Social Patriotism is an openly patriotic standpoint which combines patriotism with socialism. It was first identified at the outset of the First World War when a majority of Social Democrats opted to support the war efforts of their respective governments and abandoned socialist internationalism and workers solidarity.
At the International Socialist Conference at Zimmerwald the social patriots were identified as "the openly patriotic majority of the formerly Social-Democratic leaders" in Germany, as well as the opposition-mannered center of the party around Kautsky, and to which in France and Austria the majority, in England and Russia a part of the leaders (Hyndman, the Fabians, the Trade-Unionists, Plekhanov, Ilia Rubanovich , the Nasha Zarya) group.