Initially, the Emancipation of Labour group directed the Union and edited its publications.
But afterwards opportunist elements ('the young' or Economists) gained the upper hand within the Union.
The final break and the withdrawal of the group from the Union took place at the second congress of the Union in April 1900; the Emancipation of Labour group and its followers walked out of the congress and set up an independent organisation, Sotsial-Demokrat.
[2] From April 1899 to February 1902 the Union published Rabocheye Delo ("The Workers' Cause") in Geneva.
Russia initially sent Georgi Plekhanov, of Emancipation of Labour, and Boris Krichevsky, editor of Rabocheye Delo, both of whom were in opposing sides of the conflict within the Union.