It returned, under Marxist inspiration, in the early '8os. In 1881 Henry Mayers Hyndman, previously a well-known Radical journalist, founded the Democratic Federation, which speedily accepted Marxian ideas, and, in 1884, adopted the name "Social Democratic Federation" and a complete Socialist programme. In the same year, a split within this body led to the creation of the Socialist League, headed by the famous poet, William Morris, and inspired rather by anarchist-syndicalist ideas in opposition to the purely political Marxism of the S.D.F. These two bodies conducted a widespread agitation during the severe trade slump which culminated in 1886, and were largely responsible for the outburst of aggressive trade unionism among the less skilled workers which found its chief expression in the great dock strike of 1889.
Marxism, however, was not destined at this stage to capture the British Labour movement. Already, in the '8os, Sidney Webb and other leaders of the Fabian Society were developing a mod erate and evolutionary Socialism which based its economics rather on Jevons and John Stuart Mill than on Karl Marx, and aimed rather at permeating the existing parties with socialistic ideas than at creating a definitely Socialist party. Fabian Essays (1889) gave expression to this new doctrine ; and this book was followed up with a wealth of well-written tracts advocating various forms of constructive semi-Socialist legislation.
At the same time, the younger trade unionists, largely stirred into action by the Marxist S.D.F., were beginning to repudiate its doctrine, and to aim at the creation, not of an avowedly So cialist party, but of a more moderate Labour Party, into which there would be more hope of drawing the trade unions and the main body of the workers. James Keir Hardie, a young Scottish miner and a convert from Liberalism, became the leading exponent of this non-dogmatic Socialism, which eschewed theories and based itself and its appeal to the workers on an evolutionary pro gramme of social reform. The result was the creation, in 1893, of the Independent Labour Party, as a rallying point for the "New Unionists" and other exponents of Labour-Socialism. One of the main objects of the new body was to draw the trade unions as organized bodies, into politics, and so to get behind it the main body of workers. This aim was largely achieved when, in 1899, the Trades Union Congress at last voted in favour of creating an independent working-class party based on a trade-union-Socialist alliance. The Labour Representation Committee, which in 1906 became the Labour Party and entered politics as an effective force, was accordingly created in 1900, with the I.L.P. as its chief driving power, and the Fabians as its counsellors on ques tions of practical policy. These developments, as we have seen, reacted on German Socialism, and caused Social Democracy in Germany, despite the nominal defeat of Bernstein's "revisionist" party, largely to re-model its tactics on non-revolutionary lines.
Indeed, in the early years of the 20th century, as Socialism became in one country after another a powerful parliamentary force, there was a notable modification of its revolutionary atti tude. In practice, Socialist parties which had won a substantial
representation in parliament found themselves growingly impelled to work for the improvement of current legislation on social questions, and to appeal to the electorate, not as revolutionaries, but as constitutional reformers seeking a peaceful transformation of the social system. Only where, as in Russia, Socialism was still outlawed, and unveiled autocracy remained in being, did Marxian ideas survive in their original simplicity.
On the eve of the World War, almost every developed country possessed a powerful Socialist or Labour Party, with numerous representatives in parliament ; but in no case, except Australia, had the Labour Party achieved a clear majority. In Great Britain, indeed, political development had lagged behind ; for the Labour Party had only become properly organized in 1906, and was, in 1914, still but a small group in comparison with the French or German Socialists. It was, moreover, in the years immediately preceding the war, subjected to an increasing amount of criticism for its compromising tactics and its virtual alliance with Liberal ism in the House of Commons. These were the years during which a great wave of labour unrest spread over Europe, and new doctrines of Syndicalism and Industrial Unionism, originat ing in France and America, sought to speed up the pace of economic evolution by resort to industrial action. There were great strikes in England, and new conceptions of Socialism began to make headway. In particular, the idea of the control of indus try by the workers through their industrial organizations was widely preached, and traditional conceptions of Socialism were attacked as making for bureaucracy and denying the democratic demand for self-government in the industrial as well as in the political sphere. In Great Britain, Guild Socialism made rapid headway as the expression of this demand for "workers' control." Both the prevalent industrial unrest and the re-statement of Socialist doctrines were checked for the time by the outbreak of war in 1914. The issues of war sharply divided the Socialist forces. In every belligerent country some Socialists supported and some opposed the participation of their Governments. In the leading countries, except Italy and Russia, the majority sup ported participation; but in each case a powerful minority took the opposite view, and the Socialist movement ran considerable risk of dissolution in consequence of the cleavage. In Great Britain, for example, while the Labour Party officially supported the war, the Independent Labour Party, which was one of its constituent bodies, opposed it. In Germany, the Social Demo cratic Party split into two rival bodies, the larger supporting the war and the smaller hostile ; and in France an almost similar situation arose, though a positive split was, for the time, averted.