vol. 3 (1912–1917)]; Tom IX (iyun' 1920 – yanvar' 1921) [Vol. 9 ((June 1920 – January 1921)]; Tom X (yanvar' – iyul' 1921) [Vol. 10 (January – July 1921)]; Tom XI (iyul' – noyabr' 1921) [Vol. 11 (July – November 1921)]; Tom XII (dekabr' 1921 – yanvar' 1924) [Vol. 12 (December 1921 – January 1924]. Lenin: revolyutsioner, myslitel', chelovek. Sait o zhizni i deyatel'nosti V.I. Lenina [Lenin: A revolutionary, thinker, person. Website on life and work of V.I. Lenin]. Accessed August 16, 2024. (In Russian)
Bois M., and S. Bornost. “ Kompromisslos auf der Seite der Unterdrückten. Die Arbeiter-Illustrierte Zeitung.” In Weltweit Medien nutzen. Medienwelt gestalten, Herausgegeben von B. Hüttner, and C. Nitz, 185–94. Hamburg: VSA, 2010.
Bulatov, V.V., and M.M. Zagorul'ko. “‘Nekapitalisticheskie’ inostrannye koncessii v SSSR” [‘Non-capitalist’ foreign concessions in the USSR]. Vestnik Volgogradskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. Seriya 4: Istoriya. Regionovedenie. Mezhdunarodnye otnosheniya, no. 1 (21) (2012): 51–58. (In Russian)
“Der Spartakusbund.” LeMO – Lebendiges Museum Online. Accessed February 2, 2024.
Dreyfus, M. “Munzenberg Willy.” Le dictionnaire biographique “Le Maitron.” Accessed April 16, 2024.
Gross, B. Willi Münzenberg. Eine politische Biografie. Leipzig: Forum Verlag, 1991.
Gruber, H. “Willi Münzenberg’s German Communist Propaganda Empire 1921–1933.” The Journal of Modern History, vol. 38, no. 3 (1966): 278–97.
Gruber, H. “Willi Münzenberg: Propagandist For and Against the Comintern.” International Review of Social History, vol. 10, no. 2 (1965): 188–210.
Koch, S. Double Lives: Stalin, Willi Münzenberg and the Seduction of the Intellectuals. London: Harper Collins Publishers, 1995.
“La Construction de l’image de l’URSS: le rôle de la famine de 1921.” Fragments Sur Les Temps Presents. Accessed May 12, 2024.
“Ligue contre l’impérialisme et l’oppression colonial. Press archives.” Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft. Accessed March 29, 2024.
Lindner, T.K. A City Against Empire: Transnational Anti-Imperialism in Mexico City, 1920–1930. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2023.
McMeekin, S. The Red Millionaire: A Political Biography of Willy Münzenberg, Moscow’s Secret Propaganda Tsar in the West, 1917–1940. New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 2004.
Mel'nichanskii, G.N. Professional'nye soyuzy SSSR i Antiimperialisticheskaya liga [Trade Unions of the USSR and the Anti-Imperialist League]. Moscow: Knigoizdatel'stvo VTsSPS, 1929. (In Russian)
Nogarède-Grohmann, A. “Les réseaux d’intellectuels de l’Entre-deux-guerres: l’exemple de Willi Münzenberg (1889–1940).” Enquêtes, no. 3 (2018) : 1–18.
Petersson, F. “Caught Between Nostalgia, Anti-Colonialism, International Communism, Transnational Networks and Radical Spaces: A Re-Assessment on the Historiography of the League Against Imperialism.” CoWoPa: Comintern Working Paper, vol. 28 (2013): 1–31.
Petersson, F. “History, Transnational Connections, and Anti-imperial Intentions: The League Against Imperialism and for National Independence (1927–1937).” In The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Imperialism and Anti-Imperialism, edited by I. Ness, and Z. Cope, 1186–94. Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2021.
Petersson, F. “Hub of the Anti-Imperialist Movement: The League Against Imperialism and Berlin, 1927–1933.” Interventions, vol. 16, no. 1 (2014): 49–71.
Petersson, F. “In Control of Solidarity? Willi Münzenberg, the Workers’ International Relief and League Against Imperialism, 1921–1935.” Comintern Working Paper, no. 8 (2007). Accessed March 15, 2024.
BCnzenberg_the_Workers_International_Relief_and_League_against_Imperialism_1921_1935
Petersson, F. “La Ligue anti-impérialiste: Un espace transnational restreint, 1927–1937.” Monde(s), no. 10 (2016): 129–50.
Petersson, F. “The Labour and Socialist International and ‘the Colonial Problem’: Mobilisation by Necessity or Force, 1925–1928.” In The Internationalisation of the Labour Question Ideological Antagonism, Workers’ Movements and the ILO since 1919, edited by S. Bellucci, and H. Weiss, 119–44. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020.
Petersson, F. “‘We Are neither Visionaries nor Utopian Dreamers’: Willi Münzenberg, the League Against Imperialism, and the Comintern, 1925–1933.” Doctoral thesis, Åbo Akademi University, 2013.
Petersson, F. “Willi Münzenberg, la Ligue contre l’Impérialisme et le Comintern: Entretien avec Fredrik Petersson.” Période. Accessed March 27, 2024.
Sorkin, G.Z. Antiimperialisticheskaya liga 1927–1935. Istoricheskii ocherk [Anti-Imperialist League, 1927–1935. A historical essay]. Moscow: Nauka, 1965. (In Russian)
Weimar Communism as Mass Movement: 1918–1933, edited by R. Hoffrogge, N. LaPorte, and Ch. Heath. London: Lawrence and Wishart, 2017.
Wichers, H. “Willi Münzenberg.” Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (HLS). Accessed February 25, 2024.
“Willi Münzenberg – der rote Medienmacher,” Jacobin, November 7, 2021. Accessed
August 16, 2024.
Willi Münzenberg (1889–1940). Ein deutscher Kommunist im Spannungsfeld zwischen Stalinismus und Antifaschismus, Herausgegeben von T. Schlie, and S. Roche. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1995.
“Willi Münzenberg. 1889–1940.” LeMO – Lebendiges Museum Online. Accessed January 29, 2024.
Willmann, H. Geschichte der Arbeiter-Illustrierten Zeitung 1921–1938. Berlin: Dietz, 1974.
“Young Communist International (1919–1943).” Marxisthistory.org. Accessed April 17, 2024.
Keywords:
Willi Münzenberg, Red Millionaire, Germany, USSR, Comintern, Communist Party of Germany, Yong Communist International, Workers International Relief, League Against Imperialism, Münzenberg Group
For citation:
Bespalova, К.А, and T.A. Kraeva. “Willi Münzenberg (1889–1940): Politico-Ideological Portrait of the Red Millionaire”. Historia Provinciae – the Journal of Regional History, vol. 10, no. 1 (2026): 272–314, https://doi.org/10.23859/2587-8344-2026-10-1-7; EDN: FDZPRB
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