workingclasshistory:

On this day, 2 February 1902, the first workers’ union federation in the Philippines, the Unión Obrera Democrática Filipina (Democratic Workers Union of the Philippines) was set up by Isabelo de los Reyes. By the following year it had 150 member unions with 20,000 members. The union’s principles were based on the ideas of German communist Karl Marx and Italian anarchist Errico Malatesta. Reyes (pictured) had spent time in Spain where he was jailed for inciting strikes, came across anarchist and Marxist ideas in prison, and he brought large numbers of books by the likes of Karl Marx and Russian anarchist Mikhail Bakunin back to the Philippines with him.
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