First International Founded (1864)

Wed Sep 28, 1864

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Image: Logo of the Spanish Regional Association of the International Workingmen’s Association [Wikipedia]

The International Workingmen’s Association (IWA), commonly known as the First International, was an organization aimed at uniting different left-wing ideologies founded on this day in 1864.

Notable members of the IWA included Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Wilhelm Liebknecht, Louis Auguste Blanqui, Karl Marx, and Mikhail Bakunin. The organization was polarized on the issue of state power (followers of Bakunin and Proudhon categorically opposed state power and considered Marx’s ideas inherently authoritarian), and split on this basis after its Fifth Congress in 1872.

On hearing of the First International’s split, Otto von Bismarck remarked “crowned heads, wealth and privilege may well tremble should ever again the Black and Red unite!”