12 The Parties and Groups of the Dissident Left

Abstract

Factional division was a significant aspect of the Weimar Left, even though both the major parties abhorred it. The list of factions is long, and not all groups have been included here. The dissident Left was relatively small in numerical terms, but not unimportant towards the end of the Weimar Republic. Hans Mommsen has even claimed, surely with some exaggeration, that 'virtually all activist elements in the German labour movement left the German Social Democrats (SPD) and Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and reorganised themselves as splinter groups'. The Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (USPD) was very successful in its agitation in 1920, and it ran the SPD close in the Reichstag elections of that year, before splitting into two groups. The larger group decided to merge with the KPD; a slightly smaller group, stayed independent for less than two years, after which it rejoined the SPD.Keywords: Communist Party of Germany (KPD); German Social Democrats (SPD); Hans Mommsen; USPD; Weimar Left; Weimar Republic