Conclusion

Abstract

Any reformist social-democratic party, especially one with a strong trade union base, is likely to have, like the German Social Democrats in 1930, an inner tension between the ideals of being a Staatspartei or a Klassenkampfpartei.¹ In the British Labour Party the Fabians and moderate trade union leaders pulled in the direction of the former, while I.L.P. militants and left-wing labour leaders pulled in the direction of the latter. In either case, what has emerged from the preceding study is that by and large the roots of reformism lay not in support of imperialism but in its opposite.