Henk Sneevliet - Back in The Netherlands

Back in The Netherlands

In 1927, after years of worsening relations between Sneevliet and his followers and the CPH leadership, Sneevliet broke all ties with the CPH and the Comintern and formed his own party, the Revolutionair Socialistische Partij (RSP), this later became the Revolutionair Socialistische Arbeiders Partij (RSAP) after fusing with the Independent Socialist Party (OSP), which had earlier formed under the stewardship of Jacques de Kadt and Piet J. Schmidt. The RSP signed the Declaration of the Four in August 1933 along with the International Communist League, led by Leon Trotsky, the OSP and the Socialist Workers' Party of Germany. This declaration was intended as a step towards a new International of revolutionary socialist parties. In the end the RSAP broke from the Trotskyists in 1937/38 and became a part of the International Bureau of Revolutionary Socialist Unity along with the Independent Labour Party (Britain) and the Workers' Party of Marxist Unification (POUM) of Spain.

In the 1930s, therefore, Sneevliet and his party concentrated more on national issues, gaining some successes in organising the unemployed movement, strike actions, and the struggle against the rise of fascism. In 1933 Sneevliet, while still imprisoned, was elected a member of the Tweede Kamer, or Lower House, a position he mainly used to propagandise. Central to the activity of the small party was its relationship with a small trade union federation, the NAS, and it was due to a dispute concerning this body that the RSAP split from Trotsky's ICL.

However, the worsening political climate both abroad and nationally and the constant struggle against both the Stalinist and social democratic parties, as well as government interference, took a heavy toll on Sneevliet and his group. When war broke out on May 10, 1940, Sneevliet immediately dissolved the RSAP.