A valuable summary of the trade union work of the Internationals, from the time of Marx and Bakunin, to that of Amsterdam and the Profintern.

‘Twenty-Five Years of the International Trade Union Movement’ by A. Lyss from Workers Monthly. Vol. 5 No. 13. November, 1926.

ΟN the twenty-first of August, 1901, there was held at Copenhagen a conference of the secretaries of the trade union centers of a number of countries. At this conference an “International Secretariat” was elected and it was decided regularly to convene conferences of the representatives of the various national trade union organizations. Up to 1913 eight such conferences had been called, one and later of two years apart.

But the year 1901 was only formally the date of the formation of the international trade union center. Attempts to consolidate the trade unions and labor organizations had already been made before the Copenhagen conference. The First International organized in 1866 [sic] and baptized by Karl Marx saw the trade unions and their international unification as one of the most important tasks of the labor movement. In the resolution of the First Congress referring to this question we find: “If the trade unions are necessary for the everyday struggle between labor and capital, they are all the more necessary as an organizational means for the overthrow of the wages system and the rule of capital.” Concerning the necessity for the international solidarity of the working class it is said further: “Hitherto all the great aims of the working class have been shattered through the insufficient solidarity of the workers of the various branches of industry in the same country and through the lack of unity of the working classes of the various countries. The emancipation of the workers is no local or national problem but it is a problem involving all countries.”

Accordingly, therefore, the First International, thirty-five years before the Copenhagen conference established quite clearly and unequivocally the class character of the trade union movement and the necessity for the international consolidation of the working class.

***

FROM the first congress of the International to the present day the history of the international socialist movement has been a struggle between Marxism on the one hand and anarchism and reformism on the other. This struggle greatly furthered the international trade union movement and helped it assume definite form, ideologically and organizationally.

Up to 1872 (Hague Congress) the struggle was against Bakuninism; it ended with the expulsion of Bakunin and his adherents from the First International–which of course, strengthened the socialist wing thru restricting the influence of the Bakuninists to a few industrially backward Latin countries of Europe. But the final ideological and organizational separation of the two wings of the labor movement was not accomplished until the Zurich (1893) and London (1896) Congresses of the Second International.1

After the collapse of the First International and the organization of the Second a number of international conferences took place in which the trade unions eagerly participated. At the conference in Paris in 1883 there were present the representatives of the English trade unions while the conference called by the Paris trade unions on the occasion of the “First International Industrial Exposition” was attended by delegates of the English and French trade unions as well as by the representatives of the workers’ parties.

This period was signalized by the sharp three-sided struggle between the “Possibilists,” the English trade unions who were quite satisfied with a few crumbs, and the socialist wing of the labor movement.

The result of this struggle was that the English decided to break with the revolutionary wing which found its chief support in the political parties. The English Trade Union Congress at Southsea (September 11, 1887) instructed its parliamentary committee to call a conference for the next year from which the political leaders would be excluded so that the conference would be made up only of delegates elected by the trade union membership and sent at their expense.

The congress of 1888 was, therefore, actually the first attempt (after the conferences of 1883 and 1886 at which, as we have said, representatives of trade unions participated) at an international consolidation of the trade unions. When the question of international unity was considered the English (trade unionists) proposed to create an organization of a purely trade union character. From the English point of view this signified a strict separation from the general political tasks of the labor movement and the turning aside of the trade union movement into the strictly practical channels of English trade unionism. Since the socialists were in a majority at this congress the English failed to carry thru their proposal. But the ultra-lefts (the French) also suffered a defeat. Their proposal to fight for an eight-hour day by means of general strike was also defeated.

The next international trade union congress was called for 1889. But since the struggle between the Marxists and the Possibilists had already reached the climax, there took place–in spite of a preliminary conference–two parallel congresses of Marxists and of Possibilists, with the English trade unions attending the latter.

In 1896 the Second International called an “International Labor and Trade Union Congress” for London. Among the 475 delegates to this congress 185 were representatives of the English trade unions. The congress was characterized by a unity of the political and trade union struggle of the working class that did not please the English trade unions very much.

After a number of other attempts to organize the trade unions internationally, the corner stone was finally laid in 1901 thru the creation of an “International Secretariat” of trade unions, with Karl Legien, the chairman of the German Trades Union Federation, as secretary, a position he maintained until 1919. We must remember, however, that the beginnings of international trade union organization go back much further and that, to a certain extent, 1901 was only formally a beginning.

The period up to 1901 is divided into two parts. The years from 1866 to 1901 are characterized by the recognition of the unity of the political and the trade union struggle. The first portion of this period–up to the founding of the Second International (1889)–was marked by a passionate ideological struggle for the crystallization of the class aims of the labor movement, by the struggle of revolutionary Marxism against Bakuninism and Anarchism and against the right wing–the reformists, the possibilists, the trade unionists.

The second part of this period already begins to bear within itself–almost from the time of the founding of the Second International–seeds of opportunism and compromise that came to expression, on the one hand, in the concessions to its own right wing (Paris Congress in 1900 approves the entrance of French socialist in the bourgeois government) and, on the other, in its impotence in the face of the saber-shaking Imperialism (lack of a concrete program in the matter of the struggle against war, for example).

Of course the struggle of political tendencies did not remain without influence on the trade unions. Whereas in the period of the First International, including the congress in 1888, the English trade union methods–compromising trade unionism–found no favor among the majority of the representatives of socialist and trade union organizations, in the time of the Second International, however, the trade union movement of many countries, England, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Scandinavia, began to approach closer and closer to opportunism.

***

IN the twenty years between 1890 and 1910 Imperialism flourished as never before–and ended in the World War. For a number of European states (especially for Germany since the 90’s) this period was a time of quick economic advance. Capitalism developed the technical and economic possibilities to the limit–and gave a number of concessions to the workers. The situation of the working class in this period–particularly in Germany, which was now in the front rank–was marked by the possibility for better conditions of labor, better wages, and an organizational strengthening of the trade unions.

The growth in membership of the class trade unions affiliated to the “International Secretariat” from 1904 to 1914 is shown in the following table:

1904: 2,477,000
1905: 2,949,000
1906: 3,665,000
1907: 4,097,000
1908: 4,238,000
1909: 5,808,000
1910: 6,119,000
1911: 6,900,000
1912: 7,383,000
1913: 7,702,000

The total number of organized workers in 30 countries amounted (according to the figures supplied by the International Labor Office) in 1906, to 9,534,000; in 1913, to 16,152,000.

In comparison with the former decade the tempo of growth of the trade unions increased considerably.

The following table gives us some data on the increase of wages (the average wage for the period of 1901 to 1910 is taken as 100.2

According to the same figures for the period of 1906 to 1913 the real wages are only a trifle lower in England and France.

The general rise in nominal wages, particularly in the last decade of the nineteenth century, is remarkable because the real wages rose at the same time, beginning to sink gradually only in the first decade of the twentieth century.

This situation put its mark upon the policy and activity of the trade unions. Compare the strike wave of 1917-1926 with the strike movements of 1890 to 1917 or indeed with the first fifteen years of the 20th century (1900-1914). We must admit that, with the exception of Russia (1905-1907) and isolated spontaneous risings in the last years before the war (Russia 1912-1914, England 1911-1912), the number of strike is relatively insignificant, the curve of strikes continued without any serious disturbance, the number of participants in strikes showed no great variations. At any rate, there certainly can be no comparison between the period before 1917 and the stormy strike wave during the post-war years.

It is, of course, true that strikes are not the only criterion of the intensity of the struggle of the working-class; yet strikes have always been and remain the most powerful weapon of the trade unions for the crystalization of the class position of the workers and for their economic struggle against capitalism. The ebb in the strike wave towards the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century (except for a few countries) can be explained thru the fact that capitalism, in its period of upward development, was able to concede higher wages to the workers. It was precisely at this time that there arose the notorious theory, created primarily by the German reformists, that the working class must adjust its class policy to the boom and crisis periods of capitalism. In the time of economic advance increased economic demands must be put forward; in the period of crisis we must necessarily agree to a lowering of wages and to a worsening of the other conditions of labor. Thus was laid the basis for the class collaboration and class peace which characterize modern reformism in the trade unions.

Such were the economic conditions of the period in which the international center of the trade union movement was formed and began to develop. The dominating role of the Germans in forming and in leading the international trade union center until 1913 was determined by historic conditions (active participation of the Germans in the struggle for the Socialist International) as well as by the economic advance of Germany which had considerable influence on the trade unions and placed them in the front rank in regard to organization and to improved conditions of labor.

At the end of the 90’s of the last century the French labor movement had not yet recovered from the consequences of the France-Prussian war and from the defeat of the proletariat thru the overthrow of the Paris Commune.

Again, England’s position of monopoly was beginning to be undermined in the last quarter of the nineteenth century by the competition of now countries, particularly Germany. In the English working class a certain fermentation began to manifest itself which, though not strong enough to exercise a revolutionary influence upon the international center, was yet in a position to change the conservative orientation of the trade unions in England itself.

Germany, towards the end of the 90’s and the beginning of the new century, was marked by the victory of reformism over the left minority. This victory had great influence upon the policy of the trade unions and soon the right leaders began to exercise pressure upon the party.

***

IN the thirteen years up to the world war the International Secretariat (renamed, in 1913 at the Zurich conference, “The International Federation of Trade Unions”) did not succeed in becoming a real fighting union of the international trade union movement. In fact the International Secretariat did not really attempt an actual militant consolidation of the trade unions. Its tasks, as laid down in a number of conferences, consisted chiefly in information, in the organization of “uniform statistics,” in mutual aid, etc. The international conferences declined to investigate “theoretical and other tendencies or the tactics of the trade union movements of the individual countries.”

Already before the war this conservative leading center was opposed by revolutionary minorities in many countries. In Germany the minority was allied with the Marxist minority of the Socialist-Democratic Party. In France, there arose within the C.G.T. that was steadily going to the right a revolutionary-syndicalist minority leaping ideologically in a Marxist direction, etc.

The World War and the collapse of the Second International that followed tore the frail ties uniting the international trade union movement. With the outbreak of the war not only did the center of the world trade union movement cease to exist but it also became clear that this center and the organizations affiliated to it possessed no international ideology and quite cheerfully placed themselves at the disposal of the national interests of their particular countries.

The world war smashed the contemplative “informational” existence of the reformist international center; at the same time, however, it showed the working class of the whole world what a trade union international should not be. In the revolutionary centers of the various countries it awoke the latent strivings for greater activity and greater consolidation.

Then began the period of attempts to create a real international of trade unions which culminated in the formation of the Red International of Labor Unions after the Russian revolution.

The revolutionary wing of the international trade union movement finds its support in the historical traditions of the First International and in that clear recognition of the class position and the class aims of the trade unions which characterizes Marx and his followers, the Communists, and separates them from the epigones and falsifiers of Marxism, the reformists of all varieties.

After a number of fruitless conferences in the years 1915, 1916 and 1917, where it proved impossible to reconcile the national antagonisms of the trade unionists of the Entente and of the Central Powers, there was finally created, in 1919, a new center, the so-called Amsterdam International.

The period of 1919 to 1921, immediately following the organization of the Amsterdam International, was characterized by a mass influx of workers into the trade unions. Whereas, in 1913, the International Secretariat included about seven million organized workers, in 1920 the membership of the unions affiliated to the Amsterdam International already amounted to 28 million This influx of members into the trade unions, the gigantic growth of the strike movement in the United States, England, Germany, France, Italy (where, in 1919, over 10 million workers all around participated in strikes) created favorable conditions for the development of the trade union movement. In view of the mass influx of workers into the trade unions, of the development of the strike wave, and of the revolution in Russia and Germany, the bourgeoisie was forced to make a number of concessions on the political field (universal suffrage in a large number of countries) and in social legislation (introduction of the eight-hour day). These concessions were to be a dike against the revolutionary flood. And indeed, these concessions, obtained thru the pressure of the workers, strengthened the faith of the masses in the reformist trade unions and consequently also strengthened the Amsterdam International.

When the revolutionary tide began to ebb the real aspect of the Amsterdam International became clear.

The Amsterdam International did indeed advance from the pre-war functions of “information” to “activity”; but this activity was exclusively directed against the class interests of the working class.

The history of the Amsterdam International lies open before us. We know its position and its attitude on all important questions of world politics and of the labor movement; we know its friendly attitude towards the Versailles Treaty, towards the reparation system and the Dawes’ Plan, its impotence in the struggle against the occupation of the Ruhr, against the danger of new wars, against Fascism and the offensive of capital. Well known also is its antagonistic attitude towards the Russian revolution and towards the idea of the unity of the trade union movement.

The policy of the Amsterdam International–the main features of which could already be seen in the right wing of the labor movement even before the Copenhagen conference–the policy of class peace, of class-collaboration, considerably helped the bourgeoisie in its first offensive of the post-war period. This offensive of capital upon the ebb of the revolutionary wave still continues today; the working class is still compelled to fight to maintain its most important gains.

To the degree that the masses free themselves from reformist illusions does the revolutionary wing of the international trade union movement–within or without Amsterdam–grow and develop.

***

UPON the occasion of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the trade union movement the Amsterdam International has organized a propaganda week under the slogan: “Back into the trade unions! Fight for the international eight-hour day!”

Unless there is some change in the policy of the Amsterdam International these slogans are useless. For is not the policy of the reformist bureaucrats and of Amsterdam the immediate cause for the exodus of the workers from the trade unions? Is it not their fault that about ten million members (of the 23 million of 1919 only 16 million remain) have been lost to the trade unions? Was it not the leaders of the reformist trade unions that organized the mass expulsions of members of the revolutionary wing in the trade unions of Germany, France, America, and other countries?

Fight for the eight-hour day! Do not these same people in the camp of Amsterdam, who today issue this slogan, bear the blame for the loss of the eight-hour day? This is seen clearly in Germany. The social-democratic Reichstag fraction, including the trade union deputies, voted on December 4, 1923, for the Empowering Law which gave the government and the employers a free hand in the regulation of the hours of labor. This Empowering Law made it possible for the government to issue the well-known decree of December 21, 1923, permitting the employer to smash the eight-hour day in Germany without any consideration.

What has happened to Germany has been repeated in one form or another in many other countries, thanks to the passivity or the direct treason of the leaders of the Amsterdam tendency. Only a short time ago we saw the betrayal of the mine workers by the general council in the general strike of May, 1926, which was also carried on under the slogan of maintaining the shorter work-day (seven-hour day for the miners).

***

EXAMINING the last quarter century we can say that the Amsterdam International has proved itself to be not an organ of struggle but an organization of shameful collaboration with capital, an organization that does not lead the trade unions against the capitalist system but rather serves to protect that system.

The flourishing period of capitalism and of imperialism gave the Amsterdam International the appearance of power and strengthened the illusory belief of the laboring masses in the possibility of a peaceable settlement of social problems. But the advancing decay of capitalism in the present period is destroying the trust of the working class in Amsterdam. It is only due to the revolutionary wing, which, in spite of all the splitting attempts of the reformists continuing unto this day, is fighting for the unity of the world trade union movement, that the Amsterdam International still maintains itself as an organizational whole. Amsterdam certainly has no claim to being the only representative and the only leader of the international trade union movement. Only when the workers will succeed in uniting both of the existing international centers, Amsterdam and the R.I.L.U., as well as the trade unions remaining outside of any international organization, into one single world center will there be created a leading fighting organ of the trade union movement.

On the occasion of the twenty-fifth anniversary, in the epoch of intensified class struggle, in the period of the gigantic battles of the English proletariat, the international trade union movement must formulate as its immediate tasks:

1. Class struggle against capital until victory! Overthrow of the capitalist system!

2. Struggle against every form of class collaboration!

3. Uncompromising struggle against opportunism, against reformism of all varieties!

4. For the unity of the international trade union movement!

5. BACK INTO THE TRADE UNIONS! FENSE OF THE ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL DEMANDS OF THE WORKING CLASS!

In the trade unions–bitter struggle against any distortion of their class character.

Only by following in the glorious tradition of the First International whose teachings have already lead to the victory of the Russian proletariat and will lead to the triumph of the world proletariat when will the international trade union movement realize these slogans.

NOTES

1. Space does not permit us to examine the positive side of Bakuninism and anarchism, which have played a prominent role in the history om the labor movement role in the history of the labor movement, particularly in the history of the trade union movement (revolutionary syndicalism). Revolutionary anarcho-syndicalism of the later period (end of the 19 century and pre-war time) was a healthy reaction against reformism. The theoretically incorrect doctrines (the rejection of the political struggle, of the state and the proletarian dictatorship during the transition period) were made up for by the revolutionary protest against reformism, by the issuing of general class slogans, by an actual mass struggle for the eight hour day, etc. The most valuable element of the anarcho-syndicalism of this period, its element of struggle, was later taken over by the revolutionary Marxist wing of the labor movement. During war and post-war times anarcho-syndicalism degenerated almost completely into opportunism. International reformism is in no position to fight against the excesses manifested by this particular form of reformism in a number of Latin countries of Europe and America. This task falls to the revolutionary wing of the international labor movement, the wing that has broken with reformism in all its forms and varieties.

2. Voitinsky, Die Welt in Zahlen.

The Workers Monthly began publishing in 1924 as a merger of the ‘Liberator’, the Trade Union Educational League magazine ‘Labor Herald’, and Friends of Soviet Russia’s monthly ‘Soviet Russia Pictorial’ as an explicitly Party publication. In 1927 Workers Monthly ceased and the Communist Party began publishing The Communist as its theoretical magazine. Editors included Earl Browder and Max Bedacht as the magazine continued the Liberator’s use of graphics and art.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/culture/pubs/wm/1926/v5n13-nov-1926-1B-FT-80-WM.pdf