Rebuilding the party’s infrastructure throughout the 1920s, Blum grappled with the question of why and under what conditions a socialist would enter government. He distinguished between the “exercise of power” (taking office to prepare the groundwork for socialism) and the “conquest of power” (the actual dismantling of capitalism). In the end, Blum settled for “the occupation of power,” to keep it out of the grasp of fascists.
