Olav Andreas Scheflo (9 September 1883 – 25 June 1943) was a

Norwegian Norwegian, Norwayan, or Norsk may refer to: *Something of, from, or related to Norway, a country in northwestern Europe * Norwegians, both a nation and an ethnic group native to Norway * Demographics of Norway *The Norwegian language, including ...

Communist politician and journalist. Olav Scheflo was a member of the Norwegian Labour Party from 1905. After the

October Revolution The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key mome ...

he fought hard to convince the Labor Party to join the

Communist International The Communist International (Comintern), also known as the Third International, was a Soviet-controlled international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism. The Comintern resolved at its Second Congress to "struggle by ...

and Scheflo was a Norwegian representative at the second congress of the Comintern in 1920 and was member of the Comintern Executive Committee from 1921 to 1927. Critical towards Stalinism, he left the

Norwegian Communist Party The Communist Party of Norway ( no, Norges Kommunistiske Parti, NKP) is a communist party in Norway. The NKP was formed in 1923, following a split in the Norwegian Labour Party. It was Stalinist from its establishment and, as such, supported the ...

in 1928 and rejoined the Labor Party in 1929. When Sweden's Communist leader,

Zeth Höglund Carl Zeth "Zäta" Konstantin Höglund (29 April 1884 – 13 August 1956) was a leading Swedish communist politician, anti-militarist, author, journalist and mayor (''finansborgarråd'') of Stockholm (1940–1950). Höglund can be credited as t ...

was offered to be made honorable corporal in the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army ( Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, afte ...

in 1918 but declined, the offer instead went to Scheflo, who gladly accepted the position. When

Leon Trotsky Lev Davidovich Bronstein. ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky; uk, link= no, Лев Давидович Троцький; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trotskij'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky''. (), was a Russian ...

lived in exile in Norway in 1935 and 1936, Scheflo strongly defended him against attacks from both Stalinist and the Norwegian bourgeoisie. However, he would never become a real

Trotskyist Trotskyism is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Ukrainian-Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky and some other members of the Left Opposition and Fourth International. Trotsky self-identified as an orthodox Marxist, a ...

since he was closer to the Soviet

Right Opposition The Right Opposition (, ''Pravaya oppozitsiya'') or Right Tendency (, ''Praviy uklon'') in the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) was a conditional label formulated by Joseph Stalin in fall of 1928 in regards the opposition against certain me ...

. Scheflo's autobiography is ''Den røde tråd i Norges historie'' (''The Red Thread in Norwegian History''). After the split in the party With the party split of 1923, he sided with the Norwegian Communist Party (NKP) in which he was voted into party leadership as a Comintern representative (until 1927) and editor of the main organ of the party, Norges Kommunistblad. In 1924 he was sent to prison for publishing a statement against strikebreaking during the great Iron strike (a series of labor conflicts from 1923-24). That same year, he was condemned for “encouragement of punishable deeds” after having agitated for a military strike. Politically, Scheflo was relatively moderate and was counted among the right wing in the NKP. The conflict within the party led to his resignation as editor of the main organ in 1927. In March 1928 Scheflo left the NKP in protest against the party’s negative attitude towards the Hornsrud government. From 1929 he was a member of the Norwegian Labor Party and from 1931 he was the editor of the party newspaper Sørlandet in

Kristiansand Kristiansand is a seaside resort city and municipality in Agder county, Norway. The city is the fifth-largest and the municipality the sixth-largest in Norway, with a population of around 112,000 as of January 2020, following the incorporati ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Scheflo, Olav 1883 births 1943 deaths Norwegian communists Norwegian Comintern people Comintern people Executive Committee of the Communist International