French Communist Party

French Communist Party Parti communiste français
Abbreviation	PCF
Secretary	Fabien Roussel
Founders	Ludovic-Oscar Frossard Fernand Loriot Boris Souvarine Marcel Cachin Hồ Chí Minh
Founded	1920 December 30
Split from	SFIO
Headquarters	2, place du Colonel Fabien, Paris, France
Newspaper	L'Humanité
Student wing	Union of Communist Students
Youth wing	Mouvement Jeunes Communistes de France
Political orientation	Communism Eurocommunism Democratic socialism
European affiliation	Party of the European Left
International affiliation	IMCWP Cominform (1947–1956) Comintern (1920—1943)
Anthem	The Internationale
National Assembly	8 / 577
Senate	14 / 348
European Parliament	0 / 74
Presidency of Regional Councils	0 / 17
Presidency of Departmental Councils	0 / 95
Website
https://www.pcf.fr

The French Communist Party (PCF) is a communist party in France. It was founded in 1920 by members of the French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO).

In 2012, the PCF had 138,000 members, making it the third largest party in France in terms of membership after The Republicans (LR) and the Socialist Party (PS). It has participated in three governments: the provisional government of the Liberation (1944–1947), at the beginning of François Mitterrand's presidency (1981–1984), and in the Plural Left cabinet led by Lionel Jospin (1997–2002).

History

The headquarters of the PCF in Paris

In 1920, during the Tours Congress of the socialist French Section of the Workers' International, a resolution was adopted by the majority of the SFIO to join the Comintern and become a truly revolutionary party. However, the opportunist leadership of the party wished to remain in the equally opportunist Second International, which led to a split in which the majority of the party left and formed the French Communist Party.

Following its founding, the PCF spent the 1920s growing as a party, helped by the advice of the Comintern and Vladimir Lenin, and successfully managed to strengthen its ties to the masses whilst purging its social democratic and anarchosyndicalist factions. Pierre Semard became general secretary in 1924 and for the rest of the 1920s the party focussed on building a united front for socialism and opposing French imperialist actions such as anti-Soviet aggression and colonialist wars in Morocco and Syria.

Maurice Thorez became general secretary in 1930 and in the 1930s with the threat of fascism and war looming, the PCF formed a united front with the SFIO and other socialist parties to organize the Popular Front. In the 1936 elections the PCF received 1.5 million votes and the Popular Front came to power from 1936 to 1938, though the PCF itself did not participate in this government. The PCF was banned by the French government on September 26, 1939 and went underground, but when France was occupied by Nazi Germany during the Second World War, the PCF played a leading role in the resistance, losing 75,000 members throughout the war.

After the war, the PCF was one of France's largest and most popular parties due to its role in the resistance and for that period received over 20% of the vote in elections. The PCF was included in government from 1944 to 1947, with Thorez as Deputy Prime Minister, and succeeded in passing some minor reforms before the government removed all communists from office in May 1947 due to pressure from the United States.