The Comintern's first secretary, who taught Mussolini and branded him traitor
"I had never seen a more wretched human being" — on first meeting Mussolini in Lausanne
Russian-born Italian socialist. First secretary of the Comintern, she taught Mussolini Marxism and publicly denounced him as a traitor when he embraced fascism. She broke with Bolshevism in 1922 and led Italy's maximalist socialist faction.
Career timeline
1897Left Russia for Brussels; earned a doctorate in philosophy and literature at the New University
1900Joined the Italian Socialist Party (PSI); organised immigrant textile workers
1912–1914PSI Central Committee member and Avanti! editor; worked alongside Mussolini
1915–1916Participated in the Zimmerwald and Kienthal anti-war conferences
1917Returned to Russia and joined the Bolshevik Party
1919–1920First secretary of the Comintern; organised the 1st and 2nd Congresses
1922–1930Broke with Bolshevism; returned to Italy to lead the PSI maximalist faction
1930–1945Led the PSIm (Maximalist Socialist Party); anti-fascist work in Swiss, French, and US exile
Ukrainian Social Democratic writer who led the Rada's General Secretariat and the Directory
Just as you created the dictatorship of workers and peasants in Russia, we must create a dictatorship of the Ukrainian language in Ukraine.
A Ukrainian Social Democratic writer, he led the Central Rada's General Secretariat in 1917 and retook Kyiv as first chairman of the Directory in 1918. Arguing for talks with the Soviets he broke with Petliura and resigned in 1919, dying in France in 1951.
Career timeline
1905Co-founder of the Ukrainian Social Democratic Workers' Party
1917Vice-president of the Central Rada and first head of its General Secretariat
1918.01Premier of the Ukrainian People's Republic, soon resigned
1918.12Retook Kyiv as chairman of the Directory
1919–1920Wrote the memoir Rebirth of a Nation
1920Deputy head of the Ukrainian SSR Sovnarkom; soon re-emigrated
A social democrat who changed course between revolution and economics
At the Northern Front, he reported to Kerensky the reality that soldiers no longer wanted the offensive.
Vladimir Voitinsky was a Russian revolutionary and economist who explored both the labor movement and theories of markets. After Bolshevik work during the 1905 Revolution and exile in Siberia, he moved toward the Mensheviks in 1917 and sought cooperation between the soviets and the Provisional Government. As commissar of the Northern Front, he helped prepare the June Offensive but then confronted soldiers exhausted by war and unwilling to obey orders, exposing the limits of revolutionary military authority. After October he lived in exile and became an international labor and economic researcher who argued for democratic social reform.
Career timeline
1905–1907Worked in the RSDLP Petersburg Committee and organized a council of the unemployed
1908–1912Arrested in Yekaterinoslav, sentenced to hard labor, and exiled to Siberia
1914–1916Worked with Siberian Zimmerwaldist social democrats
1917.04Member of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and editorial board of its newspaper
1917.06–10Commissar of the Northern Front, involved in June Offensive preparations and political work at the front
1918–1935Represented the Democratic Republic of Georgia, wrote for European socialist publications, and worked with the International Labour Organization
1935–1960Conducted economic and labor research for the U.S. Census Bureau, Social Security Committee, and other institutions
