Lecture on the history of social democracy in Chemnitz
Date: Thursday, 27 September, 6 p.m., lecture room in the Volksbank building, Innere Klosterstraße
Admission to the event is free.
The city archive will provide information on the lecture: On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Chemnitz SPD party conference, the pre-war social democracy in the Saxon industrial metropolis will be presented. In 1912, the party had 14,300 members in the city and the surrounding area. The organisational and political centres were the "Volkstimme" building on Dresdner Straße and the "Koloseum" people's house on Zwickauer Straße. The "Volkstimme" had 60,000 subscribers and two to three times as many readers. The party achieved extraordinary things with its educational and lecture evenings and its own library. The Labour Secretariat provided free advice on legal issues. The party conference met with great interest among the Chemnitz working class; thousands attended the opening event at the Altendorf racecourse. In terms of party history, the 1912 party conference was certainly not one of the highlights of social democratic party conference culture; however, it does provide an insight into social democratic policy areas before the First World War and into the internal party disputes between the various party wings.