Abstract
In June 1976 George Matthews, the Communist Party of Great Britain’s head of press and publicity, received a letter from Gordon McLennan, the party’s general secretary, in which Matthews was invited to meet with a film maker from Granada Television, Roger Graef. The point of the meeting, which Matthews agreed to, was to film the Communist Party during preparations for its 35th Congress in 1977, where it would debate an important change of rule. The resultant television programme, ‘Decision British Communism’, a three-part series that aired in Summer 1978, has received scant historical attention. Drawing on the party’s own archives, this article places the ‘Decision’ programme in the broader historical context of the party’s decline. It argues that in allowing a TV crew inside its clandestine world, the Communist Party actually demonstrated the very reasons for its own marginality.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
The best account of this is MacLeod (1997). Unfortunately, and by coincidence, the party’s general secretary, Harry Pollitt, had retired just before these problems materialised. His successor, John Gollan, lacked not only Pollitt’s longevity, but arguably his charisma.
Referring to Saville and Thompson’s decision, Gollan had the following to say: ‘In defiance of party practice they have published a cyclostyled bulletin, which they say shall come out bi-monthly, and in which they present us with a hatch-pot of muddled thinking, but all intended as an attack on the party and a face-saver for those tender-souled colleagues who are incapable of standing up “against the grain” ’ (see CP/CENT/GOLL/02/03 1956).
Particularly, Dave Cook was the party’s national organiser; Sue Slipman, of the party’s Executive Committee and the Marxism Today editorial board; Martin Jacques, editor of Marxism Today; Sarah Benton, as editor of Comment in 1978; and the historian Eric Hobsbawn.
The extreme hard-line faction within the CPGB, Sid French and the Surrey district, seceded from the party at this point, in complete opposition to even the debate that was occurring around the new line.
In the event, at the 35th Congress the term ‘broad democratic alliance’ (and the Eurocommunist position) triumphed.
Marxism Today began to increase its readership, even from outside the party.
References
Andrews, G. (2004) Endgames and New Times: The Final Years of British Communism 1964-1991. London: Lawrence and Wishart.
Branson, N. (1997) The History of the Communist Party of Great Britain, 1941–1951. London: Lawrence and Wishart.
Broadbridge, S. (1977) The Politics of Rank and Fileism, Marxism Today August: 125–129.
Callaghan, J. and Harker, B. (2011) British Communism: A Documentary History. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press.
Callaghan, J. (2004) Industrial militancy, 1945-79: The failure of the British Road to Socialism? Twentieth Century British History 15 (4): 388–409.
Callaghan, J. (2005) The plan to capture the Labour Party and its paradoxical results. Journal of Contemporary History 40 (4): 707–725.
‘Card Check’ (1972) CP/CENT/ORG/19/04.
CPGB (1962) (CP/CENT/PUB/01/03) Our Party on the Air, 2 August.
Daily Mail (1978) Red scare 29 July. A collection of these reviews are in CP/CENT/MATT/06/08.
Daily Mail (1978) Are they boring their way to power? 2 August.
Devine, P. (1975) Inflation and Marxist Theory, Marxism Today March: 79–92.
Falber, R. (1978) The world about us. Comment 27 (May): 165–171.
Financial Times (1978) 26 July.
Gollan, J. (1954) The British Political System. London: Lawrence and Wishart.
Granada (1976) Rule for Filming U/D CP/CENT/COMM/04/05.
Hobsbawn, E. and Stedman Jones, G. (1986) 1956, Marxism Today November: 16–23.
‘Issue of Cards’ (1976) CP/CENT/PUB/01/03.
Jessop, B (1980) The Gramsci Debate, Marxism Today February: 23–25.
Letter from Ramelson to Matthews (1976) 1 June, (CP/CENT/COMM/04/05).
Letter from John Gollan to BBC (1964) 18 March (CP/CENT/PUB/03/09). ‘National Conference of Workplace Branches’, U/D, (CP/CENT/ORG/19/04).
MacLeod, A. (1997) The Death of Uncle Joe. Rendlesham: Merlin Press.
Observer (1978) 30 July Television.
Rettie, J. (2006) How Khrushchev leaked his secret speech to the world. History Workshop Journal 62 (1): 187–193.
‘Rules for Filming’. U/D, (CP/CENT/COMM/04/05).
Samuel, R. (2006) The Lost World of British Communism. London: Verso. This is also serialised on the website of New Left Review.
Simon, R. (1977) ‘Gramsci’s Concept of Hegemony’ Marxism Today March: 78–86.
The Sunday Times Reds in their own beds (1978) 23 July.
Thompson, W. (1992) The Good Old Cause: British Communism, 1920–1991. London: Pluto.
Time Out (1978) 21–27 July 1978.
Tribune (1978) When Granada’s cameras went behind the scenes-was this communism with a human face? 4 August.
TV Times (1978) The novice nun who changed her habit for a red flag, 28 July.
Telegraph (1978) Revolutionary zeal gets bogged down, 2 August.
Watters, F. (1992) Being Frank. London: Monkspring.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Buckley, S. Division British communism? Televising the decline of the Communist Party of Great Britain. Br Polit 9, 494–503 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1057/bp.2014.14
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/bp.2014.14