Communist and Social Democratic Inter- nationals during the 1919–1920 Period and Their Opposite Views of the Socialist Political System

Abstract

Focusing on ideological, political, and organi- zational preparations for the founding congress of the Third International (the Comintern) in Moscow, and on the revival of the Social Democratic International in Bern, Switzerland, the article explores their opposing views on the most burning issues pertaining to socialism. Certain of the imminent (European) revolution of the proletariat that would dispense with all social and political bodies of oppression, the Com- munist wing pronounced bourgeois democracy the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie. According to the Communist doctrine, the introduction of the system of soviets represented the basis for proletarian democracy that was to surpass bourgeois parliamentarism. In contrast, the right- wing Social Democratic faction denounced any form of dictatorship, which certainly included the Bolshevik system. These opposing positions on Bolshevik Russia were the very reason why the attempt at restoring the “old” Second International, whose aim was to reunite the divided proletariat, failed completely.