CHAPTER 1 ELEANOR MARX (1855 –1898) AND LILY BRAUN (1865-1915):  THE MARXIST AND THE SOCIAL DEMOCRAT 

Among the first women to publicly identify as socialist feminists were Eleanor Marx and Lily Braun; both were trying to balance socialist and feminist concerns. With Eleanor Marx, socialism was usually the stronger current. In Lily Braun’s case, feminism was clearly the stronger tendency; she was drawn to socialism because she saw it as a way of achieving feminist goals. Marx and Braun were on opposite sides of a schism in the late 19th century socialist thought, the reform vs. revolution debate then roiling the socialist world. Although she was not opposed to reforms which would improve workers’ lives in the short-term, Eleanor Marx was a proponent of the revolutionary strand which in the early 20thcentury became Marxist-Leninism and Lily Braun, a proponent of the reformist, social democratic strand which lives on in the political systems of Scandinavia and the democratic socialism of the Bernie Sanders’ wing of the American Democratic Party. 

 Although Rosa Luxemburg never fully embraced feminism, feminists have embraced her. Both as an activist and as a visionary theoretician, she charted a new path for women. Clara Zetkin chose another path we can more easily recognize as feminist and devoted her life to providing educational programs and services to enable women workers to play a leading role in the socialist movement. Luxemburg did not share this interest and did not consider Zetkin her intellectual equal; she valued Zetkin’s loyalty but viewed her as lacking in intellectual depth. However, Zetkin was clearly an intelligent, competent woman with organizational skills Luxemburg did not fully appreciate. Zetkin, on the other hand, was dazzled by Luxemburg’s intellect. 

Their relationship developed into a deep, life-long bond despite Luxemburg’s not sharing Zetkin’s passionate commitment to women’s causes. However Luxemburg’s thinking on feminism evolved largely due to her friendship with Zetkin. She and Zetkin were in agreement on most major issues such as the controversy over reform vs. revolution and later their opposition to militarism However they differed in priorities. Women’s issues were Zetkin’s great passion; Luxemburg ‘s great passion was freedom of speech, and like Kollontai, she fought for freedom of expression within the socialist movement as well as in the larger society, insisting that freedom only for the members of one party “is no freedom at all. Freedom is always and exclusively freedom for the one who thinks differently.”

Born into an aristocratic family, Kollontai was an unlikely candidate to become a socialist leader. She became the first woman elected to the Soviet Central Committee, was appointed People's Commissioner for Social Welfare, and sought to replace authoritarian, top-down management with collective management in which all employees would participate. Determined  to remove the burdens of childcare and domestic labor from individual women, Kollontai struggled to provide collective solutions. However, she encountered considerable resistance from working class and peasant women to collectivist measures.

She sought to establish a women’s bureau (Zhenotdel) inspired by Clara Zetkin’s organization of a women’s bureau within the German Social Democratic Party. Like Zetkin, Kollontai believed women needed special support if they were to overcome historic disadvantages and play a leading role in building socialism. She was willing to risk her position as director of the Zhenotdel to join the Worker’s Opposition’s protest against Lenin’s New Economic Policy, which she considered a betrayal of the revolution. Enraged by the Workers' Opposition, Lenin argued the Party could no longer afford the “luxury” of intraparty disputes. For Kollontai, freedom of expression was not a luxury but a necessity. Like Rosa Luxemburg, she was a strong supporter of freedom of speech within the socialist movement, a passionate contributor to democratic values within a Marxist-Leninist tradition often displaying little appreciation for democracy. Her opposition to Lenin’s policies resulted in the loss of her position as head of the Zhenotdel; and she spent the remainder of her professional life as Soviet ambassador to  Norway, Mexico, and Sweden. 

 Sylvia Pankhurst, the daughter of Britain’s best known suffragist Emmeline Pankhurst and committed socialist Richard Pankhurst, devoted much of her life to socialist feminism. She sought to instill socialist values into the suffrage movement, setting her on a collision course with her sister Christabel. The differences between the Pankhurst sisters over issues of gender and class mirrored the deep divisions in the suffrage movement as a whole. Inspired by Jane Addams’ Hull House, she founded the East London Federation of Suffragettes  The group did not begin to meet the overwhelming needs of the impoverished residents of the East End and was limited by Pankhurst's hostility towards government funding and her reliance on private philanthropy. 

The Russian Revolution transformed Pankhurst’s worldview; no longer focused on funding social programs through philanthropy, she was now committed to the struggle for socialist revolution. Her communist period was short-lived; temperamentally, she was not cut out for collectivist organizations, although intellectually she sought collectivist solutions. Pankhurst became once again a voice for democratic socialism. She organized against Mussolini’s invasion of Ethiopia as part of a broader battle against racism; however, her commitment to socialist feminism was not diminished. To her, it was all one struggle. Pankhurst never developed an explicit theory of the intersection of race, gender, and class but such an understanding informed her activism.