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105-576: The LSI had a history of rivalry with the Communist International (Comintern), with which it competed over the leadership of the international socialist and labour movement. However, unlike the Comintern, the LSI maintained no direct control over the actions of its sections, being constituted as a federation of autonomous national parties. Despite the hostility expressed by the Communist International ,

210-659: A Methodist in 1879 (having previously been a Congregationalist ) and became a Local Preacher . After he lost his job in 1884, he concentrated on preaching. In 1892, Henderson entered the complex world of trade union politics when he was elected as a paid organiser for the Friendly Society of Iron Founders . He also became a representative on the North East Conciliation Board. Henderson believed that strikes caused more harm than they were worth and tried to avoid them whenever he could. For this reason, he opposed

315-611: A by-election . From 1903 to 1904, Henderson also served as mayor of Darlington, County Durham . In 1906, the LRC changed its name to the Labour Party after it won 29 seats at the general election . In 1908, when Hardie resigned as Leader of the Labour Party, Henderson was elected to replace him. He remained Leader until his own resignation two years later, in 1910. In 1914 the First World War broke out and Ramsay MacDonald resigned from

420-617: A revolutionary left-wing , a moderate center-wing , and a more reformist right-wing . Lenin condemned much of the center as "social pacifists" for several reasons, including their vote for war credits despite publicly opposing the war. Lenin's term "social pacifist" aimed in particular at Ramsay MacDonald , leader of the Independent Labour Party in Britain, who opposed the war on grounds of pacifism but did not actively fight against it. Discredited by its apathy towards world events,

525-700: A by-election in Widnes . He then became Labour's Chief Whip . Vladimir Lenin held Henderson in very low regard. In a letter to the Soviet Commissar for Foreign Affairs, Georgy Chicherin , written on 10 February 1922 and referring to the Genoa Conference , Lenin wrote: "Henderson is as stupid as Kerensky , and for this reason he is helping us." Henderson lost his seat again, at the general election of 1922 . He returned to Parliament via another by-election , this time representing Newcastle East , but again, he

630-541: A call for joint action of the SPD and the Communist Party of Germany against Adolf Hitler 's regime. The Comintern responded by stating that they were not convinced of the sincerity of the declaration. However, the Comintern did soon call its national sections to form united fronts together with social democratic parties locally. The LSI, on its side, did not accept the notion of local social democrats forming united fronts with

735-559: A convention call for a unification congress in May. On May 21, 1923, some 620 delegates representing 41 socialist political parties in 30 countries was convened in Hamburg , Germany to bring about the unification of the two Internationals. A wide array of political tendencies were represented among these delegates, running the ideological gamut from activists in the left wing of the French Section of

840-790: A defense of the Soviet state. In that year, Joseph Stalin took power in Moscow and upheld the thesis of socialism in one country , detailed by Nikolai Bukharin in his brochure Can We Build Socialism in One Country in the Absence of the Victory of the West-European Proletariat? (April 1925). The position was finalized as the state policy after Stalin's January 1926 article On the Issues of Leninism . Stalin made

945-614: A disciplined fashion whatever decision was made. In this period, the Comintern was promoted as the general staff of the world revolution . Ahead of the Second Congress of the Communist International, held in July through August 1920, Lenin sent out a number of documents, including his Twenty-one Conditions to all socialist parties. Congress adopted the 21 conditions as prerequisites for any group wanting to become affiliated with

1050-408: A formal international organization, they continued to maintain close relations with each other through a series of international forums. In the period directly after the Comintern's dissolution, periodical meetings of communist parties were held in Moscow. Moreover, World Marxist Review , a joint periodical of the communist parties, played an important role in coordinating the communist movement up to

1155-867: A higher proportion of the KPD Politburo membership had died in the Soviet Union than in Nazi Germany. Weitz also noted that hundreds of German citizens, most of them Communists, were handed over to the Gestapo by Stalin's administration. The Research Institutes 100 and 205 worked for the International and later were moved to the International Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of

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1260-456: A member of the small War Cabinet with the post of Minister without Portfolio on 9 December 1916. The other Labour representatives who joined Henderson in Lloyd George's coalition government were John Hodge , who became Minister of Labour , and George Barnes , who became Minister of Pensions . Henderson resigned on 11 August 1917 after his proposal for an international conference on the war

1365-548: A national network of constituency organisations. They operated separately from trade unions and the National Executive Committee and were open to everyone sympathetic to the party's policies. Secondly, Henderson secured the adoption of a comprehensive statement of party policies, as drafted by Sidney Webb . Entitled "Labour and the New Social Order," it remained the basic Labour platform until 1950. It proclaimed

1470-544: A policy of non-intervention , declaring on November 6 that the conflict was an imperialist war between various national ruling classes on both sides, much like World War I had been, and that the main culprits were Britain and France. This period only ended on 22 June 1941 with the invasion of the Soviet Union , when the Comintern changed its position to one of active support for the Allies . During these two years, many communists turned their backs on their Comintern sections, and

1575-644: A previous seat. Henderson spent the rest of his life trying to halt the gathering storm of World War II . He worked with the World League of Peace and chaired the Geneva Disarmament Conference , and in 1934 he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize . Henderson's Nobel Prize medal was stolen in a burglary of the office of the Lord Mayor of Newcastle on 3 April 2013. A man was subsequently jailed for

1680-468: A socialist party whose principles included a guaranteed minimum standard of living for everyone, nationalisation of industry, and heavy taxation of large incomes and of wealth. Henderson lost his seat in the "Coupon Election" of 14 December 1918 , which had been announced within twenty-four hours of the end of hostilities and which resulted in a landslide victory for a coalition formed by Lloyd George . Henderson returned to Parliament in 1919 after winning

1785-519: A transition stage to the complete abolition of the state". The Comintern was preceded by the dissolution of the Second International in 1916. Vladimir Lenin , Leon Trotsky , and Joseph Stalin were all honorary presidents of the Communist International. The Comintern held seven World Congresses in Moscow between 1919 and 1935. During that period, it also conducted thirteen Enlarged Plenums of its governing Executive Committee , which had much

1890-761: The 1923 insurrection . However, this proposal was rejected by the Politburo which was controlled by Stalin, Zinoviev, and Kamenev who decided to send a commission of lower-ranking Russian Communist party members. The dream of a world revolution was abandoned after the failures of the Spartacist uprising in Germany and of the Hungarian Soviet Republic and the failure of all revolutionary movements in Europe such as in Italy, where

1995-563: The Balfour Declaration , the Labour Party issued a statement in support of a Jewish state in Palestine . Henderson spoke in favor of a Jewish state. Henderson turned his attention to building a strong constituency-based support network for the Labour Party. Previously, it had little national organisation, based largely on branches of unions and socialist societies. Working with Ramsay MacDonald and Sidney Webb, Henderson in 1918 established

2100-610: The Chinese Communist Party and the Kuomintang were supported by the Comintern. However, after the definite break with Chiang Kai-shek in 1927, Joseph Stalin sent personal emissaries to help organize revolts which at this time failed. The Fourth World Congress was coincidentally held within days of the March on Rome by Benito Mussolini and his PNF in Italy . Karl Radek lamented

2205-536: The Communist Party of Poland in 1938). Above all, the Comintern exploited Soviet prestige in sharp contrast to the weaknesses of local parties that rarely had political power. Communist front organizations were set up to attract non-members who agreed with the party on certain specific points. Opposition to fascism was a common theme in the popular front era of the mid-1930s. The well-known names and prestige of artists, intellectuals and other fellow travelers were used to advance party positions. They often came to

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2310-672: The Far Eastern Bureau of the Communist International was established in Siberia to develop their political influence in the Far East . Soon after its establishment, the bureau's manager Grigori Voitinsky arrived in Peking and established contact with local communist vanguard Li Dazhao . Li arranged for Voitinsky to meet with another Communist leader, Chen Duxiu , in Shanghai and began to establish

2415-602: The Leadership of the Labour Party in protest. Henderson was elected to replace him. The two became enemies. In 1915, following Prime Minister H. H. Asquith 's decision to create a coalition government , Henderson became the first member of the Labour Party to become a member of the Cabinet, as President of the Board of Education . In 1916, David Lloyd George forced Asquith to resign and replaced him as Prime Minister. Henderson became

2520-461: The Liberal Party . The trades unions rejected his emphasis on arbitration and conciliation, and thwarted his goal of unifying the Labour Party and the trade unions. Arthur Henderson was born at 10 Paterson Street, Anderston , Glasgow , Scotland , in 1863, the son of Agnes, a domestic servant, and David Henderson, a textile worker who died when Arthur was ten years old. After his father's death,

2625-537: The Nazi government 's propaganda against the Soviet Union and the Comintern, a treaty of assistance was concluded between Germany and Japan in 1936, the Anti-Comintern Pact . In it, the two states agreed to fight the Comintern and assured each other that they would not sign any treaties with the Soviet Union that would contradict the anti-communist spirit of the agreement. However, this did not prevent Hitler from signing

2730-759: The Nazi-Soviet Pact with Stalin in August 1939, which in turn meant the end of the Popular Front policy and, in fact, that of the Comintern as well. The German-Soviet non-aggression treaty contained far-reaching agreements on spheres of interest , which the two totalitarian powers implemented over the next two years using military means. On 3 September 1939, France and the United Kingdom declared war on Germany after its invasion of Poland , beginning World War II in Europe . The Comintern sections now found themselves in

2835-636: The Paris Commune had been crushed by force of arms in 1871. The Bolsheviks believed that this required a new international to foment revolution in Europe and around the world. During this early period (1919–1924), known as the First Period in Comintern history, with the Bolshevik Revolution under attack in the Russian Civil War and a wave of revolutions across Europe , the Comintern's priority

2940-644: The Popular Front led by Manuel Azaña winning the 1936 election in Spain , and with Léon Blum 's 1936 election which led to the Popular Front government in France . Stalin's purges of the 1930s affected Comintern activists living in both the Soviet Union and overseas. At Stalin's direction, the Comintern was thoroughly infused with Soviet secret police and foreign intelligence operatives and informers working under Comintern guise. One of its leaders, Mikhail Trilisser , using

3045-770: The Second International dissolved in 1916. In 1917, after the February Revolution overthrew the Romanov Dynasty , Lenin published the April Theses which openly supported revolutionary defeatism , where the Bolsheviks hoped that Russia would lose the war so that they could quickly cause a socialist insurrection. The victory of the Russian Communist Party in the Bolshevik Revolution of November 1917

3150-634: The Soviet Union and Henderson guaranteed Britain's full support to the League of Nations . The Great Depression plunged the government into a terminal crisis. The Cabinet agreed that it was essential to maintain the Gold Standard and that the Budget needed to be balanced , but were divided over reducing unemployment benefits by 10%. At first, Henderson gave strong support to Prime Minister MacDonald throughout

3255-650: The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) and Unión General de Trabajadores (UGT). Although the communists opposed colonialism, the LSI were generally supportive of colonialism. For example, the participation of the British Independent Labour Party in the communist-sponsored League against Imperialism caused a controversy within LSI, and the ILP was asked to break its ties with the League. However,

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3360-480: The Third International , was an international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism , and which was led and controlled by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union . The Comintern resolved at its Second Congress in 1920 to "struggle by all available means, including armed force, for the overthrow of the international bourgeoisie and the creation of an international soviet republic as

3465-874: The fascist squadristi broke the strikes during the Biennio Rosso and quickly assumed power following the 1922 March on Rome . This period up to 1928 was known as the Second Period, mirroring the shift in the Soviet Union from war communism to the New Economic Policy . At the Fifth World Congress of the Comintern in July 1924, Zinoviev condemned both Marxist philosopher Georg Lukács 's History and Class Consciousness , published in 1923 after his involvement in Béla Kun 's Hungarian Soviet Republic , and Karl Korsch 's Marxism and Philosophy . Zinoviev himself

3570-402: The popular front against fascism . This policy argued that communist parties should seek to form a popular front with all parties that opposed fascism and not limit themselves to forming a united front with those parties based in the working class. There was no significant opposition to this policy within any of the national sections of the Comintern. It would have momentous consequences, with

3675-713: The 1919 Comintern founding congress. Trotsky, who was also marginalized and persecuted by Stalin, and other communists founded the Fourth International in 1938 as an oppositional alternative to the Stalin-dominated Comintern. In the years that followed, however, their sections rarely got beyond the status of the smallest cadre or splinter parties. Although the General Association of German Anti-Communist Associations had existed in Berlin since 1933 as part of

3780-473: The British Labour Party; Friedrich Adler and Otto Bauer , and Karl Renner of the Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ); Emile Vandervelde and Camille Huysmans of the Belgian Labour Party (BWP); and the émigré Russian Mensheviks Pavel Axelrod , Raphael Abramovitch , and Fyodor Dan , among others. The unity congress voted to establish itself as a new International under the name "Labour and Socialist International" (LSI). In marked difference from

3885-480: The British and Scandinavians became more influential within the LSI. Thus the space for socialist-Communist cooperation decreased. On 25 September 1934, the Comintern Executive issued a call for 'peace negotiations' between the two internationals, but the LSI rejected the offer. After the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War , the LSI and the International Federation of Trade Unions launched an 'Aid for Spain' campaign. The LSI/IFTU relief efforts were channelled through

3990-419: The Chairman of the Executive. Zinoviev was assisted by Angelica Balabanoff , acting as the secretary of the International, Victor L. Kibaltchitch and Vladmir Ossipovich Mazin. Lenin, Trotsky, and Alexandra Kollontai presented material. The main topic of discussion was the difference between bourgeois democracy and the dictatorship of the proletariat . The following parties and movements were invited to

4095-406: The Comintern China Branch, which evolved into the Communist Party of China in 1921. The Third Congress of the Communist International was held between 22 June–12 July 1921 in Moscow. The Fourth Congress, held in November 1922, at which Trotsky played a prominent role, continued in this vein. In 1924, the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party joined the Comintern. At first, in China, both

4200-427: The Comintern labelled Social Democracy as social fascists and urged aligned parties to work to their destruction as the 'moderate wing of fascism'. Especially with the rise of the National Socialist Workers' Party in Germany after the 1930 federal election , this stance gave rise to some opposition inside. The Sixth World Congress also revised the policy of united front in the colonial (colonized) countries. China

4305-413: The Comintern. It was a network made up of the communist parties of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, France, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Romania, the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia (led by Josip Broz Tito and expelled in June 1948). The Cominform was dissolved in 1956 following Stalin's 1953 death and the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union . While the communist parties of the world no longer had

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4410-402: The Communist movement, no preconditions were established for admission, nor was any binding policy program adopted. Instead the Hamburg Congress issued a manifesto stating that the new International "must grow naturally from the process through which Socialist parties get adapted to one another." Total agreement on fundamental principles was not expected "at the moment of its birth," but the desire

4515-426: The Communist parties. However, as the Comintern adopted a more conciliatory tone, the resistance of the LSI against forming such united fronts on the national level softened. Within the LSI, a north–south cleavage emerged, as the Mediterranean LSI parties built fronts with the Communists whilst the British and Scandinavian parties rejected the notion of cooperation with the communists. With the German party in disarray,

4620-403: The Czech, Bulgarian, Yugoslav, British, French, and Swiss Communist Groups; the Dutch Social-Democratic Group; Socialist Propaganda League and the Socialist Labor Party of America; Socialist Workers' Party of China; Korean Workers' Union, Turkestan, Turkish, Georgian, Azerbaijani, and Persian Sections of the Central Bureau of the Eastern Peoples, and the Zimmerwald Commission. Zinoviev served as

4725-420: The Founding Congress: Of these, the following attended (see list of delegates of the 1st Comintern congress ): the communist parties of Russia, Germany, German Austria, Hungary, Poland, Finland, Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania, Byelorussia, Estonia, Armenia, and the Volga German region; the Swedish Social Democratic Left Party (the opposition), Balkan Revolutionary People's of Russia; Zimmerwald Left Wing of France;

4830-423: The Hendersons moved to Newcastle upon Tyne in the North-East of England , where Agnes later married Robert Heath. Henderson worked at Robert Stephenson and Sons' General Foundry Works from the age of twelve. After finishing his apprenticeship there aged seventeen, he moved to Southampton for a year and then returned to work as an iron moulder (a type of foundryman ) in Newcastle upon Tyne. Henderson became

4935-420: The International. The 21 Conditions called for the demarcation between communist parties and other socialist groups and instructed the Comintern sections not to trust the legality of the bourgeois states. They also called for the build-up of party organizations along democratic centralist lines in which the party press and parliamentary factions would be under the direct control of the party leadership. Regarding

5040-405: The Labour Party officially repudiated the new National government. It expelled MacDonald and his supporters from the party. Henderson cast the only vote against the expulsions. Against his inclinations, Henderson accepted the leadership of the main Labour Party and led it into the general election on 27 October against the cross-party National coalition. It was a disastrous result for Labour, which

5145-418: The Russian Revolution now transmuted into dependency on Moscow and belief in Soviet infallibility. Depressing cycles of "internal rectification" began, disgracing and expelling successive leaderships, so that by the later 1920s many founding Communists had gone. This process of coordination, in a hard-faced drive for uniformity, was finalized at the next Congress of the Third International in 1928. The Comintern

5250-480: The Russian Tsar. There were exceptions, such as the socialist parties of the Balkans . To Vladimir Lenin 's surprise, even the Social Democratic Party of Germany voted in favor of war. After influential anti-war French Socialist Jean Jaurès was assassinated on 31 July 1914, the socialist parties hardened their support in France for their government of national unity . Socialist parties in neutral countries mostly supported neutrality, rather than totally opposing

5355-424: The Second International to call upon the international working class to resist war if it were declared. But after the beginning of World War I, many European socialist parties announced support for the war effort of their respective nations. Including the British Labour Party who issued a manifesto stating, "the victory of the Germans would mean the death of democracy in Europe" while making no such criticisms of

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5460-436: The Soviet Government had nothing to do with Comintern. I gave up co-editing a series of documents on Russo-American relations because my Russian colleague could not or would not get over that hurdle....Even today [2020], when the Russians are more liberal in their censorship of documentary publications, one has to verify where possible through other sources independent of Moscow. And although Comintern's archives are available on

5565-413: The Soviet Union , founded at roughly the same time that the Comintern was abolished in 1943, although its specific duties during the first several years of its existence are unknown. Following the June 1947 Paris Conference on Marshall Aid , Stalin gathered a grouping of key European communist parties in September and set up the Cominform , or Communist Information Bureau, often seen as a substitute to

5670-576: The Soviet Union for propaganda tours praising the future. Under the leadership of Zinoviev, the Comintern established fronts in many countries in the 1920s and after. To coordinate their activities, the Comintern set up international umbrella organizations linking groups across national borders, such as the Young Communist International (youth), Profintern (trade unions), Krestintern (peasants), International Red Aid (humanitarian aid), Sportintern (organized sports), and more. Front organizations were especially influential in France, which in 1933 became

5775-499: The Soviet Union were liquidated, and more than a thousand were handed over to Germany. Wolfgang Leonhard , who experienced this period in Moscow as a contemporary witness, wrote about it in his political autobiography, which was published in the 1950s: "The foreign communists living in the Soviet Union were particularly affected. In a few months, more functionaries of the Comintern apparatus were arrested than had been put together by all bourgeois governments in twenty years. Just listing

5880-493: The Workers' International (SFIO) and the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (USPD) to moderate reformists of the British Labour Party . The gathering was dominated by 80 delegates of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), including among its membership such esteemed leaders of the international socialist movement as Karl Kautsky , Eduard Bernstein , and Rudolf Hilferding . Other prominent figures in attendance included Arthur Henderson and Sidney Webb of

5985-421: The adhesion issue. The French Section of the Workers International (SFIO) thus broke away with the 1920 Tours Congress , leading to the creation of the new French Communist Party (initially called French Section of the Communist International – SFIC). The Communist Party of Spain was created in 1920, the Communist Party of Italy in 1921, the Belgian Communist Party in September 1921, and so on. In 1920,

6090-449: The base for communist front organizer Willi Münzenberg . These organizations were dissolved in the late 1930s or early 1940s. In 1928, the Ninth Plenum of the executive committee began the so-called Third Period , which was to last until 1935. The Comintern proclaimed that the capitalist system was entering the period of final collapse and therefore all communist parties were to adopt an aggressive and militant 'left' line. In particular,

6195-427: The break-up of the Eastern Bloc in 1989–1991. British historian Jonathan Haslam reports that even after in Moscow archives: all references to the Communist International and later the international department of the central committee, which drove the revolutionary side of foreign policy, were removed from published diplomatic documents, in order to fit in with the prevailing dogma established by Vladimir Lenin that

6300-455: The center and right — in the form of the Vienna International and the London International , respectively — to patch together their own joint international body. Planning for such a body began in January 1923, a month after the conclusion of the Comintern's 4th World Congress, with the Executive Committees of the Vienna and London groups issuing a joint statement condemning the Communists' decision. The two Executive Committees subsequently issued

6405-444: The colonies. Notably, some of the delegates opposed the idea of an alliance with the bourgeoisie and preferred giving support to communist movements in these countries instead. Their criticism was shared by the Indian revolutionary M. N. Roy , who attended as a delegate of the Mexican Communist Party . The Congress removed the term bourgeois-democratic in what became the 8th condition. Many European socialist parties were divided over

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6510-414: The declaration asked the member sections to approve: To dissolve the Communist International as a guiding centre of the international labor movement, releasing sections of the Communist International from the obligations ensuing from the constitution and decisions of the Congresses of the Communist International. After endorsements of the declaration were received from the member sections, the International

6615-407: The financial and political crisis of August. The financial crisis across Europe was worsening and Britain's gold reserves were at high risk. New York banks provided an emergency loan; but additional money was needed and to get it, the budget had to be balanced. MacDonald and Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Snowden proposed cuts in unemployment benefits. Henderson rejected that solution and became

6720-582: The first Chairman of the Comintern's executive committee from 1919 to 1926, but its dominant figure until his death in January 1924 was Lenin, whose strategy for revolution had been laid out in What Is to Be Done? (1902). The central policy of the Comintern under Lenin's leadership was that communist parties should be established across the world to aid the international proletarian revolution . The parties also shared his principle of democratic centralism (freedom of discussion, unity of action), namely that parties would make decisions democratically, but uphold in

6825-406: The formation of the General Federation of Trade Unions , as he was convinced that it would lead to more strikes. In 1900 Henderson was one of the 129 trade union and socialist delegates who passed Keir Hardie's motion to create the Labour Representation Committee (LRC). In 1903, Henderson was elected Treasurer of the LRC and was also elected as Member of Parliament (MP) for Barnard Castle at

6930-511: The leader of nearly half the Cabinet. The Labour Cabinet decided to resign. King George V implored MacDonald to remain and form an all-party National Government that would make the budget cuts. MacDonald agreed on 24 August 1931 and formed an emergency National Government , with members from all parties. The new cabinet had four Labourites (now called the " National Labour Organisation ") who stood with Macdonald, plus four Conservatives and two Liberals . Labour unions were strongly opposed and

7035-412: The left wing of the social democratic movement sought an international "union of the whole proletariat" through 1922. This initiative finally came to a close at the end of the year with the convocation of the 4th World Congress of the Comintern , which decisively rejected calls for a broad and inclusive international body. This rejection by the Communist wing of the international socialist movement left

7140-406: The morning. [...] Exactly 3 o'clock the car lights began to be seen [...] we stayed near the window and waited [to find out], where the car stopped". Among those persecuted were many KPD functionaries, such as members of the KPD Central Committee, who believed they had found safe asylum in the Soviet Union after Adolf Hitler's rise to power . Among them was Hugo Eberlein , who had been present at

7245-414: The most important sections and that other parties joining the International would have their own representatives. The Congress decided that the executive committee would elect a five-member bureau to run the daily affairs of the International. However, such a bureau was not formed and Lenin, Leon Trotsky , and Christian Rakovsky later delegated the task of managing the International to Grigory Zinoviev as

7350-444: The names would fill entire pages." Fritz Platten died in a labor camp and the leaders of the Indian ( Virendranath Chattopadhyaya or Chatto), Korean, Mexican, Iranian, and Turkish communist parties were executed. Out of 11 Mongolian Communist Party leaders, only Khorloogiin Choibalsan survived. Leopold Trepper recalled these days: "In house, where the party activists of all the countries were living, no-one slept until 3 o'clock in

7455-421: The old Second International , with supreme authority vested in the international congress, which could be convened at any time upon the demand of 10 or more affiliated parties, so long as these represented at least a quarter of the organization's voting strength. Governance between congresses was to be conducted by an executive committee, with its participants elected by the member parties. The executive committee

7560-445: The organization lost its political credibility and relevance. On 15 May 1943, a declaration of the executive committee was sent out to all sections of the International, calling for the dissolution of the Comintern. The declaration read: The historical role of the Communist International, organized in 1919 as a result of the political collapse of the overwhelming majority of the old pre-war workers' parties, consisted in that it preserved

7665-668: The other, considering the latter as an unreliable ally yet not a direct enemy. The Congress called on the Indian Communist Party to utilize the contradictions between the "national bourgeoisie" and the British Empire . The Seventh and last Congress of the Comintern was held between 25 July and 20 August 1935. It was attended by representatives of 65 communist parties. The main report was delivered by Dimitrov, other reports were delivered by Palmiro Togliatti , Wilhelm Pieck , and Dmitry Manuilsky . The Congress officially endorsed

7770-455: The outbreak of World War I was the catalyst for their separation. The Triple Alliance comprised two empires, while the Triple Entente was formed by three. Socialists had historically been anti-war and internationalist , fighting against what they perceived as militarist exploitation of the proletariat for bourgeois states. A majority of socialists voted in favor of resolutions for

7875-511: The party leadership. Worried about factionalism in the Labour Party, he published a pamphlet, Labour and the Nation , in which he attempted to clarify the party's goals. In 1929, Labour formed another minority government and MacDonald appointed Henderson as Foreign Secretary , a position Henderson used to try to reduce the tensions that had been building up in Europe since the end of the First World War . Diplomatic relations were re-established with

7980-577: The party line clear: "An internationalist is one who is ready to defend the USSR without reservation, without wavering, unconditionally; for the USSR it is the base of the world revolutionary movement, and this revolutionary movement cannot be defended and promoted without defending the USSR". According to Russian historian Vadim Rogovin , the leadership of the German Communist Party (KPD) had requested that Moscow send Leon Trotsky to Germany to direct

8085-425: The political situation in the colonized world, the Second Congress of the Communist International stipulated that a united front should be formed between the proletariat, peasantry, and national bourgeoisie in the colonial countries. Amongst the 21 conditions drafted by Lenin ahead of the congress was the 11th thesis which stipulated that all communist parties must support the bourgeois-democratic liberation movements in

8190-544: The politically suicidal situation of having to support, for example, the Soviet invasion and subsequent annexation of Eastern Poland . The Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov declared in an October 31 speech that "as far as the European great Powers are concerned, Germany is in the position of a State which is striving for the earliest termination of war and for peace, while Britain and France [...] are in favour of continuing

8295-520: The pressure for conformity. A new policy of "Bolshevization" was adopted, which dragooned the CPs toward stricter bureaucratic centralism. This flattened out the earlier diversity of radicalisms, welding them into a single approved model of Communist organization. Only then did the new parties retreat from broader Left arenas into their own belligerent world, even if many local cultures of broader cooperation persisted. Respect for Bolshevik achievements and defense of

8400-435: The proceedings in Italy as the "largest defeat suffered by socialism and communism since the beginning of the period of world revolution", and Zinoviev programmatically announced the similarities between fascism and social democracy, laying the groundwork for the later social fascism theory. Lenin died in 1924 and the next year saw a shift in the organization's focus from the immediate activity of world revolution towards

8505-679: The pseudonym Mikhail Aleksandrovich Moskvin, was in fact chief of the foreign department of the Soviet OGPU (later the NKVD ). Numerous Comintern officials were also targeted by the dictator and became victims of show trials and political persecution, such as Grigory Zinoviev and Nikolai Bukharin . At Stalin's orders, 133 out of 492 Comintern staff members became victims of the Great Purge . Several hundred German communists and antifascists who had either fled from Nazi Germany or were convinced to relocate in

8610-543: The same function as the somewhat larger and more grandiose Congresses. Joseph Stalin , leader of the Soviet Union, dissolved the Comintern in 1943 to avoid antagonizing his allies in the later years of World War II , the United States and the United Kingdom. It was succeeded by the Cominform in 1947. Differences between the revolutionary and reformist wings of the workers' movement had been increasing for decades, but

8715-883: The support of the LSI for colonialism was not complete. Regarding the Rif War , the second LSI congress, held in Marseille August 22–27, 1925, adopted a resolution calling for support of the independence of the Rif and urging the League of Nations to accept the Rif Republic as a member. = Bureau member Other executive members: International Women's Commission: Adelheid Popp (February 1924 – September 1935), Alice Pels (September 1935 – 1940) Socialist Youth International: Karl Heinz (February 1924 – October 1932), Erich Ollenhauer (October 1932 – 1940) Communist International The Communist International ( Comintern ), also known as

8820-463: The teachings of Marxism from vulgarisation and distortion by opportunist elements of the labor movement. But long before the war it became increasingly clear that, to the extent that the internal as well as the international situation of individual countries became more complicated, the solution of the problems of the labor movement of each individual country through the medium of some international centre would meet with insuperable obstacles. Concretely,

8925-522: The theft; the medal has never been recovered. Henderson died in 1935, aged 72, and was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium . All three of Henderson's sons saw military service during the Great War, the eldest, David, being killed in action in 1916 whilst serving as a Captain with the Middlesex Regiment (Duke of Cambridge's Own) . His surviving sons also became Labour politicians: second son William

9030-471: The war. On the other hand, during the 1915 Zimmerwald Conference , Lenin, then a Swiss resident refugee, organized an opposition to the " imperialist war" as the Zimmerwald Left , publishing the pamphlet Socialism and War where he called socialists collaborating with their national governments social chauvinists , i.e. socialists in word, but nationalists in deed. The Second International divided into

9135-402: The war." This position has been described as a way for the Soviet government to explain its refusal to honour proposals for economic assistance to Poland, which had been made before and at the start of the war, since "it was found impossible to determine with any degree of certainty who was the aggressor and who the victim." The weakened and decimated Comintern was then forced to officially adopt

9240-468: The web, most of it them are still closed to the reader, even though officially declassified, and much of it is in German only. One always has to ask, what has been cut out deliberately? Several international organizations were sponsored by the Comintern in this period: Arthur Henderson Arthur Henderson (13 September 1863 – 20 October 1935) was a British iron moulder and Labour politician . He

9345-717: The work of the Executive and its officers and arranging meetings of the Bureau and the executive committee. The first Executive Committee, elected by the 1923 Hamburg Congress, included Arthur Henderson of the British Labour Party as chairman, Harry Gosling of the British Labour Party as treasurer, with the Austrian Friedrich Adler and the Englishman Tom Shaw joining as members of the group's Secretariat. London

9450-483: Was unseated at the general election of 1923 . He returned to Parliament just two months later after winning another by-election in Burnley . In 1924, Henderson was appointed as Home Secretary in the first-ever Labour government , led by MacDonald. This government was defeated later the same year and lost the general election that followed . Having been re-elected in 1924, Henderson refused to challenge MacDonald for

9555-665: Was a failed coup in Estonia by the Communist Party of Estonia . The Comintern was founded at a Congress held in Moscow on 2–6 March 1919. It opened with a tribute to Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg , recently executed by the Freikorps during the Spartacist Uprising , against the backdrop of the Russian Civil War . There were 52 delegates present from 34 parties. They decided to form an Executive Committee with representatives of

9660-505: Was a relatively small organization, but it devised novel ways of controlling communist parties around the world. In many places, there was a communist subculture, founded upon indigenous left-wing traditions which had never been controlled by Moscow. The Comintern attempted to establish control over party leaderships by sending agents who bolstered certain factions, by judicious use of secret funding, by expelling independent-minded activists and even by closing down entire national parties (such as

9765-464: Was chosen as the seat of the executive committee. The LSI functioned as a continuation of the Second International , and was often referred to as the "Second International" by the Comintern. The Social Democratic Party of Germany was the dominant party within the LSI. The rise of Nazism in Germany increased pressure on the LSI and Comintern to cooperate. On 19 February 1933, the LSI Bureau issued

9870-586: Was considered to be one of such countries. However, in 1927, the Kuomintang turned on the Chinese Communist Party , which led to a review of the policy on forming alliances with the 'national bourgeoisie' in the 'colonizal countries'. The Congress did make a differentiation between the character of the Chinese Kuomintang on one hand and the Indian Swaraj Party and the Egyptian Wafd Party on

9975-509: Was dismissed in 1926 after falling out of favor with Stalin. Bukharin then led the Comintern for two years until 1928, when he too fell out with Stalin. Bulgarian communist leader Georgi Dimitrov headed the Comintern in 1934 and presided until its dissolution. Geoff Eley summed up the change in attitude at this time as follows: By the Fifth Comintern Congress in July 1924 [...] the collapse of Communist support in Europe tightened

10080-472: Was dissolved. The dissolution was interpreted as Stalin wishing to calm his World War II allies (particularly Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill ) and to keep them from suspecting the Soviet Union of pursuing a policy of trying to foment revolution in other countries. According to historian Eric D. Weitz , 60% of German exiles in the Soviet Union had been liquidated during the Stalinist terror and

10185-620: Was exporting the October Revolution. Some communist parties had secret military wings. One example is the M-Apparat of the Communist Party of Germany . The Comintern was involved in the revolutions across Europe in this period, starting with the Hungarian Soviet Republic in 1919. Several hundred agitators and financial aid were sent from the Soviet Union and Lenin was in regular contact with its leader Béla Kun . The next attempt

10290-431: Was felt throughout the world and an alternative path to power to parliamentary politics was demonstrated. With much of Europe on the verge of economic and political collapse in the aftermath of the carnage of World War I, revolutionary sentiments were widespread. The Russian Bolsheviks headed by Lenin believed that unless socialist revolution swept Europe, they would be crushed by the military might of world capitalism just as

10395-435: Was given the power to elect its own chair and other officers, to determine the location for its central office, and to elect a 9-member Bureau for prior consideration of matters of concern in advance of meetings of the full Executive Committee. The executive committee was additionally to establish a 6-member special committee of local members residing at or near the seat of the committee, who were to be responsible for supervising

10500-496: Was made at the time of the Ruhr crisis in spring and then again in selected parts of Germany in the autumn of 1923. The Red Army was mobilized, ready to come to the aid of the planned insurrection. Resolute action by the German government cancelled the plans, except due to miscommunication in Hamburg, where 200–300 communists attacked police stations, but were quickly defeated. In 1924, there

10605-526: Was reduced to a small minority of 52. Yet again Henderson lost his seat, at Burnley. The following year, he relinquished the party leadership. Henderson returned to Parliament after winning a by-election at Clay Cross , achieving the unique feat of being elected five times at by-elections in constituencies where he had not previously been the MP. He holds the record for the greatest number of comebacks from losing

10710-631: Was rejected by the rest of the Cabinet. The Labour National Executive Committee had rejected the Second International 's request for a meeting of European socialist parties on the war in Stockholm , but after Henderson convinced it to give provisional support after visiting the Russian Republic as an envoy and recognizing that the Russian Provisional Government would collapse if the war continued. In August 1917, three months before

10815-630: Was the March Action in Germany in 1921, including an attempt to dynamite the express train from Halle to Leipzig. After this failed, the Communist Party of Germany expelled its former chairman Paul Levi from the party for publicly criticizing the March Action in a pamphlet, which was ratified by the Executive Committee of the Communist International prior to the Third Congress. A new attempt

10920-413: Was the first Labour cabinet minister, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1934 and, uniquely, served three separate terms as Leader of the Labour Party in three different decades. He was popular among his colleagues, who called him "Uncle Arthur" in acknowledgement of his integrity, his devotion to the cause and his imperturbability. He was a transitional figure whose policies were, at first, close to those of

11025-404: Was voiced that establishment of the new international body would over time serve as "one of the most important conditions for the harmonizing of their views." The LSI was to remain a federation of fully independent and autonomous political parties — groups which were freely allowed under organizational statutes to determine their own internal policies and programs. The organization was modeled upon

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