Social Democratic Federation

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SDF election campaign leaflet from 1896

The Social Democratic Federation (SDF) was the first socialist party in the United Kingdom . It was founded in 1881 as the Democratic Federation , was temporarily a member of the Labor Party and in 1911 was absorbed into the British Socialist Party .

history

The Social Democratic Federation emerged from its direct predecessor organization, the Democratic Federation . The background to the founding of the first socialist party in Great Britain was an incipient alienation between liberals and trade unionists or other representatives of the labor movement . In Great Britain, the Liberal Party was the political platform through which workers' representatives were elected to the lower house and regional parliaments well into the 20th century.

In 1880 Henry Hyndman decided to found a new political party. Hyndman had previously tried unsuccessfully to move into the House of Commons as an independent candidate. In the meantime he read some of Karl Marx's writings and began to be more and more enthusiastic about socialist ideas. The Democratic Federation was finally founded in 1881 and was a reservoir for socialists but also for representatives of radicalism , who no longer found a political home with the liberals.

In 1884 the party was finally renamed the Social Democratic Federation and got a stronger socialist-Marxist profile, or what the often authoritarian Chairman Hyndman thought it was. The SDF was quickly able to accept a number of prominent personalities as members, for example William Morris , Eleanor Marx Aveling , Edward Aveling or George Lansbury . Friedrich Engels, however, remained skeptical. With the name change, the weekly Justice was launched as the party's central organ . In the course of its existence, the newspaper also gained outright skeptics and opponents of the party and its chairman Hyndman as authors, such as Eduard Bernstein .

cleavage

When the SDF split on December 23, 1884 due to political differences, but mainly because of various irregularities around Henry Hyndman, Engels wrote to Friedrich Adolph Sorge on December 31 : The Democratic Federation here was blown up on Saturday. The adventurer Hyndman, who had taken over the whole thing, was exposed as a hater of the members among themselves, concealer of correspondence for the council, and founder of bogus branches in the provinces to accommodate his creatures in the conferences and congresses. He received a vote of no confidence, but the majority resigned, mainly because the whole organization was just a hoax . Above all, Engels had a deep rejection of the person of party chairman Hyndman, whom he shared with Karl Marx, who, however, had died in 1883.

After the split in 1884 and fierce disputes, a split from Hyndman opponents called the Socialist League was founded , but it had a significantly shorter lifespan than the SDF.

Alignment

The SDF's character became increasingly sectarian. On the part of the trade unions, she was often accused of having little regard for economic disputes and of relying too heavily on a parliamentary route. SDF politicians often sharply attacked trade union representatives who rarely shared socialist ideas. Nonetheless, in the run-up to the establishment of the Labor Representation Committee , the SDF also approached other left-wing and trade union organizations in Great Britain. Together with the Independent Labor Party , whose character was more that of an open collection movement; With the Fabian Society , an association of left reformist intellectuals and the traditionally strong trade unions in Great Britain, the SDF met on February 27, 1900 at the founding conference of the Labor Representation Committee, the forerunner of the Labor Party, in London's Memorial Hall and formed the first of platform for the parliamentary politics of representatives of the labor movement, independent of the liberals.

Under Hyndman's leadership, the SDF continued its sectarian course in the LRC. The historian Ralph Miliband believed that the Fabians, the ILP and the trade unionists found it easier to deal with the liberals, from whom they formally distanced themselves with the establishment of the LRC, than with the SDF. At the founding conference, the SDF already called for an explicit socialist characteristic of the LRC. In an application text it was said to align the organization: [...] a party organization separate from the capitalist parties based upon a regognition of the class war, and having for its ultimate object the socialization of the means of production, distribution, and exchange . Such demands met with strong resistance, especially from the trade unions, while the likewise socialist ILP, in the sense of a broad alliance, warned against too sharp commitments to socialism. After years of ideological conflict between the majority in the alliance and the SDF, the party left the organization, which was now known as the Labor Party, in 1907.

Dissolution and successor parties

In 1911 the SDF was finally absorbed into a new party called the British Socialist Party. This alliance was founded by socialists and trade unionists who were dissatisfied with the work of the Labor Party, which still had very few lower house seats. The BSP finally broke up in 1914 over the war question. Hyndman, who advocated a nationalist and war-affirming course, then founded the National Socialist Party . From 1919 to 1939 an SDF existed again after the National Socialist Party had disbanded, but was meaningless.

Known members

Footnotes

  1. ↑ MEW 36, p. 264f.
  2. ↑ Ralph Miliband: Parliamentary Socialism. A Study of the Politics of Labor. P. 20
  3. ^ Labor Party Annual Conference Reports 1900, p. 11

Bibliography

  • Graham Johnson: Social Democratic Politics in Britain, 1881-1911. Lewiston 2002
  • Ralph Miliband : Parliamentary Socialism. A Study of the Politics of Labor. London 1972 (2nd edition)

Web links

Commons : Social Democratic Federation  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files