School of Business. University of Alberta. Printer friendly page. The German Social Democratic Party, founded in , was a parliamentary party and advocated a moderate program of social and economic reform.
It was nevertheless a Marxist-influenced party Although it was an illegal party for many years, the party grew and became the mass party of the German working class. Thus the Party became legal. In the Social Democrats set forth their program at a congress at Erfurt.
The Erfurt Program of the Social Democratic Party of Germany The struggle of the working class against capitalistic exploitation is of necessity a political struggle. The working class cannot carry on its economic contests, and cannot develop its economic organization, without political rights. It cannot bring about the transference of the means of production into the possession of the community, without having obtained political power. To give to this fight of the working class a conscious and unified form, and to show it its necessary goal - that is the task of the Social Democratic Party.
The interests of the working classes are the same in all countries with a capitalistic mode of production. With the extension of the world's commerce, and of production for the world market, the position of the worker in every country grows ever more dependent on the position of the worker in other countries.
The liberation of the working class, accordingly, is a work in which the workmen of all civilized countries are equally involved. In recognition of this, the Social Democratic Party of Germany feels and declares itself to be one with the class-conscious workmen of all other countries.
