Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist–Leninist)

Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist–Leninist)
Abbreviation	CPGB-ML
Chairperson	Ella Rule
Founded	3 July, 2004
Newspaper	Proletarian
Youth wing	Red Youth
Political orientation	Marxism–Leninism Anti-revisionism (de-jure) Right-Opportunism (de-facto)
Website
https://thecommunists.org
Twitter	@CPGBML
YouTube channel	https://www.youtube.com/c/ProletarianCPGBML

The Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist–Leninist) (CPGB-ML) is a Marxist-Leninist political party based in the United Kingdom, specifically England, Scotland and Wales. It was founded in July 2004 by former members of the Socialist Labour Party who were expelled for supporting AES states, as well as some members of the original Communist Party of Great Britain. Today the party is the largest and most prominent Marxist-Leninist party in the United Kingdom, mostly due to its extensive online and media outreach and the prolific activities of its founder and former chairman, Harpal Brar; he has founded and run a number of pro-communist organisations, including the Indian Workers' Association and the Stalin Society.

The party runs two bi-monthly newspapers: Proletarian, which mainly considers current affairs, and Lalkar, which consists of more long-form theoretical content. The party also runs the YouTube channel Proletarian TV from which it uploads its conferences, speeches from its members, pro-communist documentaries it does not own, and other similar material. To support its written content, Proletarian articles are given voiceovers on Proletarian Radio. The Party supports China, and Harpal Brar, a Party founder, co-founded the Hands Off China campaign and published a book on China: Socialism with Chinese Characteristics: Marketisation of the Chinese economy.

History

Formation of the party

CPGB-ML May Day procession, 2013

The CPGB-ML was formed in 2004, believing itself to be the "natural progression of the CPGB of the 1920s and 30s" (for they believe that the decline of that original party began with the publication of The British Road to Socialism in 1951). The party acknowledges that "there are already several parties in Britain who refer to themselves as communist", but believed that the existing parties (which were all formed slightly before the dissolution of the Soviet Union) were revisionist.

On the one hand, the Communist Party of Britain (CPB) established itself as continuing the CPGB's original British Road to Socialism (now confusingly called Britain’s Road to Socialism), which had in the CPGB-ML's view "allowed the euro-communists to take control in the first place. In fact the euro-communists were only a group of revisionists within what was then a revisionist party that took revisionism to its logical conclusion, ie, liquidation." On the other hand, the New Communist Party (NCP)'s "decision never to stand in elections and their total support for the Labour Party in elections set them only a wafer’s width apart from the revisionists that they had left".

It claims that each party "fawn all over it [the Labour Party] in Lenin’s name", referring to Lenin's Library:"Left-wing" communism, an infantile disorder. The CPGB-ML hold that Lenin's advice here (for communists to canvass on the basis of supporting the Labour Party, but making clear that an impending Labour government would not truly represent the working class) was based on the material conditions of Britain at that time, and is not applicable to the present day.

Relations with other parties

International standing

Joti Brar attends CPC and World Political Parties Summit, 2021

The CPGB-ML has a history of relationships with political (some communist) parties and the embassies of AES states, having met delegations from China, Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea, Laos, Vietnam, Nepal, Nicaragua, Turkey, Sri Lanka and South Korea. Most of these meetings occurred at CPGB-ML events, with some exceptions. Amongst other international appearances, representatives of the party have attended the World Socialist Forum (Beijing, 2016). In terms of television appearances, representatives of the party have spoken on TeleSUR, Press TV, Al-Mayadeen, RT, CGTN, and the BBC.

Covid and International meeting with Chinese, Cuban, Venezuelan, and Nicaraguan delegates in attendance, 2021

At its ninth (and most recent) congress, the party held a public meeting regarding "Covid and Internationalism". The panel of speakers was made up of ambassadors from socialist countries: China, Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua. This is despite the fact that, at this point in time, Nicaragua maintained official diplomatic relations with the Republic of China rather than the PRC. At this event, the Chinese ambassador formally presented a congratulatory letter to party for its holding of the congress.

The CPGB-ML has attempted to be included in the annual International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties (IMCWP). In 2008, the Communist Party of Greece—acting on behalf of the IMCWP—asked the Communist Party of Britain (CPB) to produce a report on the eligibility of the CPGB-ML for membership of the IMCWP (since 2008, the CPB and the NCP are the only British parties on the members list.) The 3-page report denounced the CPGB-ML as a party which "lacks the essential requirements of a Marxist Leninist Communist Party" with "no base in the organized working class". The CPGB-ML subsequently produced a 15-page response to the "lies and slanders of the CPB". The original report seems to be unavailable online, although alongside its response, the CPGB-ML reproduced it here.

Workers Party of Britain

Joti Brar, Vice Chair of the CPGB-ML, is also the Deputy Leader of the Workers Party of Britain (WPB). Since 2019, much of the CPGB-ML's practical work has been within the WPB. CPGB-ML members are required to also be members of the WPB, making the point that "sitting smugly on the sidelines will not help us to bring this essential understanding [Marxist analysis of social democracy] to our fellow workers". Its leader, George Galloway, has a history with the CPGB-ML, despite never having been a member himself.

George Galloway attends a Hands off China event, 2009

The CPGB-ML's first official views of Galloway were negative, describing him as "a man who had to be thrown out of the imperialist Labour Party kicking and screaming". However, since 2009, Galloway has participated in several meetings held by the CPGB-ML, and prominent member of the party Ranjeet Brar (an NHS surgeon) routinely appeared on Galloway's popular Mother Of All Talkshows as the "MOATS medic" throughout the pandemic. Other prominent members have appeared on other shows hosted by Galloway.

One reason Galloway may have grown closer to the party over time—and the party to him—is that he found he held common ground with the party's line on several issues. Crucially, his anti-EU stance coming up to the Brexit referendum, and the defence of the results of that referendum. In addition, both Galloway and the CPGB-ML hold positive views of Venezuela, in particular Hugo Chavez—whom Galloway considers a close friend and had been on the campaign trail with.

Center for Political Innovation

Joti Brar, Vice Chair, has historically associated with and aligned with the Center for Political Innovation, a United States-based organisation, with a cult-of personality surrounding their leader Caleb Maupin. Brar, in a talks with Caleb Maupin has gone as far as to say, in answer to a question about what Maupin calls the "transgenderism issue" that she opposes "the ideology that's being pushed on people that says you are what you think", claiming that it is "total idealism". She here completely ignores the irony of slandering trans existence as idealist when she is in the process of practising non-materialism by omitting and disregarding the vast bodies of research and dialectical material study upholding trans existence (see LGBT+) and the constructed nature of so-called "biological gender" what Brar accepts as reality without question - a total contradiction of the principle of "No Investigation, No Right to Speak" which Comrade Mao Zedong outlined in his 1930 Essay, Oppose Book Worship.

She also, supported by Maupin, says of trans women's expression that "we'll be happy to see it disappear into history".

Structure

The CPGB-ML is organized under the principles of democratic centralism. The Party Congress is the supreme authority of the party and meets at least once every four years. Most party resolutions only require a 50% vote to pass, but changes to the party rules or programme require 75%. If the party has 500 full members or less, all members may attend the party congress. If it has between 501 and 5,000 members, the congress has one representative for every ten members. If it has over 5,000 members, there is one representative for every 25 members. The Party Congress elects a Central Committee consisting of a Chair, two Vice-Chairs, and at least 15 other members.

Local organizations

The lowest level of party organization is the study group, which meets weekly. The Central Committee may establish Regional or City Committees for areas with multiple study groups.

Domestic positions

The party defends the television network RT because of the role it plays in counter-propaganda against mainstream media, using the specific example of its coverage of the Syrian civil war.

Criticism

Dismissal of LGBT rights as "LGBT ideology"

In its 8th Congress of 2018, the CPGB-ML put forward a motion claiming that "obsession with identity politics, including sexual politics, is anti-Marxian", in opposition to what they call "LGBT ideology". CPGB-ML justifies this view on the argument that the LGBT struggle is opposed to class politics, as the number of transgender people is "statistically so small as to be insignificant", and that transgender activists want to encourage children to be trans, a common reactionary stance promoted by chauvinists and fascists.

The central committee of the party is openly anti-trans due to its position that gender and biological sex are synonymous and "common sense", a position against historical-materialist understanding of gender. A 70-page pamphlet written by Ranjeet Brar, Edward Renyard, and Joti Brar titled Identity politics and the transgender trend: where is LGBT ideology taking us? confuses the LGBT struggle with the liberal appropriation of that struggle. The pamphlet claims that "it is not gender that alienates men from women, it is our social relations", completely oblivious to the fact that gender is a historical social construct, and that the existence of trans people even precedes the use of the term. Overall, this approach is a form of right-opportunism that has repackaged bourgeois political lines as being of a Marxist character, fundamentally distorting the party line away from a materially-based analysis of gender.

Opposition to self-determination for Scotland and Wales

The party opposes the right of the Scottish and Welsh people to self-determination, preferring them to remain under English sovereignty despite the movements for independence in both constituent countries. The party refers to these movements as "petty nationalist fantasies" and pushes for Britain to remain united, equating the peoples in all of Britain as the same people and neglects to mention atrocities committed against the Scottish and Welsh by the English since this "union".

Published works

Listed in order of appearance on the party's website.

Party pamphlets

• Party Programme and Rules
• The Rise and Fall of Project Corbyn
• Identity Politics and the Transgender Trend
• Zionism: A Racist, Antisemitic and Reactionary Tool of Imperialism
• Claudia Jones, Communist
• A Class Analysis of Britain at the Start of the 21st Century
• The Drive to War Against Russia and China
• The Soviet Victory Over Fascism
• World War One: An Interimperialist War
• Revisionism and the Demise of the USSR
• Capitalism and Immigration
• The 1926 General Strike
• NATO’s Predatory War Against Yugoslavia
• 60th Anniversary of the Victory Over Fascism

Harpal Brar books

Main article: Harpal Brar

• Socialism with Chinese Characteristics: Marketisation of the Chinese economy
• Inquilab Zindabad! India’s Liberation Struggle
• Imperialism and the Worst-Ever Crisis of Overproduction
• Imperialism and War
• Imperialism: The Eve of the Social Revolution of the Proletariat
• Chimurenga! The Liberation Struggle in Zimbabwe
• Imperialism in the Middle East
• Marxism and the Emancipation of Women
• Bourgeois Nationalism or Proletarian Internationalism?
• Imperialism: decadent, parasitic, moribund capitalism
• Social Democracy – the Enemy Within
• Trotskyism or Leninism?
• Perestroika: the Complete Collapse of Revisionism

Stalin Society pamphlets

Main article: Stalin Society

• Stalin Society Magazine | issue 01
• Lies about the Soviet Union
• The Soviet Union at War
• Life in the Soviet Union