CHNN 22, Spring 2008 - School of Social Sciences

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Figure b3. Index of CPGB Membership, by geography, 1967-1989 (1967=100) Source: CP Membership campaign returns (some undated, handwritten), sampled biennially: CP Archive (Manchester) CP/CENT/ORG/19/01-04. 20
Concluding Remarks Without further investigation, it is impossible to draw conclusions from these figures. But it is tempting to speculate. One speculation is this; that the decline in membership figures after the mid-1970s may have been largely generational. The fall does not seem to have related directly to political events (like 1968 – or even, in the long term, 1956); but it could be credibly explained by mortality. If many members had joined in the 1930s and early 1940s (aged, perhaps, in their early twenties), 4 and if that group represented the core of the loyal membership of the party, the sad truth is, that by 1975, it is actuarially probable that they would have started to die, in increasing numbers. Given mortality rates for manual workers, who made up much of the party’s core membership, especially in the large industrial districts, a sharp decline in membership in those areas could have been accounted for by mortality alone, especially for men aged 65 and over. (If, by contrast, many of the doughty Cornish and Devonian members were drawn from middle-class groups such as teachers, with higher life expectancies, the relative out-performance of the West Country in terms of membership retention, might also be partly explained.) Similar patterns – though this is not an analogy that would have appealed to the party – can be seen in the 1970s’ sales figures for soap-powders, where old brands (adopted by consumers early in their married lives) were, by 1976, dying along with their loyal users. 5 Harold Carter, St John’s College, Oxford haroldcarter@mac.com Gabriel Silkstone-Carter, Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge Harold Carter is working on the changing political economy British cities between 1945 and the present day; he is especially interested in the political and social impact of fifty years of social-democratic intervention in housing and planning, in the context of de-industrialisation. As part of this project he has written detailed histories of Southwark and of Sheffield, and he is currently working on the rise of the left in Sheffield before 1984. Gabriel Silkstone-Carter is writing on the role of the Communist Party in the 1972 Miners' Strike in Kent. They would be very interested to hear from anyone with information (especially personal reminiscences) relating to these topics. Notes 1 All our sources are loose documents in the box CP/CENT/ORG/19 (folders /01 to /04), in the Communist Party Archive in the People’s History Museum Manchester. There is an un-sourced part typed and part handwritten document, in folder 19/04 of that box, which gives annual membership totals for the party but no regional breakdown; these totals cross-check with the figures we report. The maximum divergence between the two totals is 5% of the total membership (in 1957), and the figures for other years agree closely. On 10 occasions the divergence is 2% or less, and on two others it is 3%. 2 We have also reported numerically, though not graphically, three bench-mark years (1945, 1955, and 1957) because rather comprehensive data are available for those years (and we would like to draw attention to them), and because 1945 in particular represented a strong year for party membership (presumably, partly reflecting the popularity of the USSR as a wartime ally, and partly reflecting the continuing political activity of the CPGB at a time when Labour Party activism was muted by the exigencies of war). 3 In the graphs, 1987 has been inserted as an average of 1985 and 1989, since no data were available in the file for 1986, 1987, or 1988. The graphs are available in coloured-in form (which is easier to read) in the online version of the Newsletter. 4 Party membership peaked, at 56,000, in 1942, according to the unsourced document in file CP/CENT/ORG/19/04, which we have no reason to believe to be inaccurate. 5 Author’s notes; presentation by Proctor and Gamble Ltd, Newcastle, 1975. 21
Page 1 and 2: C O M M U N I S T H I S T O R Y N E
Page 3 and 4: Contents ANNOUNCEMENT New journal:
Page 5 and 6: Announcement New journal: From the
Page 7 and 8: C ommunism was one of the defining
Page 9 and 10: Thesis reports The Communist Party
Page 11 and 12: the party still viewed the issue of
Page 13 and 14: sending the President of the Board
Page 15 and 16: Research note Regional Membership F
Page 17 and 18: Figure 2. 1955 Membership Data, and
Page 19: Figure b2. Membership Totals, biann
Page 23 and 24: a major factor in his decision, on
Page 25 and 26: to climb over the wall because I co
Page 27 and 28: with Cole there sort of presiding.
Page 29 and 30: epudiated, and you apologise to Tit
Page 31 and 32: direction and this reinforced my de
Page 33 and 34: one accepted the term, there were d
Page 35 and 36: She last visited the museum in Apri
Page 37 and 38: Don’t forget that this was post-S
Page 39 and 40: else. The party there was far more
Page 41 and 42: tended to be a bit broader. Eddie g
Page 43 and 44: they were marched out and the doors
Page 45 and 46: publicity, without caring a fig for
Page 47 and 48: would not have known this. Or would
Page 49 and 50: In his synopsis for an autobiograph
Page 51 and 52: to entirely go along with Cohen’s
Page 53 and 54: party represented the more recent t
Page 55 and 56: Jim Riordan: The Last British Comra
Page 57 and 58: there, and eaten them. There is to
Page 59 and 60: Sobhanlal Datta Gupta. Comintern an
Page 61 and 62: IWW Bibliography A century of writi
Page 63 and 64: Werstein, Irving. Pie In the Sky: A
Page 65 and 66: Sellars, Nigel Anthony. Oil, Wheat
Page 67 and 68: pages. A complete biography. Smith
Page 69 and 70: Queensland Press, 1988, illus., 252
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Lewis, Austin. The Militant Proleta
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ut critical of their failure to res
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Burke, Fielding (pseud. for Olive T
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Smedley, Agnes. Daughter of Earth.
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CHNN 22, Spring 2008 - School of Social Sciences

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