Clara Zetkin: May Thoughts

[My own translation of the text in "Die Gleichheit. Zeitschrift für die Interessen der Arbeiterinnen", 26th Volume No. 16, 28 April 1916, p. 117. Corrections by English native speakers would be extremely welcome]

Nothing illuminates the abyss which has opened up in the existence of the socialist working masses of all countries between once and now as glaringly and painfully as May Day. With what feelings, with what wishes and hopes did we otherwise look to the World Day of Labour! For millions of proletarians it was the annual messenger and herald of the fraternisation of peoples, of world peace, of the great brotherly alliance of workers of all tongues and zones, and today! ... For the second time, the sun of 1 May rises over a terrible sea of blood. Almost two full years have passed in the mutual laceration of the peoples, and the longed-for saviour of humanity, the proletarian International, has been shattered.

Even in the deepest distress, indeed precisely in distress, it is best to "say what is" in accordance with Lassalle's principle. The socialist International lies on the ground, it is no more. To deceive oneself or others about this would be to continue to nourish the disastrous policy of the illusions, which has suffered shameful bankruptcy before our eyes. But the thought of May Day not only illuminates the ruin of the Second International, it also points to the why of its collapse and the how of its future resurrection.

If the Second International could suddenly, within twenty-four hours, dissolve into vapour, it only proves that its existence had been floating in the air before. If in the hour of decision it was unable to exert any influence at all on the feelings and actions of the masses, this fact shows that the International had not yet taken root at all in the spiritual life of the masses. And here is the knot of the problem.

Some proletarians look around with bleeding hearts and cry out painfully: Where has the International gone? Why is it silent? When will it raise its voice again? And in doing so they turn their eyes to Brussels, to Paris, to the Hague, to Berne, as if the message of salvation of the resurrection of the International should come from there. But those who cry out in this way are in grave error. They must look for the International not somewhere outside, but within themselves. Every social democratic worker, every female worker and worker's wife must say to themselves: The International, that is you!

The International is not an office, a congress, a body of one or two dozen people, a body that sends out documents to the countries. The socialist International, which is to be more than a beautiful dream, which is to be embodied in flesh and blood, that are the proletarian masses of all countries who have taken the idea of the world fraternisation of the working people into their hearts and brains. The International as a political reality, that is the masses of the working people for whom this thought has turned from a Sunday parade play into daily practice, into the guiding star of all their dos and don'ts.

In order to re-establish the International, it is therefore not necessary to leave Germany, any more than it is necessary to leave France, England or Russia. The International revives of its own accord as soon as the working masses of the most important countries act faithfully according to socialist principles. Conversely, the International remains dead, it is nothing more than a "whitewashed grave" when in London, Vienna, Copenhagen or elsewhere representatives of the workers' parties of different countries sit down around a table to pass paper resolutions, while their practical policy, their action is a mockery and derision of Social-Democratic principles. The International will remain dead as long as the masses of workers everywhere remain the wax from which small statesmen in various party costumes model figures as they please.

Each individual must work on the construction of the International within himself. It is not from delegates, representatives, deputies, leaders of all kinds that the proletarians should expect the message of salvation from the resurrected one. They alone can perform the miracle, the miracle which is as simple and self-evident as all the great laws of development, as all the iron historical necessities. Nor will the May of the fraternisation of peoples descend from heaven as a gift of grace from heroic personalities. The spring day of their return to socialism must be won by the workers themselves. According to the instruction of their master Karl Marx: "Men do not make their history as they please, but they make it themselves."