Brigitte Studer is a professor of Swiss and contemporary history at the University of Bern, Switzerland. Her recent publications include Reisende der Weltrevolution: Eine Globalgeschichte der Kommunistischen Internationale (Suhrkamp, 2020) and The Transnational World of the Cominternians (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015).
Throughout history, it’s been hard for agitators and troublemakers to hold down a good job. In the interwar decades, tens of thousands of them were hired by the Communist International — an employer with long hours, difficult bosses, and a lot of opportunities for travel.