International

International primarily describes the union of workers' organizations from different countries that are ideologically shaped by socialist , communist or anarchist goals. Best known today is the partly social-democratic , partly socialist Socialist International .

In a figurative sense, the term is also used for other international phenomena, such as “blue international” for the European aristocracy or “golden international” for global finance capital .

Origin and meaning

The term international is derived from the abbreviation of the International Workers' Association (IAA), founded in 1864 , which is also known as the First International . The basic idea of such an unification stems from the demand “Proletarians of all countries, unite!” , Which was anchored in the Communist Manifesto in 1848 by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels . This appeal was addressed to all revolutionary socialist workers' parties and organizations that profess internationalism . The international anthem of the socialist workers' movement, the International, was intended to strengthen this bond.

The individual directions

First International

The First International or International Workers' Association (IAA) was founded in 1864 by English trade unionists and French emigrants in London . Karl Marx was invited as a member of the provisional organizing committee and had a decisive influence on its course. It was stressed that liberation from oppression "should be the work of the workers themselves" with the aim of eliminating any kind of class society. There were endless discussions between Marx, the French followers of Proudhon, and the followers of Bakunin . The International did not survive the failure of the Paris Commune in 1871 and was finally dissolved in 1876 . The reason for the failure lay in the insoluble conflict between Karl Marx as a representative of communism and Mikhail Bakunin as a representative of anarchism .

Second (Socialist) International

The Second International or Socialist International was founded in Paris in 1889 . It dissolved at the beginning of the First World War , as its parties had come to terms with their belligerent government (see Burgfrieden ). A re-establishment after the war was postponed due to the establishment of the Third International (= Comintern) by Lenin at the request of the Austrian SDAP ( Friedrich Adler ). At that time, European social democracy denied the anarchists access to the Second International, even though they were still among the strongest factions of the labor movement during the First International.

In the 1920s there were various attempts to revive the Second International as an alternative to the Comintern. This initially included the International Working Group of Socialist Parties (= Two and a Half International ). It represents the attempt under the direction of the Austrian Friedrich Adler to reunite the workers 'movement that had drifted apart with the founding of the Third International within the framework of the integral socialism propagated by the deputy chairman and chief ideologist of the Austrian Social Democratic Workers' Party (SDAP) Otto Bauer . When this attempt failed at the preliminary conference in Berlin in April 1922, the working group dissolved, joined the remaining remnants of the Second International and together with it founded the Socialist Workers' International on May 21, 1923 in Hamburg as an association of those parties that had not joined the Third International.

The Socialist Workers' International went under in the course of the Second World War, in the course of which the mass of socialist parties in Europe was smashed.

Third (Communist) International

The Third International or the Communist International (= Comintern ) was founded in Moscow in 1919 . The breaking of the resolutions of the Conference of the 2nd International 1913 (to answer a future war between the countries with a war between the classes) and the support of the war course of the respective member parties represented the political break of the 2nd International with the traditions of the labor movement ( International solidarity). In the course of the violent appropriation of the means of production by the workers and the establishment of their own interest organs (militias, councils) in many countries (Russia, Germany, Italy, Austria-Hungary, etc.), the left socialists concluded that now was the The time has come to build a new international.

Parallel to the Comintern, the Red Trade Union International was founded in Moscow in 1921 .

The defeat of the revolutionary movements in many countries and the resulting political and economic isolation of the Russian October Revolution led to the adjustment of the CPSU under Stalin, in the course of which the position of an international revolution was abandoned, and in 1943 to the dissolution of the Comintern, not least out of consideration for the allied powers Great Britain and the USA; this was rebuilt (or converted) in a new form in 1947 as Cominform (Communist Information Office), which was then finally dissolved in 1957 as a result of the de-Stalinization .

After the dissolution of the Cominform, the world communist movement organized itself through international conferences, among other things. For example at the International Meetings of Communist and Workers' Parties in 1960 and 1969 . Since 1998, the International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties has once again been a continuously operating international organization of communist parties .

Fourth international

The Fourth International , founded in 1938, was the reaction to Stalinism initiated by Leon Trotsky . Before the Moscow trials she had a certain influence on the left opposition within the CPSU and also led a partially successful struggle against the Stalinist bureaucracy and for the maintenance of Marxist principles in the KPD .

The first major split occurred shortly after the violent death of Trotsky, as in 1941 in the great American US section, Socialist Workers Party (SWP), no agreement on the attitude of the current leadership of the Soviet Union and to the methods of dialectical materialism was achieved . It is speculated that the SWP was permeated by numerous Russian and US agents who contributed to the dissent. Further divisions led to several organizations now viewing themselves as the Fourth International or wanting to establish a new one. These divisions and the low political weight of its sub-organizations have minimized the importance of the organization.

The newly founded Socialist International

The Socialist International (SI), which has existed to the present day, was founded on June 30, 1951 in Frankfurt am Main with the aim of reviving the tradition of the Second International . It currently comprises 168 parties with different orientations (social democratic, socialist and reform communist parties). To distinguish it from the Marxist Third and Trotskyist Fourth Internationals, it is rarely referred to as the Fifth International.

Other groups and projects

The International Association of the Communist Opposition consisted of parties that had split off from the Third International due to the ultra-left political change of the Comintern in 1928. It existed from 1930 to 1939.

The London office existed between 1932 and 1940 and was an amalgamation of (partially exiled) left-wing socialist and independent communist parties and groups that stood ideologically between the two major internationals.

Anarchists: After the fall of the First International, there were some amalgamations of anarchist groups on the international level. The anarcho-syndicalist IAA , founded in 1922, had a mass base in countries like Spain and Argentina in the 1920s and 1930s that no longer exist today. In 1968 the International of Anarchist Federations was founded, referring to the anti-authoritarian International (1872).

In April 2003 the Trotskyist “League for a Revolutionary Communist International” was renamed the “League for the 5th International” . Building on the criticism of the previous four formal Internationals, which are described as degenerate and centrist, it calls for the creation of a new International to overcome the leadership crisis of the proletariat. The LFI has u. a. Sections in Germany , Austria , Great Britain and Pakistan.

Party alliances and organizations

Other international party alliances such as B. the Liberal International , the Humanist International , the International Democratic Union or the Christian Democratic International (IDC-CDI) back to this term. You can also find it with the Situationist International , with the agrarian parties as the “Green International” or with extra-parliamentary groups such as the Hedonist International .

Web links

Party and organizational alliances

Individual evidence

↑ See http://www.fifthinternational.org/

[1] See http://www.fifthinternational.org/