ACTA HISTORICA - A MTA TÖRTÉNETTUDOMÁNYI FOLYÓIRATA TOM. 25 (1979)
25. kötet / 1-2. sz. - ETUDES - L. KŐVÁGÓ: The International Socialist Federation of Hungary in 1919
» The International Socialist Federation of Hungary in 1919 By L. KŐVÁGÓ In Hungary, on March 21, 1919, the workers' revolution came to power without bloodshed. A council government was formed which began instituting measures to eliminate the capitalist system and build up a socialist one. This event was not merely a victory for the Hungarian working classes, it was also the crest of a revolutionary wave that had built up in Central and Eastern Europe after the First World War, an attempt to spread westwards the flame of revolution that had triumphed in Russia. In this international task no small role was played by the International Socialist Federation founded in Budapest at the end of March, which united the socialist revolutionaries of 15 countries. In this article we attempt a sketch of this international organization, of its aims, of the events leading up to its formation, and of its work. During the First World War, the massacre, misery and suffering spread ever wider the revolutionary aim of not only stopping the war but also changing a social system which could solve its problems only at the expense of millions of deaths. In Russia, Lenin and the Bolshevik wing of the Social Democratic Party — identifying the historic moment — undertook the leadership of the mass movement pushing towards socialist revolution, and helped it to victory. In most European countries, the social democratic parties did not take on the leadership of socialist revolutions. They took the view that the time was not yet ripe for socialist revolution, that the economic and social preconditions were not suitable; they agreed instead that the bourgeois democratic revolution had still to be completed, and thus they worked in reality at maintaining and consolidating the bourgeois system. The leaderless mass movements seeking a socialist solution began straight away to evolve their own new leadership. Revolutionary socialist groups were set up in almost every country, while at the same time revolutionary left-wing factions began to grow in the social democratic parties. This process everywhere pointed towards the formation of revolutionary workers' parties. The formation Acta Hi&torica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 25, 1979