{{Short description|Principle in Austromarxism; expression of left-wing nationalism}} '''National personal autonomy''' is one form of [[non-territorial autonomy]] that grew out of autonomy ideas developed by [[Austromarxism|Austromarxist]] thinkers.
One of these theorists was [[Otto Bauer]] who published his view of national personal autonomy in his 1907 book {{lang|de|Die Nationalitätenfrage und die Sozialdemokratie}} (The Nationalities Question and Social Democracy) was seen by him a way of gathering the geographically divided members of the same nation to "organize nations not in territorial bodies but in simple association of persons", thus radically disjoining the nation from the [[territory (country subdivision)|territory]] and making of the nation a non-territorial [[Voluntary association|association]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Bauer |first=Otto |author-link=Otto Bauer |translator-first=Joseph |translator-last=O'Donnell |title=The Question of Nationalities and Social Democracy |editor-first=Ephraim J. |editor-last=Nimni |publisher=[[University of Minnesota Press]] |year=2000 |pages=696 |isbn=978-0-8166-3265-7}}</ref> The other ideological founders of the concept were another Austromarxist, [[Karl Renner]], in his 1899 essay ''Staat und Nation'' (State and Nation),<ref>All of Renner's essay is reproduced in an English translation in {{cite book |title=National Cultural Autonomy and its Contemporary Critics |editor-first=Ephraim |editor-last=Nimni |publisher=[[Routledge]] |year=2005 |pages=260 |isbn=978-0-415-24964-5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zP_9TccTwnYC}}</ref> and the [[Bundism|Jewish Labour Bundist]] [[Vladimir Medem]], in his 1904 essay ''Di sotsial-demokratie un di natsionale frage'' (Social Democracy and the National Question).<ref>{{langx|yi|Medem, V.}} 1943. “Di sotsial-demokratie un di natsionale frage” (1904). Vladimir Medem: Tsum tsvantsikstn yortsayt. New York: New York: Der Amerikaner Reprezentants fun Algemeynem Yidishn Arbeter-Bund (‘Bund’) in Poyln, pp. 173-219.</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Gechtman |first=Roni |date=December 2008 |title=National-Cultural Autonomy and 'Neutralism': Vladimir Medem's Marxist Analysis of the National Question, 1903-1920 |journal=[[Socialist Studies (1983)|Socialist Studies]] |volume=III |issue=1 |issn=1918-2821 |url=http://journals.sfu.ca/sss/index.php/sss/article/view/23 |access-date=2009-12-02 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120227054336/http://journals.sfu.ca/sss/index.php/sss/article/view/23 |archive-date=2012-02-27 |url-status=dead}}</ref>
== Medem == In his 1904 text, Medem exposed his version of the concept: <blockquote> Let us consider the case of a country composed of several national groups, e.g. Poles, Lithuanians and Jews. Each national group would create a separate movement. All citizens belonging to a given national group would join a special organisation that would hold cultural assemblies in each region and a general cultural assembly for the whole country. The assemblies would be given financial powers of their own: either each national group would be entitled to raise taxes on its members, or the state would allocate a proportion of its overall budget to each of them. Every citizen of the state would belong to one of the national groups, but the question of which national movement to join would be a matter of personal choice and no authority would have any control over his decision. The national movements would be subject to the general legislation of the state, but in their own areas of responsibility they would be autonomous and none of them would have the right to interfere in the affairs of the others.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Plassereaud |first=Yves |date=May 2000 |title=Choose Your Own Nationality or The Forgotten History of Cultural Autonomy |journal=[[Le Monde diplomatique]] |language=English |url=http://www.panarchy.org/plasseraud/choice.html |access-date=2009-12-02 |archive-date=2009-05-04 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090504042749/http://www.panarchy.org/plasseraud/choice.html |url-status=live}}</ref> </blockquote>
== Supporters == This principle was later adopted by various parties, among them the [[Jewish Socialist Workers Party]] from its foundation in 1906, the [[General Jewish Labour Bund in Lithuania, Poland and Russia|Jewish Labour Bund]] at its August 1912 Conference (when the motion "On National Cultural Autonomy" became part of the Bund's program), the [[Dashnak|Armenian social democrats]], the Russian [[Constitutional Democratic Party]] (''Kadets'') at its June 1917's Ninth Congress,<ref name=bowring>Bill Bowring, "Burial and resurrection, Karl Renner's controversial influence on the "national question" in Russia", in {{cite book |title=National cultural autonomy and its contemporary critics |editor-first=Ephraim |editor-last=Nimni |publisher=[[Routledge]] |year=2005 |pages=260 |isbn=978-0-415-24964-5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zP_9TccTwnYC}}</ref> the first Ottoman then Greek [[Socialist Workers' Federation]] of [[Thessaloniki]], the left-wing [[Zionist]]s ([[Hashomer Hatzair]]) in favour of a [[one-state solution|binational solution]] in [[History of Palestine|Palestine]], the Jewish [[Folkspartei]] (inspired by [[Simon Dubnov]], who had developed a concept of Jewish autonomy close to Bauer's), and the [[Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania]] (DAHR) after 1989.
== Opponents == The whole concept was strongly opposed by the [[Bolshevik]]s. [[Stalin]]'s pamphlet ''[[Marxism and the National Question]]'' (1913) was their ideological reference on the matter, along with [[Lenin]]'s ''Critical Remarks on the National Question'' (December 1913), in particular in the chapter "Cultural-National Autonomy".<ref name=bowring/><ref name="Stalin">{{cite book |last=Stalin |first=Joseph |author-link=Joseph Stalin |title=Marxism and the National Question |via=[[Marxists Internet Archive]] |location=Prosveshcheniye |number=3–5 |date=March–May 1913 |url=http://www.marx.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1913/03.htm |accessdate=2009-11-12 |language=English}}</ref><ref name="lenin">{{cite book |last=Lenin |first=Vladimir |author-link=Vladimir Lenin |title=Critical Remarks on the National Question |via=[[Marxists Internet Archive]] |location=Prosveshcheniye |number=10, 11 and 12 |date=October–December 1913 |url=http://www.marx.org/archive/lenin/works//1913/crnq/index.htm |accessdate=2009-11-12 |language=English |archive-date=2005-11-19 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051119042531/http://marx.org/archive/lenin/works/1913/crnq/index.htm |url-status=live}}</ref> (Stalin was later People's Commissar of Nationalities from 1917 - 1923.) Lenin's and Stalin's critiques of the national personal autonomy concept were later joined by the Catalan [[Andreu Nin]] in his article ''The Austrian School, National Emancipation Movements'' (1935).<ref name="nin">{{cite web |url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/nin/1935/xx/austromarx.htm |title=Austro-Marxism and the National Question (chapter in National Emancipation Movements) |last=Nin |first=Andrés |via=[[Marxists Internet Archive]] |year=1935 |language=English |access-date=2009-11-12 |archive-date=2009-05-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090507140722/http://www.marxists.org/archive/nin/1935/xx/austromarx.htm |url-status=live}}</ref>
== Implementation == It was adopted as an official policy in the short-lived [[Ukrainian People's Republic]] (1917–1920) and in the interwar [[History of Estonia (1920-1939)|Estonian Republic]] (1925 Law on Personal Autonomy), and it was included in the Declaration Concerning the Protection of Minorities in Lithuania by the [[League of Nations]] in 1925.<ref name="bowring"/><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.einst.ee/factsheets/cult_auton/ |title=Law on Cultural Autonomy for National Minorities |year=1925 |publisher=The [[Estonian Institute]] |access-date=2009-12-02 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100212210236/http://www.einst.ee/factsheets/cult_auton/ |archive-date=2010-02-12 |url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.forost.ungarisches-institut.de/pdf/19220512-1.pdf |title=Declaration concerning the protection of minorities in Lithuania |year=1922 |publisher=[[League of Nations]] |access-date=2016-06-06 |archive-date=2016-03-20 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160320034954/http://www.forost.ungarisches-institut.de/pdf/19220512-1.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref>
== See also == * [[Millet (Ottoman Empire)]] * [[Jewish Autonomism]] - [[Kehilla (modern)|Kehilla]] - [[Assembly of Representatives (Mandate Palestine)|Asefat ha-Nivharim]] * [[Non-territorial autonomy]] * [[Language policy#Based on non-territorialized individual rights|Non-territorial language policy]] * [[Consociationalism]] * [[Plurinationalism]] * [[Panarchy (political philosophy)]]
== References == {{reflist|2}}
[[Category:Marxism]] [[Category:Minority rights]] [[Category:Bundism]] [[Category:Forms of government]] [[Category:Political science terminology]] [[Category:Autonomy]]