International Secretariat of National Trade Union Centres

The International Secretariat of National Trade Union Centres (ISNTUC), often simply referred to as the International Secretariat and later renamed the International Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU), was an international consultative body of trade unions. Founded in 1901, it broke apart and became defunct during the First World War.

ISNTUC was founded in Copenhagen, Denmark, on August 21, 1901. Founding members of the new International Secretariat were the German, French, British, Belgian, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian and Finnish trade union centres. Together the founding organizations had a combined membership of 1 168 000.

The idea to build an international trade union structure had been a proposal of the Danish union president Jens Jensen. In 1900 the British General Federation of Trade Unions leader Isaac Michel supported the idea, whilst the leader of the German Generalkommission der Gewerkschaften Deutschlands (which had one million members at the time) Carl Legien pledged to provide financial and administrative support to the new international organization.

Parallel to the ISNTUC were various International Trade Secretariats, most of them based in Germany and, like the ISNTUC, dependent on support from the German unions.

In 1903 Legien became Secretary of ISNTUC and the headquarters of the organization was moved to Berlin.

The activities of ISNTUC were largely limited to exchanging information between unions and providing support to development of national union federations. Politically, the organization was subordinated to the socialist Second International. The majority within ISNTUC, led by the German trade unions, were firmly Social Democratic and emphasized the need to leave the political affairs to the political international. However, this subordination was not uncontroversial. The French Confédération générale du travail (CGT) adhered to the syndicalist line and harshly criticized the lack of independent political advocacy of ISNTUC. This dispute was notable both at the 1907 (Stuttgart) and 1910 (Copenhagen) congresses of ISNTUC. CGT withdrew from ISNTUC in 1905 and returned in 1909.

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