Young Communist League (Great Britain)

In August 1921 two of Great Britain's leading radical youth organisations, the Young Workers' League and the International Communist Schools Movement, gathered at a special conference held at Birmingham.[2]^:45 The assembled delegates to this Unity Conference passed a proposal calling for the two standing groups to merge under a new name, that of the Young Communist League.[2]^:45 This proposal was taken to the rank-and-file of each group and the proposed unified constitution and organisational rules ratified in a referendum of branches held in October.[2]^:45

Logo of the Young Communist League as it appeared in 1923.

The YCL was the youth wing of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), which exercised oversight over the group. The YCL modeled itself upon the adult party and, in the estimation of historian Thomas Linehan, "functioned as a younger version of it."[2]^:45 In 1954, the YCL supported 'The Red Scout' Paul Garland who had been dismissed from his local Scout Group in Bristol following his dual membership - a controversy with wide media coverage and a debate in the House of Lords.[3] While formally independent, the group was always closely linked to the CPGB and its activities and fortunes broadly followed those of its parent organisation.[4] As with the adult party, the YCL saw itself as part of a unified world movement and took its ultimate direction from the Young Communist International (CYI), with headquarters in Moscow.[2]^:45

The YCL was seen as a recruiting school for activists in the adult party, and the organisation's structure, internal relationships, and tactical activities closely paralleled and followed those of the CPGB.[2]^:45-46 This was in turn a reflection of the structure and practise of the Russian Communist Party (later known as the Communist Party of the Soviet Union).[2]^:46 Similarly the Young Communist International which formally stood at the head of the YCL's decision-making process was closely modeled upon the adult Communist International, which was shaped by Russian Communist Party practice.[2]^:46

The fledgling YCL published its own official monthly periodical, known as The Young Communist.[2]^:45

A recruitment drive started in 1966 around the slogan "The Trend - Communism" associated the group with wider cultural trends in society.[4] Pete Townshend of The Who was a prominent but short-lived member and "The Trend" campaign emphasised the power of music in social change.[5] Throughout this period YCL membership grew to over 6,000 members and a generation of young members. led by Barney Davis (national secretary), George Bridges (London secretary) and others challenged the political approach of the parent party. The YCL took a lead in condemning what it defined as the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia[4] (the Party called it at the time an intervention) but the position was only adopted by a 60:40 vote. Some members who favoured a pro-Soviet line, including John Chamberlain (Jack Conrad), left the YCL to join the New Communist Party of Britain in 1977.[4] Chamberlain was to become head of the NCP's youth section but was shortly later to attempt to rejoin the CPGB.

1968 proved the start of a long decline in membership, characterised by competition between different tendencies. The leadership tended to be eurocommunist, but opposition was stronger than in the CPGB. In 1979, its congress adopted a new programme, Our Future, which did not commit the group to Marxism and removed the policy of democratic centralism. The new programme exacerbated divisions in the group, and in 1983, with membership down to 510, democratic centralism was re-imposed. By 1987, the league had only fifty members.[4]