In 1864 in London, the International Workingmen’s Association,
later known as the First International, was founded. In the following
decades, socialist parties progressed considerably, obtained the right
to vote for male workers, and took up to 40 percent of the vote in
national elections. Trade unions also grew remarkably, in the context
of less repressive labor laws, and they organized into federations,
often in association with socialist parties.^68 When the Second Inter-
national was formed in 1889, it was less the expression of a variety of
small radical movements than a federation of powerful parties.
As these parties gained ground, the key question became one of
strategy. Should socialists participate in electoral politics and seek
power through regular means? A victory seemed probable given the
numerical importance of the working class, but would the bourgeoisie
accept defeat, and let socialists abolish its privileges? Despite certain
doubts, throughout Europe the parliamentarian strategy prevailed,
often with much success. In Germany, Austria, Finland, Sweden,
Norway, Denmark, and Belgium, social democrats became the domi-
nant party between the beginning of the twentieth century and the
1930s.^69 The Soviet Revolution of 1917, however, brought the
revolutionary strategy back to the forefront and soon opened a major
schism on the left. Already divided by the First World War and unable
to maintain the Second International, social democrats were further
weakened by the creation of a Third International led by Moscow in
1919, and the emergence across Europe of new communist parties
dedicated to revolution.^70 These divisions within the left did not
prevent trade unions and socialist parties winning political conces-
sions in the 1920s, and they did not alter either the basic nature of the
conflict between the left and the right. The right advocatedlaissez-
faireand the market economy, in spite of the Great Depression of the
1930s, while the left fought for socialism, whether through a reformist
or a more radical road.
The rise of organized labor and the new threat represented by the
Bolsheviks engendered a hardening on the right. In many countries,
authoritarian governments restrained democracy in the name of
(^68) Eley,Forging Democracy, pp. 66–70.
(^69) Adam Przeworksi and John Sprague,Paper Stones: A History of Electoral
Socialism, University of Chicago Press, 1986, pp. 27–28.
(^70) Eley,Forging Democracy, pp. 176–78.
100 Left and Right in Global Politics