The Hague Congress, held from 2 to 7 September 1872, in the eponymous city, was a congress of the International Workingmen's Association (IWA), more commonly known as the First International. It is one of the fundamental events in the history of the workers' movement, marking the split between the Marxists and the anti-authoritarians/anarchists, two political movements that separated during this congress.
Following the founding of the International, numerous factions gathered within it, notably the Bakuninists or anti-authoritarians, who brought together anarchists, collectivists, and anti-authoritarian socialists. This group represented the majority of the organization, while the Marxists and Blanquists were allied and controlled the General Council of the IWA. While all these factions started as allies within the organization, personal and theoretical conflicts arose between them, crystallized in the growing opposition between Mikhail Bakunin and Karl Marx. As the Marxists and Blanquists were progressively outpaced by the spreading Bakuninist federations, which threatened their control over the organization, they attempted to strengthen the power of the General Council, which they controlled. This provoked a rupture with a large part of the IWA, especially the Spanish (the largest of all), Italian, Belgian, and Jurassian federations. Marx, supported by the German Marxists and his own forces in London and the United States, then organized the Hague Congress, choosing the location and management to favor his interests and strengthen his positions. Bakunin, unable to travel to the congress as he was being sought by the French and German police, left his 'lieutenant' James Guillaume to represent him.
The Hague Congress resulted in the expulsion of Bakunin and Guillaume from the IWA and the adoption of statutes entrusting decision-making power to the General Council. A majority of the International's federations rejected these decisions and this congress, and decided to meet a week later in Saint-Imier for the Saint-Imier Congress, which founded the Anti-authoritarian International. This new body was perceived as the continuity of the First International and became a fundamental organization in the history of anarchism. For their part, the Marxists sidelined the Blanquists from the organization they still controlled. This action isolated them from the few remaining forces other than their own within their IWA and ultimately led to the organization's disappearance in 1876.
The Anti-authoritarian International disappeared around the 1880s, giving way to other systems of organization, such as anarchist companionship. Meanwhile, the Marxists and Social Democrats founded the Second International in 1889.
Continue reading on Wikipedia 
