90th Anniversary of the Communist Party in Australia

Vanguard November 2010 p. 3

This year marks the 90th anniversary of the formation of the Communist Party of Australian on 30th October 1920. The birth of the Australian communist party was a momentous event in the political development of Australia’s working class. It reflected the maturing of Australia’s working class, and a conscious recognition by its advanced section of the necessity for a politically revolutionary and independent working class party.

The young communist party set itself the task of finding the path of scientific socialism that would put an end to poverty, unemployment, homelessness, exploitation, oppression and imperialist wars. It embraced the ideas of Marx, Engels and Lenin and laid the foundations for conscious working class struggle and growth of the movement in Australia.

The Party grew out of Australia’s material conditions, and was a part of the emerging international communist movement after the Russian socialist revolution in 1917. Rapid expansion of capitalism, particularly after the 1st World War, was creating a larger and stronger working class. Intense working class battles of the previous thirty years from the early 1890s through the imperialist WW1 and its aftermath, spread and deepened the class consciousness and collective organisation of workers.

Communist Party members were in the leadership of most important working class struggles of 20th century, tirelessly working to educate, organise and mobilise the people against the burdens and suffering inflicted by the capitalist economic crisis and in defence of and improvements to wages, conditions, and the living standards of ordinary people. The Communist Party’s work deep amongst the people had a profound influence on the struggles and political consciousness of the working class and progressive movements. It would not be overstating to say that most significant mass struggles won by workers and unions were led by communists. The CPA and its members led the mass struggles against fascism in 1938-45, against imperialist war, and building international solidarity and support for workers of other countries. Overcoming personal and political hardships and difficulties in complex and hostile conditions, most communists never lost confidence in the people and the pivotal role of the Communist party in the struggles of the people.

At the time of the formation of the CPA in 1920, the movement was still in its infancy. It had many strengths but naturally also shortcomings, reflecting the historical limitations of practice and theory in the working class. Marxism-Leninism was enthusiastically embraced more as a blueprint for revolutionary change rather than a scientific guide for the working class in charting the difficult struggle for socialism in accordance with Australia’s own conditions. There was a tendency to follow the general principles and laws discovered by Marx, Engels and Lenin in a mechanical way, rather than using them as a tool and guide to action. In some ways this was inevitable. Communism in Australia had not yet accumulated practical experience and still had to acquire a deeper knowledge of science of Marxism.

Australia’s colonial history of worshipping all things foreign also influenced Australian communists’ dependency on the Soviet Union in the first 40 years. It did not undertake the task of developing the socialist theory and practice specific to Australian conditions. This required a Marxist investigation of Australian own class history and contemporary social, political and economic conditions. The growing ascendency of revisionism in the Soviet Union after the death of Stalin, and fierce struggle against it within the CPA and internationally, revealed serious mistakes that would lead to the abandonment of the heart and soul of revolutionary Marxist ideology and practice. (For more explanation see article on Revisionism in the recently published Australian Communist, Oct-Dec. 2010, the theoretical journal of Communist Party of Australia Party (Marxist-Leninist))

In 1963 the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist) was formed, with Ted Hill as the founding Chairman. The new party leadership included some of the best sons and daughters of Australia’s working class, militant union leaders and intellectuals who dedicated their lives to the struggles of the working class and ordinary people. These communists were steeled in struggle, deeply involved in the day to day battles of ordinary working people, and informed and guided by the science of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and MaoZedong.

Ted Hill led the CPA (M-L) in the scientific Marxist investigation and examination of Australian reality. Based on this Marxist investigation and study of Australian conditions and class relations, the CPA (M-L) identified the struggle for anti-imperialist, national independence as a necessary stage in Australia’s revolutionary road to socialism, and set about building a Communist Party of a new kind, a revolutionary party of Australia’s working class.

The new communist party understood that the economic and social laws of development illuminated by Marx and Engels will inevitably propel society to socialism, where the working class will take power and run society in the interests of ordinary people. Socialism will establish the material and social conditions for the next stage of classless society of communism.

The comrades of the new party upheld the communist principles of mass work, learning from the people and serving the people as the corner stone of a true communist political work. Today, its members work tirelessly amongst the people, deeply immersed in the day to day struggles of the people, taking ideas of the people, giving them political class content and taking them back to the people to be tested in practice again. They test generalities and truths revealed by Marxism, not as academic abstractions, but for the sole purpose of applying these truths to Australia’s conditions and present era.

Ted Hill, founding Chairman of the CPA (M-L) wrote in his 1989 book “Reflections on Communism in Australia”:

“The Communist Party acts with complete confidence in Australian people. Its organisation must be among the people. Its work must be in accordance with the degree of understanding of the people at a given time, and with the object of step by step raising that understanding towards an understanding of the overall social process. Whether or not people have little or much social knowledge, the job of Communists is to be with them. Communists seek to inspire the workers to develop all progressive Australian forces, win over the middle forces and isolate the handful of reactionary enemies of the people.”