The Marxist Group was an early

Trotskyist Trotskyism is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Ukrainian-Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky and some other members of the Left Opposition and Fourth International. Trotsky self-identified as an orthodox Marxist, a ...

group in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

History

Its origins lay in the Communist League, one of the first Trotskyist groups in the country.

Leon Trotsky Lev Davidovich Bronstein. ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky; uk, link= no, Лев Давидович Троцький; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trotskij'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky''. (), was a Russian ...

advised the group to enter the

Independent Labour Party The Independent Labour Party (ILP) was a British political party of the left, established in 1893 at a conference in Bradford, after local and national dissatisfaction with the Liberals' apparent reluctance to endorse working-class candidates ...

(ILP), which had just disaffiliated from the Labour Party. He believed that the group should work for a "

Bolshevik The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...

transformation of the party". The majority of the Communist League argued against joining the ILP in favour of maintaining an open party, but allowed thirty of its members led by

Denzil Dean Harber Denzil Dean Harber (25 January 1909, Streatham, – 31 August 1966) was an early United Kingdom, British Trotskyist leader and later in his life a prominent British ornithologist. Denzil Dean Harber was born at 25 Fairmile Avenue, Streatham ...

to form a secretive "Bolshevik-Leninist Fraction" in the ILP. This difference in orientation essentially split the party, and in November 1934, sixty Trotskyist ILPers officially formed the Marxist Group. While, perhaps due to this delay and infighting, the Group never achieved the influence hoped for by Trotsky, it did win new members, including

C. L. R. James Cyril Lionel Robert James (4 January 1901 – 31 May 1989),Fraser, C. Gerald, '' The New York Times'', 2 June 1989. who sometimes wrote under the pen-name J. R. Johnson, was a Trinidadian historian, journalist and Marxist. His works are i ...

, who in 1937 dedicated his book

World Revolution World revolution is the Marxist concept of overthrowing capitalism in all countries through the conscious revolutionary action of the organized working class. For theorists, these revolutions will not necessarily occur simultaneously, but whe ...

to the group.

Ted Grant Edward Grant (born Isaac Blank; 9 July 1913 – 20 July 2006) was a South African Trotskyist who spent most of his adult life in Britain. He was a founding member of the group Militant and later Socialist Appeal. Early life Grant's father had s ...

also joined the organisation, having moved from

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

. By the ILP Conference of 1935, it claimed a similar strength to the

Revolutionary Policy Committee {{Use dmy dates, date=April 2022 The Revolutionary Policy Committee (RPC) was a faction within the former British political party, the Independent Labour Party (ILP). The RPC was formed in 1931 by members of the ILP who were especially unhappy wit ...

, which was sympathetic to the Communist Party of Great Britain. However the same year a group (including Grant and Harber) split to work inside the Labour Party's Labour League of Youth, initially as the "Bolshevik-Leninist Group" and then as the

Militant Group The Militant Group was an early British Trotskyist group, formed in 1935 by Denzil Dean Harber, former leader of the entrist Marxist Group in the ILP, as a separate entrist group inside the Labour Party. Initially known as the Bolshevik-Leni ...

. The Marxist Group soon realised that the ILP did not have mass influence outside

Glasgow Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popul ...

, and sent John Archer to check the actual strength of the party around the country. Trotsky proposed drawing up a manifesto around a militant programme, including a call for a

Fourth International The Fourth International (FI) is a revolutionary socialist international organization consisting of followers of Leon Trotsky, also known as Trotskyists, whose declared goal is the overthrowing of global capitalism and the establishment of ...

, and requesting signatures to see how much influence the Group had. While the Group was unable to reach a decision on this, at the 1936 ILP Conference, none of its

motion In physics, motion is the phenomenon in which an object changes its position with respect to time. Motion is mathematically described in terms of displacement, distance, velocity, acceleration, speed and frame of reference to an observer and m ...

s were passed. Because these motions included a clear call for the Fourth International, many members of the Group were expelled from the ILP, including James. James then convinced the remainder of his organisation to exit the ILP. Outside the ILP, the Group began working again with the Marxist League (as the Communist League was now called), and in early 1938 the two joined to form the Revolutionary Socialist League, into which the Militant Group fused later the same year.

References

{{reflist * Sam Bornstein and Al Richardson, ''Against the Stream''. Independent Labour Party Political parties established in 1934 Political parties disestablished in 1938 Defunct Trotskyist organisations in the United Kingdom 1934 establishments in the United Kingdom 1938 disestablishments in the United Kingdom