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Organisation and Structure of the Communist Party

Guidelines on the Organizational Structure of Communist Parties, on the Methods and Content of their Work Adopted at the 24th Session of the Third Congress of the Communist International, 12 July 1921
 

 

IX. LEGAL AND ILLEGAL ACTIVITY 

 

53. The party must be so organised that it shall always be in a position to adapt itself quickly to all the changes that may occur in the conditions of the struggles. The Communist Party must develop into a militant organisation capable of avoiding fight in the open against overwhelming forces of the enemy, concentrated upon a given point, but on the other hand, the very concentration of the enemy must be so utilised as to attack him on the spot where he least suspects it. It would be the greatest mistake for the Party organisation to stake everything upon rebellion and street-fighting or only upon condition of severe repression. Communists perfect their preliminary revolutionary work in every situation on a basis of preparedness, for it is frequently next to impossible to foresee the changeable wave of stormy and calm periods and even in cases it might be possible, this foresight cannot be made use of in many cases for reorganisation, because the change, as a rule, comes quickly and frequently quite suddenly. 
 

54. The legal Communist Parties of the capitalist countries usually fail to grasp all the importance of the task before the Party to be properly prepared for the armed struggle, or the illegal fight in general. Communist organisations often commit the error of depending on a permanent legal basis for their existence and of conducting their work according to the needs of the legal task.
 

On the other hand, illegal parties often fail to make use of all the possibilities of legal activities towards the building up of a Party organisation which would have constant intercourse with the revolutionary masses. Underground organisations which ignore these vital truths run the risks of becoming merely groups of conspirators wasting their labours in futile tasks. 
 

Both these tendencies are erroneous. Every legal Communist organisation must know how to insure for itself complete preparedness for an underground existence, and above all for revolutionary outbreaks. Every illegal Communist organisation must, on the other hand, make the fullest use of the possibilities offered by the legal labour movement, in order to become, by means of intensive Party activity, the organised and real leader of the great revolutionary masses. 
 

55. Both among legalized and underground Party circles, there is a tendency for the unlegalised Communist organisational activity to evolve into the compartment of establishment and maintenance of a illegal from legal purely military organisation isolated from the rest of the party organisation and activity. This is absolutely erroneous. On the contrary, during the pre-revolutionary period, the formation of our militant organisations must be mainly accomplished through the general work of the Communist Party. The entire Party must be developed into a militant organisation for the revolution. 
 

Isolated revolutionary military organisations, prematurely created in a pre-revolutionary period, are apt to show tendencies towards dissolution because of the lack of direct and useful Party work. 
 

56. It is of course imperative for an illegal party to protect its members and Party organs from being found out by the authorities, and to avoid every possibility of facilitating such discovery by registration, careless collection, by contribution and injudicious distribution of revolutionary material. For these reasons, it cannot use frank organisational methods to the same extent as the legal Party. It can nevertheless, through practice, acquire more and more proficiency in this matter. 
 

On the other hand, a legal mass Party must be fully prepared for illegal work and periods of struggle. It must never relax its preparations for any eventualities (viz. it must have safe hiding places for duplicates of members' files and must, in most cases, destroy correspondence, put important documents into safe keeping and must provide conspirative training for its messengers). 
 

It is assumed, the circles of the legal as well as the illegal Parties, that the illegal organisations must be in the nature of a rather exclusive, entirely military institution, occupying within the Party a position of splendid isolation. This assumption is quite erroneous. The formation of our fighting organisation in the pre-revolutionary period must depend principally on the general Communist Party work. The entire Party must be made into a fighting organisation for the revolution. 
 

57. Therefore, our general Party work must be apportioned in a manner which would ensure, already in pre-revolutionary period, the foundation and consolidation of a fighting organisation, commensurate with the needs of the revolution. It is of the greatest importance that the directing body of the Communist Party should be guided, in its entire activity, by the revolutionary requirement and that it should endeavour, as far as possible, to gain a clear idea of what these are likely to be. This is naturally not an easy matter, but that should not be a reason for leaving out of consideration this very important point of Communist organisational leadership. 
 

Even the best organised Party would be faced with very difficult and complicated tasks if it had to undergo great functionary changes in a period of open revolutionary risings. It is quite possible that our political Party will be called upon to mobilize, in a few days, its forces for the revolutionary struggle. Probably it will have to mobilize, in addition to the Party forces, their reserves, the sympathizing organisations, viz., the unorganised revolutionary masses. The formation of a regular Red Army is as yet out of the question. We must conquer without a previously organised army through the masses under the leadership of the Party. For this reason even the most determined effort would not succeed should our Party not be well-prepared and organised for such an eventuality. 
 

58. One has probably seen that the revolutionary central directive bodies have proved unable to cope with revolutionary situations. The proletariat has generally been able to achieve great revolutionary organisation as far as minor tasks are concerned, but there has nearly always been disorder, confusion and chaos at headquarters. Sometimes there has been a lack of even the most elementary “apportioning” of work. The intelligence department is often so badly organised that it does more harm than good. There is no reliance on postal and other communications. All secret postal and transport arrangements, secret quarter and printing works are generally at the mercy of lucky or unlucky circumstances and afford fine opportunities for the “agent provocateurs” of the enemy forces. 
 

These defects cannot be remedied unless the Party organises a special branch in its administration for this particular work. The military intelligence service requires practice and special training and knowledge. The same may be said of the secret work directed against the political police. It is only through long practice that the satisfactory secret department can be created. For all these specialized revolutionary work, every legal Communist Party must make preparations, no matter how small. In most cases a such secret apparatus may be created by means of perfectly legal activity. 
 

For instance it is quite possible to establish secret postal and transport communications by a code system through the judiciously arranged distribution of legal leaflets and through correspondence in the press. 

 

59. The Communist organiser must look upon every member of the Party and every revolutionary worker as a prospective soldier in the future revolutionary army. For this reason he must allot him a place which will fit him for his future role. His present activity must take the form of useful service, necessary for present Party work, and not mere drilling, which the practical worker of today rejects. One must also not forget that this kind of activity is, for every Communist, the best preparation for the exigencies of the final struggle.