USPD
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Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany
|
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|---|---|
| Founded | 1917 |
| Dissolved | 1931 |
| Preceded by | Social Democratic Party of Germany |
| Succeeded by | Socialist Workers' Party of Germany |
| Newspaper | Die Freiheit |
| Ideology |
Democratic socialism, Centrist Marxism, Pacifism |
| Political position | Left-wing |
| International affiliation | International Working Union of Socialist Parties |
| Colors | Red |
The Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (German: Unabhängige Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, USPD) was a short-lived political party in Germany during the German Empire and the Weimar Republic. The organization was established in 1917 as the result of a split of left wing members of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). The organization attempted to chart a centrist course between electorally oriented revisionism on the one hand and bolshevism on the other. The organization was terminated in 1931 through merger with the Socialist Workers' Party of Germany (SAPD).
On December 21, 1915, several SPD members in the Reichstag, the German parliament, voted against the authorization of further credits to finance World War I, an incident that emphasized existing tensions between the party's leadership and the left-wing pacifists surrounding Hugo Haase and ultimately led to the expulsion of the group from the SPD on March 24, 1916.
To be able to continue their parliamentary work, the group formed the Sozialdemokratische Arbeitsgemeinschaft (SAG, "Social Democratic Working Group"); concerns from the SPD leadership and Friedrich Ebert that the SAG was intent on dividing the SPD then led to the expulsion of the SAG members from the SPD on January 18, 1917. On April 6, 1917, the USPD was founded at a conference in Gotha, with Hugo Haase as the party's first chairman; the Spartakusbund also merged into the newly founded party, but retained relative autonomy. To avoid confusion, the existing SPD was typically called MSPD (Mehrheits-SPD, "majority-SPD") from then on. Luise Zietz was one of the main agitators in favor of a split in the party in 1917. She became a leader in the creation of the USPD's women's movement.
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