Revolutionary Socialism and Industrial Unrest in the Era of the Winnipeg General Strike: The Origins of Communist Labour Unionism in Europe and North America

This paper explores, from a comparative perspective, the industrial unrest of the years 1917-20 and the role of revolutionary socialists in it. It argues that both industrial militants and left-wing socialists re-evaluated their positions because of their experiences in this period and sought, from different perspectives, to formulate a new relationship between industrial and political forms of worker struggle. They converged around 1920 in the founding of the Communist International, in which both leading industrial militants and left-wing socialists from Europe and North America participated. After the defeat or arrest of their movements for industrial unionism and workers' control, industrial militants sought a political strategy to complement their previous emphasis on economic action. Left-wing socialists, for their part, sought a means to reach and influence the mass of industrial workers and found such a means in industrial action and organization. The two joined forces in the early years of the Communist International, thereby decisively transforming Marxist views of labour unions and industrial action while linking industrial militancy to a larger political movement. The success with which the Communists established themselves after 1920 as the leading radical force in the workers' movement, in both the labour union and political arenas, is in large part due to their incorporation of industrial action into the politics and organization of the Communist Party. Thus, although the industrial unrest of the World War I period subsided after 1920 without having achieved its major immediate or long-term goals, the Communist Party inherited and then transformed its legacy.