The Kibbutz Ha-Me'uhad was the spearhead of the pioneering enterprise that eventually led to the establishment of the Jewish state, but its political history is that of a faction. Its political views were inextricably bound up with the internal politics of the Labour Movement. Siya Bet, as it was called, underwent several mutations – part of Mapai until 1944, it merged with Left Po'alei Zion in 1946, and with Ha-Shomer Ha-Tza'ir in 1948 – but throughout it preserved its organisational integrity and independence.

Mibifnim (From Within), the name of the Kibbutz Ha-Me'uhad journal, was an accurate reflection of the faction's world-view – perceiving internal strength in all its aspects as the determinant of external power, expressing maximalist Zionism through the idea of territorial integrity, and advocating activism which represented the most complete synthesis of Jewish history and pioneering settlement as both strategic concept and political objective. Revolutionary socialism played a crucial educational role, but the pro-Soviet orientation which reached its height in the 1940s found no expression in the faction's politics after the establishment of the State.

The Kibbutz Ha-Me'uhad emerged as a political faction in the second half of the 1930s, with the emergence of the internal conflicts within Mapai and the principal political issue of the time – the 1937 Partition Plan. In the struggle against the ‘working agreement’ between Ben-Gurion and Jabotinsky, the Kibbutz Ha-Me'uhad for the first time displayed a united political front. The faction criticised the party leadership for concentrating on external politics, rather than on internal affairs and the movement's values.