Czechoslovakia. Czechoslovak Republic. Insignia for the 40th Anniversary of the Czechoslovak National Socialist Party 1897-1937.

The Czech National Socialist Party (in Czech: Česká strana národně sociální, ČSNS) was a civic nationalist political party in the Czech Republic. It was founded in 1897, breaking away from the Young Czech Party as a nominally socialist group that supported Czech independence from Austria-Hungary (it opposed the international revolution of the Czech Social Democratic Party, the main socialist group of the time). Its most well-known member was Edvard Beneš, co-founder of Czechoslovakia and the second president of the country.

Despite the similar name, the ČSNS was never related to the National Socialist German Workers’ Party and was never antisemitic; the Nazis formally suppressed the party and persecuted its members. Most of the party’s representatives supported Israeli Zionism and German Jewish refugees in the 1930s. It was considered by contemporaries as a radical-left center-liberal or progressive liberal party, as a counterpart to the Radical Party in France and the Progressive Party in Germany.

The party was founded in 1897 and was led by Václav Klofáč. Jiří Stříbrný and Emil Franke also played important roles. The party’s platform was based on the social traditions of Hussitism and Taborism, but also included a program of «collectivization through development, overcoming class struggle through national discipline, the revival of morality and democracy as conditions for socialism, a powerful popular army, etc.»

In 1918, the party changed its name from the Czech National Socialist Party to the Czech Socialist Party, in 1919 to the Czechoslovak Socialist Party, and in 1926 to the Czechoslovak National Socialist Party. Edvard Beneš effectively took over the leadership of the party, although it was nominally led by his ally Václav Klofáč. Jiří Stříbrný and his followers were expelled due to disagreements with Václav Klofáč and Edvard Beneš. They later collaborated with the National Fascist Community and the Czechoslovak National Democracy.

In its early years, the party had some resemblance to the German National Social Association. In the early 1920s, the party was an observer at the Workers’ and Socialist International, but was never a full member due to disputes over internationalism. Its main international affiliation in the 1920s and 1930s was the Entente of Radical and Democratic Parties, a center-left international for progressive non-Marxist democratic parties, where the leading party was the French Radical Socialist Party; it also had relations with similar parties like the Narodniks of Alexander Kerensky and the People’s Socialist Party in Yugoslavia. During World War II, the exiled leadership of the party collaborated with the British Labour Party.

Since 1921, the party was part of most government coalitions. Its newspaper was České slovo. After the German occupation of 1938, most Czech members of the party joined the left-wing National Labour Party, and a minority joined the National Unity Party led by Rudolf Beran, while some of its Slovak members joined the Slovak People’s Party led by Jozef Tiso.

During the German occupation, the Czechoslovak National Socialist Party was in exile, and most of its members were active in the Czech Resistance. After 1945, the party resurfaced under the leadership of Petr Zenkl as one of the parties in the National Front. When Czechoslovakia became a socialist state in 1948, the party changed its name to the Czechoslovak Socialist Party, and anti-communist members were expelled for alleged fascist sympathies. In exile, Petr Zenkl led the Free Czechoslovak Government in London.