New Zealand Socialist Party
New Zealand Socialist Party | |
|---|---|
| Founded | 28 July 1901 |
| Dissolved | 1 July 1913 |
| Merged into | Left-wing |
The New Zealand Socialist Party was founded in 1901, promoting the works of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. The group, despite being relatively moderate when compared with many other socialists, met with little tangible success, but it nevertheless had considerable impact on the development of New Zealand socialism. It later merged in 1913 with a faction of the United Labour Party to form the Social Democratic Party.
History
The party was founded by members of the 'Clarionettes', a group of about 190 English Socialist immigrants recruited through
Some of the most prominent leaders of the party were English-born Frederick Cooke[2] and Ted Howard. Visitors from England were Tom Mann in 1902 and 1908 and Ben Tillett in 1907. Robert Rivers La Monte from America was (briefly) an organiser for the party: he was a member of the "Wobblies": the IWW Industrial Workers of the World.[3]
By 1903, Robert Hogg was publishing a party journal called the Commonweal in Wellington. The party was not prolifically active and stood no candidates at the 1902 election. The party received new vigor with the entry of several radical unionists from Australia including Paddy Webb, Bob Semple, Michael Joseph Savage and Harry Holland.[1]
Others of the Australian cohort, while less radical and active in attempts to enter the political sphere, were still invested in significant social change; Thomas Eagle, who was a
By 1908 the party was tested by the Blackball miners strike and membership had increased to 3,000 by April of that year. Also that year the Socialist Party held its first national conference in Wellington.[1] Many of the early leaders were from the UK and Australia, where radical ideologies were not uncommon among political parties, but were seen as "out of touch" in New Zealand, where more moderate platforms were the norm. As such the party failed to gain much traction.[5]
A different group, the Socialist Party of New Zealand, was founded in 1930 and became the World Socialist Party (New Zealand).
Policies
At the outset the Socialist Party had a traditionally
Election results
| Socialist Party (1901) | Independent Political Labour League (1905) | ||||||||||||||||
| (independents) | Labour Party (original) (1910) | ||||||||||||||||
| United Labour Party (1912) | |||||||||||||||||
| Social Democratic Party (1913) | (remnants) | ||||||||||||||||
| Labour Party (1916) | |||||||||||||||||
| Election Restlts[7] | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Election | candidates | seats won | votes | percentage |
| 1905 | 2 | 0 | 194 | 0.04% |
| 1908 | 5 | 0 | 2,521 | 0.58% |
| 1911 | 8 | 0 | 9,091 | 1.90% |
References
- ^ a b c Brown 1980, p. 7.
- ^ McAloon, Jim. "Frederick Riley Cooke". Dictionary of New Zealand Biography. Ministry for Culture and Heritage. Retrieved 23 April 2017.
- ^ Bennett 2004, pp. 64, 65.
- ^ "LABOR IN NEW ZEALAND". World. Vol. VI, no. 125. Tasmania, Australia. 27 May 1921. p. 6. Retrieved 23 September 2020 – via National Library of Australia.
- ^ Brown 1980, p. 11.
- ^ Brown 1980, p. 10.
- ^ Paul, J.T. (1946). Humanism in Politics: New Zealand Labour Party in Retrospect. Wellington, NZ: New Zealand Worker Printing and Publishing. p. 38.
Bibliography
- Bennett, James (2004). Rats and Revolutionaries:The Labour Movement in Australia and New Zealand 1890-1940. Dunedin, NZ: University of Otago Press. ISBN 978-1-877276-49-1.
- Brown, Bruce (1962). The Rise of New Zealand Labour: A history of the New Zealand Labour Party. Wellington: Price Milburn.
External links
| International | |
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| National | |
