The International African Service Bureau (IASB) was a pan-African

Pan-Africanism

Pan-Africanism is a movement that seeks to unify African people or people living in Africa, into a "one African community". Differing types of Pan-Africanism seek different levels of economic, racial, social, or political unity...

 organisation founded in London in 1937 by West Indians George Padmore

George Padmore

George Padmore , born Malcolm Ivan Meredith Nurse, was a Trinidadian communist who became a leading Pan-Africanist in his later years.-Early years:...

, C. L. R. James

C. L. R. James

Cyril Lionel Robert James , who sometimes wrote under the pen-name J.R. Johnson, was an Afro-Trinidadian historian, journalist, socialist theorist and essayist. His works are influential in various theoretical, social, and historiographical contexts...

, T. Ras Makonnen

T. Ras Makonnen

T. Ras Makonnen was a Guyanese-born Pan-African activist.He completed his secondary school in Guyana, before leaving in 1927 to study mineralogy in Texas, and then attended Cornell University in 1983...

 and Sierra Leonian labor activist and agitator

Agitator

An agitator is a person who actively supports some ideology or movement with speeches and especially actions. The Agitators were a political movement as well as elected representatives of soldiers, including the New Model Army of Oliver Cromwell, during the English Civil War. They were also known...

 I. T. A. Wallace-Johnson.Chris Braithwaite, aka Jones, was Secretary of this organisation. The bureau intended to address West African problems to the British general public. Similar in design and organization to the West African Youth League

West African Youth League

The West African Youth League was a political organisation founded by I. T. A. Wallace-Johnson in June 1935. The group was a major political force against the colonial government in West Africa, especially in the Gold Coast and Sierra Leone....

, the IASB also sought to inform the public about the grievances faced by those in West Africa and created a list of desired reforms and freedoms that would help the colonies. The bureau also hoped to encourage new West African trade unions to affiliate themselves with the British labor movement. To further its interest, it held weekly meetings at Hyde Park

Hyde Park, London

Hyde Park is one of the largest parks in central London, United Kingdom, and one of the Royal Parks of London, famous for its Speakers' Corner.The park is divided in two by the Serpentine...

, where members discussed labor strikes in the Caribbean

Caribbean

The Caribbean is a crescent-shaped group of islands more than 2,000 miles long separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north...

 and Ethiopia

Ethiopia

Ethiopia , officially known as the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. It is the second-most populous nation in Africa, with over 82 million inhabitants, and the tenth-largest by area, occupying 1,100,000 km2...

. It also supplied speakers to branches of the Labour Party, trade unions and the League of Nations Union

League of Nations Union

The League of Nations Union was an organization formed in the United Kingdom to promote international justice, collective security and a permanent peace between nations based upon the ideals of the League of Nations. The League of Nations was established by the Great Powers as part of the Paris...

and provided questions to be asked in front of Parliament regarding legislation, working conditions and trade union regulations.