Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia


The Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia is a communist party in the Czech Republic. It has a membership of 42,994 and is a member party of the European United Left–Nordic Green Left bloc in the European Parliament.
Along with the Party of Communists of the Republic of Moldova it is one of only two former ruling parties in post-communist Central Eastern Europe which has not dropped the communist title from its name, although it changed its party program to adhere to laws adopted after 1989. For most of the first two decades after the Velvet Revolution, the party was politically isolated and accused of extremism, but it has moved closer to the Czech Social Democratic Party. After the 2012 regional elections, it began governing in coalition with the ČSSD in 10 regions. It has never been part of a governing coalition in the executive branch, but provides parliamentary support to Andrej Babiš' Second Cabinet.
The party's youth organisation was banned from 2006 to 2010, and there have been calls from other parties to outlaw the main party. Until 2013 it was the only political party in the Czech Republic printing its own newspaper, called Haló noviny.
The party's two cherry logo comes from the song Le Temps des cerises, a revolutionary song associated with the Paris Commune.

History

The Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia was formed in 1989 by the Congress of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, which decided to create a party for the territories of Bohemia and Moravia, the areas that were to become the Czech Republic. The new party's organization was significantly more democratic and decentralized than the previous party and gave local district branches of the party significant autonomy.
In 1990, the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia was reorganized as a federation of the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia and the Communist Party of Slovakia. Later, the Communist Party of Slovakia changed its name to the Party of the Democratic Left, and the federation dissolved in 1992.
During the party's first congress, held in Olomouc in October 1990, party leader Jiří Svoboda attempted to reform the party into a democratic socialist one, proposing a democratic socialist program and changing the name to the transitional "Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia: Party of Democratic Socialism." Svoboda had to balance the criticisms of older conservative communists, who made up a majority of the party's members, with the demands of an increasingly large and moderate bloc of members, led primarily by a group of young KSČM parliamentarians called the Democratic Left, who demanded the immediate social democratization of the party. Delegates approved the new program but rejected the name change.
During 1991 and 1992 factional tensions increased, with the party's conservative anti-revisionist wing increasingly vocal in criticizing Svoboda. There was an increase in popularity of the anti-revisionist Marxist–Leninist Clubs amongst rank and file party members. On the party's other wing, the Democratic Left became increasingly critical of the slow pace of the reforms and began demanding a referendum of members to change the name. In December 1991 the Democratic Left split off and formed the short-lived Party of Democratic Labour. The referendum on changing the name was held in 1992, with 75.94% voting not to change the name.
The party's second congress, held in Kladno in December 1992, showed the increasing popularity of the party's anti-revisionist wing. It passed resolutions reinterpreting the 1990 program as a "starting point" for the KSČM, rather than a definitive statement of a post-communist program. Svoboda, who was hospitalized due to an attack by an anti-communist, could not attend the congress but was nevertheless overwhelmingly re-elected. After the party's second congress in 1992, several groups split away. A group of post-communist delegates split off and merged with the Party of Democratic Labour to form the Party of the Democratic Left. Several independent left-wing members who had participated with the KSČM in the 1992 electoral pact called the Left Bloc left the party to form the Left Bloc Party. Both groups eventually merged into the Party of Democratic Socialism, which does some joint work, and co-operates with the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia.
In 1993, Svoboda attempted to expel the members of the 'For Socialism' platform, a group in the party that wanted a restoration of the pre-1989 communist regime. However, with only the lukewarm support of the KSČM's Central Committee, he briefly resigned. He withdrew his resignation after the Central Committee agreed to move the party's next congress forward to June 1993 to resolve the issues of its name and ideology.
At the 1993 congress, held in Prostějov, Svoboda's proposals were overwhelmingly rejected by two-thirds majorities. Svoboda did not seek re-election as chairman, and neocommunist Miroslav Grebeníček was elected chairman. Grebeníček and his supporters were critical of what they termed the "inadequacies" of the pre-1989 regime but supported the retention of the party's communist character and program. The members of the 'For Socialism' platform were expelled at the congress, with the existence of "platforms" in the party being banned altogether, on the grounds that they gave too much influence to minority groups. Svoboda left the party and eventually joined the ČSSD in 1997.
The expelled members of 'For Socialism' formed the 'Party of Czechoslovak Communists', led by Miroslav Štěpán. The Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia refuses to work with this group.
The party was left on the sidelines for most of the first decade of the Czech Republic's existence. Václav Havel suspected the KSČM was still an unreconstructed Stalinist party and prevented it from having any influence during his presidency. However, the party provided the one-vote margin that elected Havel's successor Václav Klaus as president.
After a long-running battle with the Ministry of the Interior, the Communist Youth Union, the KSCM youth section led by Milan Krajča, was dissolved in 2006, allegedly for endorsing in its program the replacement of private with collective ownership of the means of production. The decision met with international protests.
In November 2008, the Senate of the Czech Republic asked the Supreme Administrative Court to dissolve the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia because of its political program, which the Senate claimed contradicted the Constitution of the Czech Republic. 30 out of the 38 senators who were present agreed to this request and expressed the view that the program of KSČM did not reject violence as a means of attaining power and adopted The Communist Manifesto of Karl Marx. However, this was only a symbolic gesture, as according to the Constitution only the Cabinet may file a petition with the Supreme Administrative Court to dissolve a political party.
For the first two decades after the end of Communist rule in Czechoslovakia, the Communist Party was politically isolated. However, after the 2012 regional elections, the party started to participate in coalitions with the Social Democrats, forming part of the ruling coalition in 10 out of 13 regions. Since 2018, the Communists have been providing parliamentary support to Andrej Babiš' Second Cabinet.

Popular support and electoral results

The KSČM's strongest bases of support are in the regions hit by deindustrialization, particularly in the Karlovy Vary and Ústí nad Labem Regions. In 2012 the party won a regional election for the first time, in Ústí nad Labem. Its regional leader Oldřich Bubeníček subsequently became the first communist regional governor in the history of Czech Republic. The party is stronger among older voters than younger voters, with the majority of the membership being over 60. The party is also stronger in small and medium-sized towns than in big cities, with Prague consistently being the party's weakest region.

Parliament of the Czech Republic

Chamber of Deputies (Lower House)

Notes:

Senate (Upper House)

European Parliament

Local election

Regional election

Prague municipal elections

Brno municipal elections

Ostrava municipal elections

Plzeň municipal elections

Leaders