Communist Party Historians Group

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The Communist Party Historians' Group (CPHG) was a subdivision of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) that formed a highly influential cluster of British Marxist historians. The Historians' Group developed social history, which was popularised in the 1960s with "history from below" approach described by E. P. Thompson. During the heyday of the Historians' Group, from 1946 until 1956, notable members included Thompson, Christopher Hill, Eric Hobsbawm, Raphael Samuel, as well as non-academics like A. L. Morton and Brian Pearce. The Historians' Group arose at the University of Cambridge in the 1930s under the encouragement of the economist Maurice Dobb.[1]

## Aims and methods

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In their work we can read two definite aims:

1. to seek out a popular revolutionary tradition that could inspire contemporary activists; and yet
2. to apply a Marxist economic approach which placed an emphasis on social conditions rather than supposed "Great Men".

This dualism was represented by Marx and Engels' dictum that "men make their own history, but they do not do so in conditions of their own choosing", which is regularly paraphrased in CPHG members' texts.

Revisiting and reinstating popular agency in the narrative of British history required originality and determination in the research process, to draw out marginal voices from texts in which they were barely mentioned or active. The techniques influenced both feminist historians and the Subaltern Studies Group, writing the histories of marginalised groups.

## Heyday (1939-1956)

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Although the Historians' Group did not officially exist until 1946, it began informally before the Second World War.[2] The most consequential achievement of the Historians' Group as a result of this period was the development of social history, a field of history that gained prominence in the 1960s with the publication of Thompson's The Making of the English Working Class. Although Thompson's Marxism waned over the course of his career and he would eventually distance himself from structural Marxism, underlying social history ("history from below") is historical materialism.[1][3]

In 1952 several of the members founded the influential social history journal Past and Present. Another major journal, the History Workshop Journal, also arose from the Historians' Group.

## Post-Hungarian Uprising (1956-1991)

[edit]

The group had been losing members during the Cold War, but lost many more prominent members due to events that shook the Global Communist movement in 1956. First was Khrushchev's Secret Speech, which stunned many diehards and led to discussions in parties around the world about the crimes of Stalin. Instead of this leading to loosening up of the system in the Eastern Bloc it helped trigger the Hungarian Uprising, the brutality of the Soviet invasion disgusted a great many party members who abandoned hope in peaceful reform. The year 1956 thus had several key factors that precipitated something of a sea change in international Marxist opinion. Many figures went on to become prominent in the New Left, especially Samuel, Saville and Thompson. Others stayed in the party, most notably Eric Hobsbawm, who remained in the group, which in 1956 launched a quarterly monograph series "Our History". As the CP History Group, it continued until the CPGB's dissolution at the end of 1991, and even managed to increase its membership and output of publications at a time when the CPGB itself was in terminal decline.

## Socialist History Society (1991-present)

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In early 1992 it reconstituted itself as the Socialist History Society (SHS), and made full membership available to anybody regardless of party affiliation. The SHS now publishes a twice-yearly journal Socialist History and a series of monographs called "Occasional Papers".

## Notable members

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* Maurice Dobb
* Christopher Hill
* Rodney Hilton
* Charles Hobday
* Eric Hobsbawm
* Victor Kiernan
* Stephen Finney Mason
* A. L. Morton
* George Rudé
* Raphael Samuel
* John Saville
* Dorothy Thompson
* E. P. Thompson
* Dona Torr

## Bibliography

[edit]

* Kaye, Harvey J., The British Marxist Historians: an introductory analysis, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1984.
* Hobsbawm, Eric. The Historians’ Group of the Communist Party, Verso Books, 9 June 2023, https://www.versobooks.com/en-gb/blogs/news/the-historians-group-of-the-communist-party.

## References

[edit]

1. ^ a b Coventry, C. J. (January 2023). Keynes From Below: A Social History of Second World War Keynesian Economics (PhD thesis). Federation University Australia.
2. ^ Eric Hobsbawm, “The Historians’ Group of the Communist Party,” 9 June 2023, Verso Books, https://www.versobooks.com/en-gb/blogs/news/the-historians-group-of-the-communist-party.
3. ^ E. P. Thompson, “History from Below,” Times Literary Supplement, 7 April 1966, 279

## External links

[edit]

* Socialist History Society
* Selection of CPHG publications

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Communist Party of Great Britain

Leadership|

| General Secretaries|

* Albert Inkpin (1920–1928)
* J. R. Campbell (1929)
* Harry Pollitt (1929–1939)
* Rajani Palme Dutt (1939–1941)
* Harry Pollitt (1941–1956)
* John Gollan (1956–1975)
* Gordon McLennan (1975–1989)
* Nina Temple (1989–1991)

|

Assistant General Secretaries|

* Fred Peet (1920–1922)
* John Gollan (1947–1949)
* George Matthews (1949–1956)
* Bill Wainwright (1956-59)
* Bill Alexander (1959–1967)
* Reuben Falber (1968–1979)

Chairs|

* Arthur MacManus (1920–1927)
* Willie Gallacher (1943–1956)
* Harry Pollitt (1956–1960)
* Frank Stanley (1964–1967)
* Tony Chater (1968–1969)
* John Tocher (1969–1971)
* Irene Swann (1972–1974)
* Mick McGahey (1974–1979)
* Ron Halverson (1980s)
* George Bolton (1980s–1990)

National Organisers|

* Tom Bell (1920–1921)
* Bob Stewart (1921–1923)
* Harry Pollitt (1923)
* Idris Cox (1930s)
* R. W. Robson (1930s)
* Dave Springhall (1940–1943)
* Peter Kerrigan (1943–1951)
* Mick Bennett (1951–1954)
* John Gollan (1954–1956)
* Bill Lauchlan (1956–1966)
* Gordon McLennan (1966–1975)
* Dave Cook (1975–1981)
* Ian McKay (1982–1991)

National Industrial Organisers|

* Ernie Woolley (1925–)
* Finlay Hart (1937–1939)
* Peter Kerrigan (1939–1942)
* George Allison (1942–1951)
* Peter Kerrigan (1951–1966)
* Bert Ramelson (1965–1978)
* Mick Costello (1979–1982)
* Pete Carter (1982–1991)

History|

* Foundation Congress
* Campbell Case
* Zinoviev letter
* Mass trespass of Kinder Scout
* British Battalion
* 1945 general election

Publications|

* Marxism Today
* Morning Star
* Workers' Weekly

Associated groups|

* Communist Party Historians Group
* Jersey Communist Party
* Democratic Left
* National Minority Movement
* National Unemployed Workers' Movement
* New Politics Network
* New Times
* Straight Left
* Young Communist League
* Connolly Association

Predecessors|

* British Socialist Party
* Communist Labour Party
* Communist Party (British Section of the Third International)
* Communist Unity Group
* South Wales Socialist Society

Splits|

* Communist Party of Britain
* Appeal Group
* Committee to Defeat Revisionism, for Communist Unity
* Communist League
* Communist Party of Britain (Marxist–Leninist)
* Communist Party of Great Britain (PCC)
* Workers' Socialist Federation
* Fife Socialist League
* New Communist Party of Britain
* New Left
* Revolutionary Marxist–Leninist League

Other topics|

* Britain's Road to Socialism
* British left
* Election results
* Far-left politics in the United Kingdom
* Members of Parliament
* Percy Glading
* Tankie

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British New Left

General|

* Communist Party Historians Group (Communist Party of Great Britain)
* Hungarian Revolution of 1956
* Revisionism
* Marxist humanism
* Cultural studies
* Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies
* Partisan Coffee House
* Socialist Society
* Socialist Movement

Figures|

* E. P. Thompson
* John Saville
* Stuart Hall
* Raymond Williams
* Richard Hoggart
* Perry Anderson
* Tom Nairn
* Peter Worsley
* Ralph Miliband
* Raphael Samuel
* Rodney Hilton
* Robin Blackburn
* Tariq Ali
* Catherine Hall
* Sheila Rowbotham
* Dick Hebdige
* Jeffrey Weeks

Organisations|

* The Angry Brigade
* Big Flame
* British Black Panthers
* Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
* Gay Left
* International Marxist Group
* International Socialists (UK)
* King Mob

Major influences|

* Antonio Gramsci
* Louis Althusser
* Frankfurt School
* Isaac Deutscher
* Harold Laski
* C. Wright Mills
* Talcott Parsons
* Iris Murdoch

Publications|

* New Reasoner
* Universities and Left Review
* New Left Review
* Socialist Register
* Radical Philosophy
* Soundings

Related articles|

* Far-left politics in the United Kingdom
* Anti-Stalinist left
* Eurocommunism
* UK underground
* Counterculture

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