The Bloomsbury Socialist Society (BSS) was a

socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...

organisation which broke away from the Socialist League in 1888. At the third annual conference of the Socialist League held on 20 May 1888, the Anarchist wing of the league prevailed over the Marxist wing in their rejection of

parliamentarianism Parliamentary sovereignty, also called parliamentary supremacy or legislative supremacy, is a concept in the constitutional law of some parliamentary democracies. It holds that the legislative body has absolute sovereignty and is supreme over al ...

. The BSS was founded in August 1888 by leading Marxists such as

Edward Aveling Edward Bibbins Aveling (29 November 1849 – 2 August 1898) was an English comparative anatomist and popular spokesman for Darwinian evolution, atheism and socialism. He was also a playwright and actor. Aveling was the author of numer ...

Eleanor Marx Jenny Julia Eleanor Marx (16 January 1855 – 31 March 1898), sometimes called Eleanor Aveling and known to her family as Tussy, was the English-born youngest daughter of Karl Marx. She was herself a socialist activist who sometimes worked as a ...

and A. K. Donald In 1893 they participated in the founding of the

Independent Labour Party The Independent Labour Party (ILP) was a British political party of the left, established in 1893 at a conference in Bradford, after local and national dissatisfaction with the Liberals' apparent reluctance to endorse working-class candidates ...

(ILP), with Aveling being elected the first

National Administrative Council The National Administrative Council (NAC) was the executive council of the Independent Labour Party (ILP), a British socialist party which was active from 1893 until 1975. Creation The Independent Labour Party (ILP) was founded at a conference in ...

. They had joined the ILP with the goal of shifting its ideology towards Marxism, but were unsuccessful, as the party remained under the influence of

Keir Hardie James Keir Hardie (15 August 185626 September 1915) was a Scottish trade unionist and politician. He was a founder of the Labour Party, and served as its first parliamentary leader from 1906 to 1908. Hardie was born in Newhouse, Lanarkshire. ...

's Christian socialism. By 1897, Marx and Aveling left the ILP to rejoin the Social Democratic Federation, while Donald retired from political activity entirely.

References

{{reflist Socialism in the United Kingdom Political history of the United Kingdom 1888 establishments in the United Kingdom