Anti-Authoritarian International

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Place of foundation of the Anti-Authoritarian International : Hôtel de la maison de Ville in Saint-Imier . The hostel was later renamed the Hôtel Central and gutted in the 2000s .

The anti-authoritarian international (also Saint-Imier Internationale ) is unofficially the union of anti-authoritarian and collectivist sections and federations of the International Workers' Association (IAA). After the controversial congress of the International in The Hague , it was formed at an international counter-congress in the Swiss Jura on 15/16. September 1872.

The Anti-Authoritarian International initially comprised all active national federations of the International and thus regarded itself as a legitimate IAA, in contrast to the General Council and individual local sections of the IAA, which also claimed to be the IAA. In fact, it ceased to exist in 1878 after calls for an all-socialist international became louder and its most active federation in the Swiss Jura was in decline.

history

Division of the International

After the adoption of the IX. Resolution at the secret London conference of the International of 1871, which demanded the formation of national workers' parties , arose opposition to the General Council around Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels , which was accused of arbitrarily putting an end to flow pluralism within the International with this decision. At the Ordinary Congress of the International in The Hague in 1872, a majority of delegates consisting of many members of the General Council, delegates loyal to the General Council with German mandates and Blanquists passed further controversial resolutions. The General Council was given more power, allowing entire federations to be excluded from the International, and members Michail Bakunin and James Guillaume were excluded from the International.

These resolutions were subsequently annulled by all regional federations of the International at their respective congresses. The reason for this was that the majority of the congress participants did not represent any sections of the International and that the decisions therefore did not correspond to the will of the members of the International. The conflict split the International into one part with the General Council of the International at its head, which supported the decisions of London and The Hague, and another part around the national federations of Italy , Spain , France , Belgium , Holland , England , the USA and the United States Swiss Jura who rejected these decisions. Both parts saw themselves as the legitimate International Workers' Association and continued to run it separately in their own way.

The Anti-Authoritarian International

The Bulletin de la Fédération jurassienne became the organ of the anti-authoritarian international

The Anti-Authoritarian International was formed two weeks after the Hague Congress (5th Congress) of the International when 15 delegates from Spain, Italy, France, the USA and Switzerland were present in Saint-Imier. The anti-authoritarian part of the International should include all sections and members who advocate a strengthened federal organization of the International. At the counter-congress, the delegates unanimously decided to destroy all structures of power and to use anarchy as the goal and the means to achieve this, the revolutionary strike. However, since not all national federations were present at the founding congress, this point was later rejected by the British and American federations, which considered the influence of the workers on politics to be necessary. It was agreed that the International - as before - could not dictate to the national sections which strategy they had to pursue in the struggle for the emancipation of the workers, and they spoke out in favor of flow pluralism within the International. After the Congress, the federations of Belgium, England, Spain and the Jura Federation were excluded from the International by the new General Council in New York ; the Italian federation was not recognized at all. This step was not taken seriously by the affected federations and led to a further isolation of the General Council.

At the first congress to Saint Imier, who was named VI. Congress of the IAA, held in Geneva in 1873, was attended by delegates from the federations of England, Belgium, Spain, Holland, Italy, Switzerland and France. In a first resolution, the delegates decided to abolish the General Council and partially restored the statutes of 1866. In general, the revision of the statutes was the largest and most important part of the congress. The autonomy of the federations and sections was strengthened by making all resolutions binding only to the approving federations or sections. Every year a different regional federation should take over the federal office of the International and be charged with correspondence, statistics and the organization of the next congress. So that similar incidents like the Hague Congress could not be repeated, it was decided that voting could only be on administrative issues and no longer on questions of principle. Finally, on the last day of the congress, the congress delegates sent a conciliatory address to the congress of the General Council, which was also to hold its congress two days later in Geneva.

In fact, due to the political situation, only congresses in Switzerland and Belgium were possible in the following years, and a planned congress in Barcelona in 1875 had to be canceled. The year before, August Reinsdorf was the first German delegate to take part in a congress of the anti-authoritarian international.

Delegates from the federations of Italy, France, Germany , Greece , Egypt , the Swiss Jura and the Walloon part of Belgium took part in the last congress in Verviers in 1877 . The Belgian federation tried to cooperate with other socialist forces and strove to build an all-socialist organization. After the Verviers Congress, the anti-authoritarian International virtually ceased to exist, because the next planned Congress of 1878 in Belgium was no longer held. The end was hastened by the decline of the most active federation in the Jura.

Congresses

  • 1-6 September 1873: Geneva ; VI. congress
  • 7-12 September 1874: Brussels ; VII Congress
  • 26.-29. September 1876: Bern ; VIII Congress
  • 6-8 September 1877: Verviers ; IX. congress

literature

  • Marianne Enckell: La fédération jurassienne , Âge d'Homme, Lausanne, 1971 (new editions: Canevas Editeur, Saint-Imier 1991, ISBN 2-88382-008-2 ; Entremonde, Geneva, 2012, ISBN 978-2-940426-16- 4 ).
  • James Guillaume: L'Internationale. Documents et souvenirs , Paris 1910.
  • Max Nettlau : History of Anarchy , Berlin 1927.

Web links