In the royalist Yugoslavia, the education of workers took place primarily within the workers’ common houses and the workers’ academies. A number of such institutions had been established before the First World War and they became the main gathering places of the working class. Lectures were given there, socialist literature ...
(Show more)In the royalist Yugoslavia, the education of workers took place primarily within the workers’ common houses and the workers’ academies. A number of such institutions had been established before the First World War and they became the main gathering places of the working class. Lectures were given there, socialist literature was available at those places, and meetings were held to discuss a wide range of topics, ranging from the basic principles of Marxism to issues such as abortion and colonialism.
Having in mind the fact that the Communist Party of Yugoslavia was banned in 1920 and that the Yugoslav labor movement was divided between the social-democratic and communist parties, the aim of the presentation is primarily to present their struggle for supremacy over the ownership of these institutions. Furthermore, the goal is to describe the activities of the workers’ common houses and academies and the government’s attitude towards their work.
The presentation is based on the analysis of archive documents that are available in several Croatian archives (Zagreb, Osijek, Slavonski Brod), as well as on the analysis of articles that were published in the contemporary workers’ newspapers (Organizovani radnik, Radni?ki list, Pravda, etc.).
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