Clara Zetkin (1857–1933)

Formerly known as Klara Eisner, one of the leaders of the left wing of the Social Democratic Party of Germany and the Second International; an outstanding leader of the international socialist women’s movement; one of the founders of the Communist Party of Germany.

Zetkin was born on July 5, 1857, in the village of Wiederau, Saxony, Germany, into a primary school teacher’s family. In 1878, she graduated from the Steyberschen Institut for Girls’ Education in Leipzig and joined the Socialist Workers’ Party of Germany (SAP) in the same year. In 1881, she moved to Switzerland and France. In 1889, she attended the Inaugural Conference of the Second International, where she was elected one of the 11 secretaries and delivered a speech entitled Für die Befreiung der Frau! (For the Liberation of Women). In 1897, she joined the Social Democratic Party of Germany.

In 1904, at the Third Women’s Conference of the Social Democratic Party of Germany in Bremen, Zetkin systematically put forth a series of ideas on educational reform, such as unified compulsory education system, secularization of education and attaching importance to vocational education, in view of the education system of Germany at that time and the education situation of the children of the working people. In 1907, she was elected Secretary of the Secretariat of the Women’s International Council at the First International Socialist Women’s Conference. In August 1910, at the Second International Socialist Women’s Conference, held in Copenhagen, the capital of Denmark, March 8 of each year was designated as International Working Women’s Day on the initiative of Clara Zetkin.

During the World War I, she actively campaigned against imperialist war and social chauvinism and joined the Spartacists, a left-wing organization of the Social Democratic Party of Germany. After the victory of the October Revolution, she enthusiastically propagated and supported the October Revolution. In March 1919, Zetkin joined the Communist Party of Germany. In 1921, she was elected a member of the presidium of the executive committee of the Communist International (Comintern) and Secretary of the International Women’s Secretariat. In 1924, she served as Chairwoman of the International Red Aid. Zetkin died on June 20, 1933 in Moscow.