International Marxist Group

The International Marxist Group is a British Trotskyite revolutionary group affiliated to the Fourth International. Its broad aims are the overthrow of imperialist capitalism followed be the setting up of a government based on direct democratic control by the people.

The International Marxist Group, the official Trotskyist section of the Fourth International, Unified Sectretariat, emerged in the mid 1960s from work around the journal The Week. Its broad aims are the overthrow of capitalist power by revolution and the overthrow of Stalinist state capitalism followed by the setting up of a government based on direct democratic control by the people. It started off as an entryist group working within the Labour Party. In 1968 it broke away to pursue an independent path and has since gone through a succession of phases. In 1977 its newspaper the Socialist Challenge first appeared. Its membership peaked in the 1970s at around 1000 by 1983 its membership had fallen to around 700. This inability to maintain a strong stable membership caused the International Marxist Group to reconsider its relationship to the Labour Party. In the early 1980s it reverted back to entryism although it chose not to refer to its members or branches within the Labour Party instead referring to Socialist Challenge supporters. In December 1982 the Group changed its name to the Socialist League and its associated newspaper from Socialist Challenge to Socialist Action . By 1990 the circulation of Socialist Action was around 500. The organisation also appeared to operate under the name Socialist Action during the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Reference: David Widgery The Left in Britain 1956-68 (Harmondsworth, 1976.). Peter Shipley The Militant Tendency: Trotskyism in the Labour Party (Foreign Affairs Publishing Co., Surrey, 1983.).