Proletariat is the name used to refer to three Polish political parties:

• The First Proletariat (International Social Revolutionary Party "Proletariat" (Polish: ) (1882–1886)), also called the Great Proletariat.
• The Second Proletariat (Social Revolutionary Party "Proletariat" (Polish: ) (1888–1893)), also called the Small Proletariat.
• The Third Proletariat (Polish Socialist Party "Proletariat" (Polish: ) (1900–1909)).

First Proletariat

The First Proletariat (or Great Proletariat) was the first Polish

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

 socialist party

Socialism

Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...

. It was founded in 1882 by Ludwik Waryński

Ludwik Warynski

Ludwik Tadeusz Waryński was an activist and theoretician of the socialist movement in Poland.-Biography:...

 from members of Warsaw socialist circles.

At a meeting in Vilna in 1883, The First Proletariat joined with parties from other cites in creating a central committee composed of Waryński, Stanisław Kunicki

Stanisław Kunicki

Stanisław Kunicki was a Polish revolutionary.Kunicki was born into the nobility to a Polish father and a Georgian mother on June 8, 1861. During his student days in St. Petersburgh he joined the Polish St. Petersburg Social Revolutionary Party, which was one of the groups that merged in 1883 to...

, Tadeusz Rechniewski

Tadeusz Rechniewski

Tadeusz Rechniewski was a Polish revolutionary and one of the leaders of the First Proletariat party.Born into the nobility in St. Petersburg in 1862, Rechniewski began studying law at St. Petersburg University in 1879...

, and others. Other important party activists were Edmund Płoski, Maria Bohuszewiczówna

Maria Bohuszewiczówna

Maria Stefania Bohuszewiczówna was a Polish revolutionary and a leader of the First Proletariat party.Bohuszewiczówna was born on January 4, 1865 in the village of Ceperce . She moved to Warsaw in 1874. In 1882 and 1883 she attended courses at the Flying University. From 1882 she was active in the...

, Marian Stefan Ulrych, Aleksandra Jentysówna, and Henryk Dulęba.

In March 1884 the First Proletariat formed an alliance with the People's Will

People's Will

Will of the People is a political party that aimed for representation in the Parliament of Sweden, but only got 881 votes nation-wide in the Swedish general election, 2006, of a national turnout of 5,650,416...

 and embraced political and economic terror as a means to combat autocracy. The party supported proletarian internationalism

Proletarian internationalism

Proletarian internationalism, sometimes referred to as international socialism, is a Marxist social class concept based on the view that capitalism is now a global system, and therefore the working class must act as a global class if it is to defeat it...

 and opposed the Polish independence movement.

In 1883-1884 several of the chief activists were arrested and the party lost much of its power. In July 1886 the party was crushed as many of its remaining members were imprisoned or executed. The First Proletariat disbanded that year, but many of its traditions would be continued by the Second Proletariat.

Second Proletariat

The Second Proletariat (or Small Proletariat) was founded in 1888 by merging the remaining organization of the First Proletarian (led by Marcin Kasprzak) and a student group led by Ludwik Kulczycki.

The Second Proletariat also embraced terror as means to combat autocracy. Representatives of the Second Proletariata participated in the founding congress of the Second International

Second International

The Second International , the original Socialist International, was an organization of socialist and labour parties formed in Paris on July 14, 1889. At the Paris meeting delegations from 20 countries participated...

 in Paris in 1889. In 1891 a faction emerged in the party which opposed the tactics of terror. In 1893 the party merged with three other parties to create the Polish Socialist Party

Polish Socialist Party

The Polish Socialist Party was one of the most important Polish left-wing political parties from its inception in 1892 until 1948...

.

Third Proletariat

The Third Proletariat was created in 1900 as a splinter group of the Polish Socialist Party. It was led by Ludwig Kulchytskyy and, beset by Tsarist repression, ceased operations in 1909.