Eighty years ago:
IWMA’s foundation congress twice interrupted by German police

When the syndicalist international, IWMA (now IWA) held its foundation
congress at the turn of the years 1922-1923, it was against a background of
great upheavals. World War I had ended a few years earlier, a war which was
immediately followed by widespread revolutionary movements in a number of
countries, setting lasting trends in the development of the world.

During the war the social democratic international collapsed, and its
affiliated parties threw their internationalism overboard. Under the
leadership of especially their Belgian chairman Emilie Vandervelde, they
gave active support to the war in the name of their respective countries.
The reformist trade union international collapsed at about the same time.

After the end of the war, attempts began to re-build the international
organizations. The Communist international was organized at a congress in
Moscow i 1919, as a continuation of the so-called Zimmerwald international
which has been etstablished already during the war. The trade union
international was re-established the same year at a congress in Amsterdam.
The social democratic international was formed in 1921 at a congress in
Vienna, with the Austrian Friedrich Adler as its prime mover. This
organization merged with the social democratic international in 1923.

On communist initiativ a congress in Moscow in 1921 founded the so-called
Red trade union international. This organization made great efforts to get
the syndicalists as members, but the syndicalsit organizations refused,
being unwilling to be involved in a union international led by a political
movement, in this case the communists.

During the days 25.12.1922 to 02.01.1923 delegates from 10 countries
representing about 2 ? million organized workers held a congress in Berlin.
It was at this congress that the syndicalist international IWMA was founded.

The congress was certainly not able to work undisturbed. Care was needed
because some of the delegates had to get there illegally, without the
knowledge of the police. The first day of the congress was held in a
building in the outskirts of Berlin. The plan was to continue the congress
the next day at another place, but the police were on the trail so the
delegates had to be given a secret message to meet at the third place, in
Nieder-Schönweide, another area in Berlin. Work went on ok until during the
afternoon, when a police patrol suddenly entered the building and wanted to
see the delegates’ identity papers. The German comrades protested
powerfully, and demanded that the police show documentation that they had
orders for this action. They had no such orders, so the patrol withdrew,
leaving two policemen behind to watch. The congress delegates then crowded
out through the door into the street, pushed the policemen aside, and
disappeared.

The congress met again the next day, this time near Alexanderplatz in the
centre of Berlin, not far from the police headquarters.

In this building the congress proceeded without interruption for some days.
But then one day before noon came a new police attack. The whole building
was surrounded by policemen carrying rifles and with revolvers and grenades
on their belts. They forced their way into the meeting room, where the
delegates raised an uproar and protested powerfully. One delegate lacking
proper papers jumped out of the window but was caught by the police
outside. A Polish delegate lacking papers resisted the police but was
knocked down. A French woman delegate then rushed foreward and hit the
police officer in the face with her clenched fist. She was arrested and
transported with some other comrades to the prison in Moabit. Every
delegate was thoroughly searched. Among the delegates were Emil Manus who
represented Denmark and Norway, and Edvind Lindstam and Frans Severin who
represented the SAC. Two other SAC members were also present, not as
delegates, but as individual members passing through Berlin on a journey to
Paris. They were the later well-known authors Eyvind Johnsson and Viktor
Vinde, the latter to later become editor of Stockholmstidningen.

After all this, the police left the meeting alone and the congress
continued. It founded the International the International Working Men’s
Association IWMA (since 1974 the International Workers’ Association IWA),
the Syndicalist international. The Syndicalist international kept going
during the second world war, when the other internationals collapsed, and
continues its activity today.

John Andersson
from ”Solidaritet” Aug-sept 1959

Translator’s remarks on the new name IWA in paranthesis. P.G. (NSF-IWA)