Det röda Dalarna : Socialdemokrater, anarkosyndikalister och kommunister inom Dalarnas Arbetarrörelse 1906-1937

• Main Author: Henningsson, Börje
• Format: Doctoral Thesis
• Language: Swedish
• Published: Uppsala universitet, Historiska institutionen 2004
• Subjects: History; labour movement; politics; organisation; socialism; social democracy; anarcho-syndicalism; communism; election; Swedish history 1906-1937; Historia
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-3995; http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:isbn:91-554-5839-4

This dissertation investigates the internal struggles within the labour movement in Dalarna at the beginning of the twentieth century. I investigate Social Democracy, Anarcho-Syndicalism and Communism, the three major factions of the working class. I study the relationship between these organisations and their supporters in the complex socio-economic area of Dalarna. I have based my study on the three party programs and their answer to two central questions of the time: Will the conflicts of society lead to revolution? and How should politics and production be organised in the non capitalist society to come? Generally, anarcho-syndicalists argue that state power must be transformed to local government, social democrats hope to make different social interests compromise into political consensus. Communists want a proletarian state through social revolution. How were those ideologies received in Dalarna? In the beginning, anarchists fought social democrats: The opposition excluded from social democracy 1917 was also more influenced by anarchism than by communism. The opposition founded a party, witch towards the 1920´s turned from anarchism into communism, and the small farmers, that erlier had been attracted by the anarchist influenced rural propaganda, left and more industrial workers joined. Simultaneously, anarchists reorganised from a political party to a syndicalistic trade union, gradually mowing from the industrialised south to northern Dalarna. Communists, mainly left in the industrialised south, were shaken by two splits in the 1920´s and they lost their ability to compete with the social democrats in democratic elections. In Dalarna, social democrats, confronting anti-parliamentary anarchy and totalitarian communism alike, won the contest within the labour movement: At the end of the period, they dominated the area.