Ferdinand Domela Nieuwenhuis

Netherlands state institutions Anarchists 1846–1919 ○ Died

The Netherlands' first socialist MP, who turned anarchist and was expelled from the Second International for his anti-war general strike

Born in Amsterdam in 1846, he was a Lutheran preacher who lost his faith and took up the political fight for workers, led the founding of the Social Democratic League, and in 1888–1891 was the first socialist member of parliament in Dutch history. At the Brussels congress of 1891 he proposed that the workers of all countries answer an outbreak of war with a general strike, and was voted down. Drifting towards anarchism, he was expelled from the Second International in 1896 and then broke completely with the socialist movement. He died in Hilversum in 1919.