The party was founded in 1969 by students from Victoria University of Wellington, and was originally named the Socialist Action League.
The party achieved a certain amount of public recognition for its role in protests against the Vietnam War,[1] and regularly engaged in protests against adventurist United States foreign policy, South African apartheid,[2] in defence of the pro-choice side of the abortion debate, as well as supporting LGBT rights in New Zealand, during the 1970s and 1980s.
In the 1980s, the Socialist Workers Party in the United States broke away from Trotskyism, and left the FI.
A number of other parties in FI also chose to leave, including the Socialist Action League in New Zealand.
Those members of the Socialist Action League who did not agree with this departure from Trotskyism and the FI were expelled or resigned.