Founder and leader of Austrian Social Democracy who could not stop the war in 1914 and backed it
In January 1918 he urged strikers in Lower Austria and Vienna to return to work. Elected foreign minister by German Austria’s provisional assembly on 30 October, he oversaw the end of hostilities with the Entente and died on 11 November.
Born to a Jewish family in Prague, a physician turned socialist by the misery of Vienna’s workers, he united the Austrian Social Democratic Workers’ Party at the Hainfeld congress of 1889 and led it as a “little International” inside a multinational empire. At the Brussels Bureau meeting of July 1914 he confessed that “the war is already with us” and that his party was powerless, and despite private misgivings backed the government’s war. He became foreign minister of the provisional government in October 1918 but died on 11 November, a day before the republic was proclaimed.
Career timeline
- 1880sLed efforts to unite the divided factions of Austrian Social Democracy.
- 1889Founded the socialist newspaper Arbeiter-Zeitung.
- 1914At the Second International’s emergency meeting, he said the war could no longer be stopped and defended Austria-Hungary’s entry into the war and the party leadership’s pro-war position.
- 1918Elected foreign minister by German Austria’s provisional National Assembly, he served for eleven days.
Chief theoretician of orthodox Marxism in the Second International, founding editor of Die Neue Zeit, editor of Marx's Capital Vol. IV
"Socialism as a means to the emancipation of the proletariat, without democracy, is unthinkable." — The Dictatorship of the Proletariat (1918)
Leading Marxist theoretician of the Second International. He authored the Erfurt Programme, refuted Bernstein's revisionism, and after the Russian Revolution critiqued Bolshevik rule, creating the defining point of divergence between social democracy and Leninism.
Career timeline
- 1875Joined Austrian SDAP; published Darwin and Socialism
- 1880–1883Moved to Zurich, met Bernstein; travelled to London and befriended Marx and Engels
- 1883–1917Founded and edited Die Neue Zeit for 35 years — leading Marxist theoretical journal of the Second International
- 1885–1890Worked closely with Engels in London; began editing Marx's Theories of Surplus Value
- 1891–1892Authored theoretical section of Erfurt Programme and commentary The Class Struggle — defining SPD Marxism
- 1899–1909Led orthodox Marxist counter-attack against Bernstein's revisionism; published The Road to Power
- 1917Broke with SPD over war policy; co-founded Independent Social Democratic Party (USPD)
- 1918–1922Published The Dictatorship of the Proletariat criticising Bolshevik rule; provoked Lenin's polemical reply
Heir presumptive of Austria-Hungary whose assassination in Sarajevo in 1914 was the immediate cause of the First World War
Born in Graz, the eldest son of Archduke Karl Ludwig, the younger brother of Emperor Franz Joseph, he became heir presumptive after Crown Prince Rudolf’s suicide in 1889 and his father’s death in 1896. His morganatic marriage to Sophie Chotek was allowed only after he renounced his descendants’ rights to the throne. He exerted great influence over the armed forces and in 1913 became their inspector general. Clericalism, anti-democratic views and anti-Hungarianism were the cornerstones of his politics; he advocated more autonomy for the empire’s Slav peoples, but urged caution towards Serbia for fear of conflict with Russia. On 28 June 1914 he and his wife were assassinated in Sarajevo by Gavrilo Princip, setting off the July Crisis and the war.
Career timeline
- 1896Heir presumptive of Austria-Hungary
- 1900Morganatic marriage to Sophie Chotek
- 1913Inspector general of the armed forces
- 1914.06.28Assassinated in Sarajevo
Young Bosnia member who shot dead Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife in Sarajevo in 1914
Born to a poor Serb farming family in western Bosnia, he studied in Sarajevo and in 1911 joined Young Bosnia, a secret society seeking to free Bosnia from Austrian rule and unite the South Slavs. Expelled from school after anti-Austrian demonstrations, he went to Belgrade. Armed and trained through the Serbian secret society the Black Hand, on 28 June 1914 in Sarajevo he shot dead the heir to the throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and his wife Sophie. The assassination set off the July Crisis and the First World War. At his trial he declared himself a Yugoslav nationalist; too young for the death penalty, he received twenty years. He died of tuberculosis in the prison of the Theresienstadt fortress in 1918.
Career timeline
- 1911Joined Young Bosnia
- 1914.06.28Assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife in Sarajevo
- 1914.10Sentenced to twenty years
- 1918Died in Theresienstadt prison
