The Workers' Socialist Federation was a socialist political party in the United Kingdom, led by Sylvia Pankhurst. Under many different names, it gradually broadened its politics from a focus on women's suffrage to eventually become a left communist grouping.
East London Federation of the WSPU
It originated as the East London Federation of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU, better known as the Suffragettes). The East London Federation was founded by Dr Richard Pankhurst and his wife Emmeline Pankhurst in 1893, and differed from its parent organisation in being democratic and including men, such as George Lansbury.
By this point, Sylvia had many disagreements with the route the WSPU was taking. She wanted an explicitly socialist organisation tackling wider issues than women's suffrage, aligned with the Independent Labour Party, based among working class people in the East End of London. She also wanted to focus on collective workers' action, not individual attacks on property.
East London Federation of Suffragettes
These and other differences, including personal ones, led to Sylvia's expulsion, along with the East London Federation, from the WSPU. In early 1914, they renamed themselves the East London Federation of Suffragettes (ELFS) and launched a newspaper, the Women's Dreadnought.
At first, the group campaigned for universal suffrage and agitated among parliamentarians, with the assistance of Keir Hardie. But with the outbreak of World War I, they began also to attack participation in the war, supporting the positions of the Zimmerwald Conference. This view initially lost the group support, but they began work to ameliorate suffering in the East End.
The ELFS got a chain of cost price restaurants set up, and itself set up a toy factory, free clinic and Montessori nursery. They also agitated for widow's pensions and dependent's allowances.
Workers' Suffrage Federation
As public opinion turned against the war, the group gained new support, and its newspaper increased its circulation. To reflect its now broader political positions, in March 1916 it renamed itself the Workers' Suffrage Federation (WSF). Similarly, in July 1917, the newspaper was renamed the Workers' Dreadnought. From the start of 1917, it adopted a new aim: "to secure Human Suffrage, namely, a Vote, for every Woman and Man of full age, and to win Social and Economic Freedom for the People".
The WSF supported the 1916 Irish Rising and became a leading proponent of improved social welfare while continuing agitation for a universal franchise. As such, it opposed the Franchise Bill which ultimately gave women in Britain the vote in general elections as the restrictions on women voting were much stricter than those on men.
Despite its evolving position, during much of 1917, the party remained focused on campaigning for universal suffrage and an end to World War I. It welcomed the February Revolution in Russia, largely on the basis that it would establish a Constituent Assembly elected by universal suffrage and withdraw Russia from the war. As the months went by, the WSF noted in Workers' Dreadnought that a situation of dual power had broken out between the Petrograd Soviet and the Russian Provisional Government, and upon analyzing the attitudes of the various socialist faction, decided to align with the Bolsheviks.
The party then enthusiastically supported the October Revolution of 1917, which acted as a catalyst that changed their position from supporting universal suffrage towards anti-parliamentarism. When, in January 1918, the new Bolshevik government in Russia dissolved the Assembly, the group now welcomed its replacement by the All-Russian Congress of Soviets and now argued that Soviets were the most democratic form of government. The WSF also looked forward to the Russian withdrawal from the war, welcoming the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk as a step towards peace. During this period, the WSF led campaigns against the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War, with the slogan "Hands off Russia". The WSF demanded that the British government negotiate peace with Soviet Russia, urged the labour movement to take action in support of the Soviet government, and eventually called on workers' to launch a general strike that would force an end to the intervention. In the April 1918 issue of Workers' Dreadnought, Pankhurst argued that the most effective way to aid the Soviet government in Russia would be to establish workers' councils in Britain, and later insisted that a world revolution would be needed to overthrow global capitalism in order for the Russian Revolution to survive.