Marxism & the Socialist Movement

1. Marxism & the Socialist Movement

2. Appealed to large numbers of workingmen in the late 19th century. Growth after 1871 phenomenal. • Socialist political parties sprang up in most European countries. • Linked together in an international organization. • Marx urged proletariat to ignore international borders. Concluded that revolution follows economic crisis in his masterpiece, Das Kapital (1867)

3. 1864, played an important role in founding the First International. Used its meeting to spread his own work. • Embraced the Paris Commune as a step in the right direction. Frightened many of his early supporters. The First International collapsed. • 1889, founded Second International, which lasted until 1914. Met every three years to interpret Marxist doctrine and plan coordinated action. • May 1st was declared an annual international one-day strike.

4. Unions and Revisionism • Militantly moderate; radical rhetoric, sober action. • Workers less inclined to follow radical programs. • As they gained the right to vote they focused more on elections. • Not immune to patriotic education and indoctrination from military service. • Standard of living for workers rose.

5. Unions • Unions at first considered to be subversive organizations that had to be outlawed in most countries. • In GB, unions won right to exist in 1824. Focused on winning higher wages and better hours through collective bargaining and compromise. Paved the way for 1870 ruling that they could strike without being held legally liable for the financial damage inflicted on emplyers.

6. Germany was the most industrialized, socialized, and unionized continental country by 1914. • After antisocialist law repealed in 1890 and government harassment ceased, membership skyrocketed to 3 million workers (out of 8 million). • Gradual improvement, not revolution, became the goal of many German socialist organizations.

7. Revisionism • Attempt to update Marxian doctrines to reflect the realities of the time. • Edward Bernstein (1850-1932) argued in Evolutionary Socialism Marx’s predictions of ever-greater poverty for workers & ever-greater concentration of wealth in ever-fewer hands had proved false. • Should combine with other progressive forces to win gradual economic gains through legislation and unions.

8. Socialist Parties before 1914 • Russia & Austria-Hungary: most radical • Germany: talked revolution practiced reformism • France: talked revolution, tried to practice it, unrestrained by a trade-union movement that was both weak and radical. • England: gradual reform • Spain & Italy: Marxian socialism weak, anarchism strong.