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Red flag (politics)

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For other uses, see Red flag (disambiguation).

The plain red flag is often used at socialist or communist rallies, especially on International Workers' Day.

In politics, a red flag is predominantly a symbol of left-wing ideologies, including socialism, communism, anarchism, and the labour movement. The originally empty or plain red flag has been associated with left-wing politics since the French Revolution (1789–1799). The red flag and red as a political colour are the oldest symbols of socialism.

Socialists adopted the symbol during the Revolutions of 1848. It was first used as the flag of a new authority by the Lyon Commune and Paris Commune in the aftermath of the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871). The flag of the Soviet Union, introduced during the Russian Revolution, as well as the flags of many subsequent communist states, were explicitly inspired by the plain red flag. Many socialist and socialist-adjacent political parties, including those of democratic socialists and social democrats, have adapted and adopted a red flag as their symbol. The plain red flag was an official symbol of the Labour Party in the United Kingdom until the late 1980s. It was the inspiration for the socialist songs "The Red Flag" and "Bandiera Rossa".

History

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"Lamartine, before the Hôtel de Ville, Paris, rejects the Red Flag," February 25, 1848. By Henri Félix Emmanuel Philippoteaux (1815–1884). Lamartine said that the red flag represented revolutionary violence, and "has to be put down immediately after the fighting".
Plain red banners for the Sultan's retinue. From the Turkish Costume Book by Lambert de Vos, 1574.

Red color as a combat or revolt symbol in Europe goes back to the turn of the second millennium and before. In the Middle Ages, ships in combat flew long red streamers called baucans to signify a fight with no quarter.[1] Prior to the French Revolution and in some contexts since, red banners were seen as symbols of defiance and battle.[2]

In Eastern Arabia, tribal federations used red standards as their flags. These federations later developed into sheikhdoms and emirates. The red standard was adopted as one of the early Islamic flags. The prominent Arab military commander Amr ibn al-As used a red banner.[3]

The red cap was a symbol of popular revolt in France going back to the Jacquerie of 1358. The color red became associated with patriotism early in the French Revolution due to the popularity of the tricolour cockade, introduced in July 1789, and the Phrygian cap, introduced in May 1790. A red flag was raised over the Champ-de-Mars in Paris on July 17, 1791, by Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, commander of the National Guard, as a symbol of martial law, warning rioters to disperse.[4] As many as fifty anti-royalist protesters were killed in the fighting that followed. Inverting the original symbolism, the Jacobins protested this action by flying a red flag to honour the "martyrs' blood" of those who had been killed.[5] They created their own red flags to declare "the martial law of the people against the revolt of the court."[6] The plain red flag has since been associated with left-wing politics.[7]

In 1797, British sailors mutinied near the mouth of the River Thames and hoisted red flags on several ships.[citation needed]

Commemoration March of the 1831 Merthyr Rising in Merthyr Tydfil, Wales, 2012.

Two red flags soaked in calf's blood were flown by marchers in South Wales during the Merthyr Rising of 1831. It is claimed to be the first time that the red flag was waved as a banner of workers' power. The red flags of Merthyr became a potent relic following the execution of early trade unionist Dic Penderyn (Richard Lewis) in August 1831, despite a public campaign to pardon him.[8][9]

During the Battle of the Alamo in March 1836, General Antonio López de Santa Anna of Mexico signified no quarter by displaying a plain blood-red flag (approx. 10 feet square) from the highest church tower in Béxar. William B. Travis, a commander of the Alamo defenders, responded with a blast from the Alamo's largest cannon.[10]

The flag of the Colorados during the Uruguayan Civil War

During the Uruguayan Civil War (1839–1851), the victorious liberal faction of "Colorados" (lit. 'Reds') used red flags. This prolonged struggle received considerable attention and sympathy from liberals and revolutionaries in Europe; Giuseppe Garibaldi first made a name for himself in 1843, having been inspired to have his troops wear the famous Red Shirts.[11]

The Ottoman Empire used a variety of flags, especially as naval ensigns, during its history. The star and crescent came into use in the second half of the 18th century. A buyruldu (lit. 'decree') from 1793 required that the ships of the Ottoman Navy use a red flag with the star and crescent in white.[citation needed] In 1844, a version of this flag with a five-pointed star was officially adopted as the flag of the Ottoman Empire.[12][13]

During the 1848 revolution in France, socialists and radical republicans demanded that the red flag be adopted as France's national flag. Led by poet-politician Alphonse de Lamartine, the government rejected the demand: "[T]he red flag that you have brought back here has done nothing but being trailed around the Champ-de-Mars in the people's blood in [17]91 and [17]93, whereas the Tricolore flag went round the world along with the name, the glory and the liberty of the homeland!"[14]

Following the unexpected defeat of France by the Germans in the Franco-Prussian War, French workers and socialist revolutionaries seized major cities and created the Lyon Commune and Paris Commune.[15] The Lyon Commune was established in September 1870 and lasted for roughly eight months, while the Paris Commune was established in March 1871 and crushed by the French Army after two months, with much bloodshed. The original red banners of the Paris Commune became icons of the socialist revolution; in 1921, members of the French Communist Party came to Moscow and presented the new Soviet government with one of the original Commune banners; it remains in place in the tomb of Vladimir Lenin, next to his open coffin.[16]

In the Haymarket affair, during which a bomb blast killed a police officer at a May Day rally for an eight-hour workday in Chicago, anarchists flew red flags.[citation needed] This event, considered to be the beginning of the revival of the international labour movement, is still commemorated annually in many countries as International Workers' Day (though not in the United States).[17][18]

The red flag gained wide popularity in Russia during the Russian Revolutions of 1917,[19] having been used as a symbol of revolutionary struggle in both the February Revolution and October Revolution; red was the political color of socialists on several opposed sides in the revolutions, such as the Bolsheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries.[20] During the Russian Civil War (1917–1922), a red flag, with a red star symbolising the party and hammer and sickle to symbolise the workers and peasants respectively, became the official flag of Soviet Russia, and, in 1923, of the Soviet Union.[19] It remained so until the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.[21]

During the Chinese Civil War (1927–1949), the flag of the Chinese Communist Party became a red flag with a hammer and sickle, while the flag of the People's Republic of China became a red flag with a large star symbolising the party and four smaller stars symbolising workers, peasants, the urban middle class, and rural middle class, respectively.[22] During the Cold War, many communist states, such as Vietnam, also adopted red flags,[23] while others, such as Cuba, chose to keep their previous flags.[24] Red national flags with symbolism unrelated to socialism have also been adopted; the red flag of Nepal, for instance, represents its national flower.[citation needed]

Usage

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Anarchism

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The red flag was one of the first anarchist symbols prior to the October Revolution, after which red flags started to be associated with Marxism-Leninism, Bolshevism, and state socialism.[25]

Arab world

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Recent and current Arabian red flags include those of Muscat and Oman,[26] the individual emirates of the United Arab Emirates,[27] the Sheikhdom of Kuwait,[28] Bahrain,[29] and Qatar.[30]

China

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Red flags in Tiananmen Square, in the front of Great Hall of the People.
The flag of the Chinese Communist Party was adopted in 1942 and slightly modified in 1966.

In China, both the Nationalist Party-led Republic of China and the Communist Party-led People's Republic of China use red fields for their flags, referencing their revolutionary origins.[citation needed] Streets, buildings, businesses and product brands named after the red flag are common in China as a result of recuperation.[citation needed] For example, a famous line of limousine cars manufactured by China FAW Group Corporation has the brand name of Red Flag. In 1967 during the Cultural Revolution, Pilal in Akto County, Kizilsu, Xinjiang, China was renamed as Hongqi Commune (红旗公社), meaning 'red flag commune'.[31] In 1968, Baykurut Commune in Ulugqat County, Kizilsu, Xinjiang, China was also renamed as Hongqi Commune.[32][33]

Labour Party (UK)

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The red flag was the emblem of the British Labour Party from its inception until the Labour Party Conference of 1986 when it was replaced by a red rose, itself a variant of the fist and rose, then in wide use by left of center parties in Europe. The more floral red rose design has subsequently been adopted by a number of other socialist and social-democratic parties throughout Europe.[34] Members of the party also sing the traditional anthem "The Red Flag" at the conclusion of the annual party conference.[35][36] In February 2006, "The Red Flag" was sung in Parliament to mark the centenary of the Labour Party's founding. The flag was regularly flown above Sheffield Town Hall on May Day under David Blunkett's Labour administration of Sheffield City Council during the 1980s.[citation needed]

Newspapers

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Various socialist newspapers have used the name The Red Flag.[37][38]

Soviet Union

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The Order of the Red Banner was the first Soviet military decoration.
The 1936–1943 variant of the Order of the Red Banner of Labour.
An anniversary medal for the Red Banner Trans-Baikal Border District.
The flag of the Soviet Union, adopted in 1936. This version was famous for its photograph in Berlin in the closing months of World War II and was used until 1955, when the flag was modified slightly. It lost official status in 1991 when the Soviet Union dissolved.

In the Soviet Union, the Red Banner (Russian: Красное знамя) was a widely used revolutionary symbol.[19] Military units, institutions, and organizations that were awarded with the Order of the Red Banner, such as the Soviet Army, Soviet Navy, and MVD Internal Troops, were referred to with the honorific title "of the Red Banner" (Russian: Краснознамённый, romanized: Krasnoznamyonny), as in "Red Banner Pacific Fleet", "Guards Red Banner Submarine S-56", or "Twice Red Banner Alexandrov Soviet Army Choir". Civilian establishments that were awarded with the Order of the Red Banner of Labour were also sometimes addressed with the "Red-Banner" honorific.[citation needed]

The Transferable Red Banner (Russian: переходящее Красное знамя) was an award for Soviet collectives in various workplaces that won socialist emulation contests. The term "transferable" means that for a given kind of competition at a given establishment (enterprise, school, institute, clinic, etc.) or category of establishments (e.g., type of industry), a single physical copy of the award was transferred from the winner of one competition to the winner of the next (held annually or quarterly). Any of several levels of the award could have been awarded, depending on the level of the socialist competition: all-Union, union-republican, oblast-wide, industry-wide, enterprise/institution-wide, etc. Similar awards existed in several communist states.[39]

A new article, 190, was added to the Soviet criminal code in the 1960s. It permitted imprisonment for anti-Soviet agitation (part 1), for participation in unauthorized meetings (part 2), and for defamation of the Soviet coat of arms or the Red Banner (part 3).[citation needed]

Trade unionism

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The building to have had a red flag flying[40] for the longest period of time is the Victorian Trades Hall in Melbourne, Australia, the oldest trade union building in the world. The flag has been flying for over a century.[citation needed]

Historical laws banning red flags

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After the suppression of the 1848 revolution, red flags and other insignia dominated by the colour red were banned in Prussia, as would later be the case in France after the demise of the Paris Commune.[41] During the persecution of communists and socialists amid the Red Scare of 1919–1920 in the United States, many states passed laws forbidding displays of red flags, including Minnesota, South Dakota, Oklahoma,[42] and California. In Stromberg v. California, the Supreme Court of the United States held that such laws are unconstitutional.[43]

In Australia, red flags were similarly banned in September 1918 under the War Precautions Act 1914. This ban was an arguable cause of the Red Flag riots.[citation needed] The ban ended in Australia with the repeal of the Act in 1920.[44]

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ Flags of the World, "Baucans (or Bauccedillian)".
  2. ^ Cited in "red flag", Oxford English Dictionary.
  3. ^ Nour, “L’Histoire du croissant,” p. 66/295. See also Ibn Khaldun, Muqaddimah, pp. 214–15.
  4. ^ Thomas Carlyle, French Revolution, p. 408.
  5. ^ Flags of the World, "French Revolution"
  6. ^ "Socialist History of the French Revolution"
  7. ^ ten Brink, Jan (1899). Robespierre and the Red Terror.
  8. ^ Reddebrek (March 31, 2015). "1831: the Merthyr Rising and Dic Penderyn". LibCom. Retrieved March 25, 2022.
  9. ^ Attard, Joe (June 2, 2020). "The Merthyr Rising 1831: rage, rebellion and the red flag". International Marxist Tendency. Retrieved March 25, 2022.
  10. ^ Nofi (1992), p. 78.
  11. ^ "Unità d'Italia: Giuseppe Garibaldi, l'eroe dei due mondi". Sapere.it (in Italian). March 7, 2011.
  12. ^ Raw, Laurence (September 18, 2013). The Silk Road of Adaptation: Transformations across Disciplines and Cultures. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. p. 42. ISBN 9781443852890.
  13. ^ Marshall, Tim (July 4, 2017). A Flag Worth Dying For: The Power and Politics of National Symbols. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1-5011-6833-8.
  14. ^ Flags of the World, "France"
  15. ^ Moissonnier, Maurice (1972). La premiere internationale et la commune a Lyon (1865–1871) [The international premiere and the commune in Lyon (1865–1871)] (in French). Paris: Editions sociales. p. 207. OCLC 902707001.
  16. ^ von Geldern, James (1993). Bolshevik Festivals 1917–21. Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 178. Archived from the original on November 26, 2018. Retrieved November 26, 2018.
  17. ^ Trachtenberg, Alexander (March 2002) [1932]. The History of May Day. Marxists.org. Retrieved January 19, 2008.
  18. ^ Foner, "The First May Day and the Haymarket Affair", May Day, pp. 27–39.
  19. ^ a b c Flags of the World, "Soviet"
  20. ^ [1]
  21. ^ Whitney Smith (2008). "Flag of Flag of Union of Soviet Socialist Republics". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved November 5, 2008.
  22. ^ "National Flag of the People's Republic of China" (in Chinese). Gov.cn. May 24, 2005. Archived from the original on October 9, 2019. Retrieved November 8, 2009.
  23. ^ "Flag of Vietnam". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved March 4, 2021.
  24. ^ Chacón, Hipólito Rafael (August 17, 2020). "The Global Legacy of Cuba's Estrella Solitaria (Lone Star Flag)" (PDF). North American Vexillological Association. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 17, 2020. Retrieved August 23, 2022.
  25. ^ "Barwy anarchistyczne: Skąd czarne i czarno-czerwone flagi?" [Anarchist colours: Where are black and black-red flags from]. cia.media.pl (in Polish). Centrum Informacji Anarchistycznej. June 19, 2012. Archived from the original on February 24, 2021. Retrieved September 4, 2016.
  26. ^ "Sultanate of Muscat and Oman until 1970 (Oman)". www.crwflags.com. Retrieved June 20, 2021.
  27. ^ Complete Flags of the World. Smithsonian Handbooks. 2007. p. 184. ISBN 978-0-7566-4115-3.
  28. ^ Nunn, Wilfred (1932). Tigris Gunboats: The Forgotten War in Iraq, 1914-1917. Naval Institute Press. p. 33. ISBN 978-1861763082.
  29. ^ "National Flag of Bahrain". BBC News. BBC. Archived from the original on December 16, 2014. Retrieved June 16, 2012.
  30. ^ "Imperial era flag of Qatar". British Empire in the Middle East. Retrieved May 7, 2015.
  31. ^ 1997年阿克陶县行政区划 [1997 Akto County Administrative Divisions] (in Simplified Chinese). XZQH.org. December 31, 2010. Archived from the original on January 22, 2020. Retrieved September 30, 2020. 皮拉勒乡 1958年成立皮拉勒公社，1967年更名红旗公社，1984年改设皮拉勒乡。
  32. ^ 乌恰县行政区划和居民地名称 (in Simplified Chinese). xjwqx.gov.cn. June 4, 2018. Archived from the original on October 8, 2020. Retrieved October 21, 2019 – via Google Cache, Internet Archive.
  33. ^ 1997年乌恰县行政区划 [1997 Ulugqat County Administrative Divisions] (in Simplified Chinese). XZQH.org. December 31, 2010. Archived from the original on October 15, 2017. Retrieved October 5, 2020. 巴音库鲁提乡　{...}1950年成立巴音库鲁提三乡，1962年建巴音库鲁提公社，1968年更名红旗公社，1984年改设巴音库鲁提乡。
  34. ^ "The Red Rose of Labour". British Heritage. Retrieved July 24, 2023.
  35. ^ "The Red Flag ends Labour rally". BBC News. October 1, 1999. Retrieved December 21, 2011.
  36. ^ "Labour Party Anthems – Top 10 songs the Labour Party has used over the years". Daily Mirror. April 7, 2010. Retrieved December 21, 2011.
  37. ^ Weitz, Eric D. (1997). Creating German Communism, 1890-1990: From Popular Protests to Socialist State. Princeton University Press. pp. 91–92. ISBN 0691026823.
  38. ^ "The ISL in Australia". LIS-ISL.org. Retrieved March 22, 2020.
  39. ^ Красные знамена in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia (in Russian) – via Great Scientific Library
  40. ^ "Trades Hall". Melbourne Point. February 15, 2015. Retrieved December 1, 2018.
  41. ^ Balz, Hanno. "'Hostile take-over'. A political history of the red flag". Socialist History. 59: 8–30.
  42. ^ Zechariah Chafee, Jr., Freedom of Speech (NY: Harcourt, Brace and Howe, 1920), 180ff., Appendix V
  43. ^ Stromberg v. California, 283 U.S. 359 (1931).
  44. ^ War Precautions Repeal Act 1920 (Act 54). 1920.
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Media related to Red flags at Wikimedia Commons

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