Theodore Rothstein

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Theodore Rothstein (1871 - 1953) was a Russian communist.

Rothstein left Russia in 1890 and settled in Britain. In 1895, he joined the Social Democratic Federation (SDF), and in 1900 was elected to its executive. He also joined the Russian Social Democratic and Labour Party, siding with the Bolsheviks against the Mensheviks and becoming a close comrade of Lenin, who often stayed at Rothstein's house on Clapton Square in the Hackney area of London.

Rothstein took work with the British War Office, but strongly opposed World War I. Within the SDF's successor, the British Socialist Party (BSP), he was a leader of the opposition to H. M. Hyndman's support for the war. After Hyndman and his supporters left the BSP, Rothstein became a leading figure in the formation of the Communist Party of Great Britain. However, in 1920 he returned to Russia, where he became the Ambassador to Tehran [1] and later the Director of the Institute of World Economy and Politics.

Rothstein's son, Andrew, remained in Britain and also became a prominent communist.