 Four-leaf clover logo as used by the Republican Party of Farmers and Peasants; popularized by the IAB as an agrarian symbol | |
 Countries and regions with IAB members, before 1935 Founding members (joined 1921) Joined by 1927 Joined by 1934 Bavarian People's Party (involved in 1921) Greek Agrarian Party (joined in 1930, dropped out in 1931) Note: Shaded areas represent regional parties. | |
| Abbreviation | IAB/IPU |
|---|---|
| Formation | November 1921 |
| Dissolved | 1971 |
| Type | Political international |
| Purpose | Agrarianism Cooperative movement Pan-Slavism (to 1927) European federalism Pacifism Anti-communism Anti-fascism |
| Location |
|
Region served | Europe (originally) Central and Eastern Europe (from 1947) |
President | Karel Mečíř (first) Ferenc Nagy (last) |
Secretary-General | G. M. Dimitrov (first) |
Main organ | Bulletin du Bureau International Agricole Monthly Bulletin of the International Peasant Union |
The International Agrarian Bureau (IAB; Czech: Mezinárodní Agrární Bureau, French: Bureau International Agraire), commonly known as the Green International (Zelená Internacionála, Internationale Verte), was founded in 1921 by the agrarian parties of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Poland and Yugoslavia. The creation of a continental association of peasants was championed by Aleksandar Stamboliyski of the Bulgarian Agrarian National Union, but originated with earlier attempts by Georg Heim. Following Stamboliyski's downfall in 1923, the IAB came to be dominated by the Republican Party of Farmers and Peasants in Czechoslovakia, whose member Karel Mečíř served as its first leader. Mečíř was able to extend the IAB beyond its core in Slavic Europe, obtaining support from the National Peasants' Party in Greater Romania; as an ideologue, Milan Hodža introduced the Green International to European federalism.
Hodža also redefined international agrarianism as a "Third Way" movement. The Bureau was thus a key competitor with the Krestintern, or "Red Peasant International", which existed as a proxy of the Communist International (or Comintern). In 1929 to 1934, the IAB also gathered allegiances from parties in other areas of the continent, managing to draw the Croatian Peasant Party away from the Krestintern, and helping to create the French Agrarian and Peasant Party. This drive was interrupted by the spread of fascism, which identified Greens as its enemies—although some sections of the IAB came to favor cooperation with the various fascist movements. From 1933, Nazi Germany also interfered directly in the politics of IAB countries. Germany's occupation of Czechoslovakia, and subsequently its takeover of Continental Europe, put an end to IAB activities, though attempts were still made to revive it from London.
In 1947, the Bureau was reestablished as the International Peasant Union (IPU), grouping agrarianist refugees from the Eastern Bloc. This group incorporated the Polish People's Party and the Hungarian Smallholders Party, whose leaders Stanisław Mikołajczyk and Ferenc Nagy were successively IPU presidents. Primarily anti-communist, this Green International fought a propaganda war against the Soviet Union, exposing its involvement in mass murders and its brutal oppression of agrarian movements.
This new Green International was powerless in effecting political change in Soviet-dominated countries, although its activities attracted the attention of communist regimes, who described the IPU as "fascist". In 1952, authorities in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic indicted a number of political and intellectual figures during a show trial of the Green International; the sentences were overturned in the 1960s. Beset by financial troubles, apathy, and disagreements between its leaders, the IPU itself was inactive from 1971.