Communist Party of Great Britain Biographical Project - John Callaghan
TitleCommunist Party of Great Britain Biographical Project - John Callaghan
ReferenceTAPE/625
Date
n.d.
Scope and ContentThis is a copy of a tape held by the British Library, in their Sound Archives, as part of their CPGB Biographical Project.
Details about the tape may be obtained from the British Library web site.
John Callaghan was born in 1952 in Cheshire
John’s family lived in Gorton, Manchester. His father had joined the Young Communist League in 1937 so John was brought up in a household where the views expressed were Party views although he did not realise it at the time. His mother had been a shop steward at Robertsons’ jam factory in Glasgow for a while.
John went to Openshaw Tech (an all-boys’ school), and then to the new Moston Brook Comprehensive School for his 6th-form education. He started the debating society, out of his own interest, and usually played a prominent part in the debate. His first demonstration was against the Springbok Tour. He also remembered discussing with his family the Civil Rights Movement in the USA and the baton charges in Northern Ireland, and Czechoslovakia in 1968.
John chose to go to LSE because of its left-wing reputation; although it was actually much more right-wing than he expected, the staff in particular. John was a member of the Socialist Society and joined IS in 1971, but was in it for only about 18 months.
He recalled a very active feminist presence, also the beginnings of the gay liberation movement. There were student occupations and agitation over the Vietnam War and a demonstration over Bloody Sunday in Derry.
John went to Essex after leaving LSE on the recommendation of his tutor. It was quite different from LSE, being a campus university with a big campaigning CP presence.
John joined the CP after leaving Essex in 1974 when he was living in the East End of London, in a house where nearly everybody, although from very different backgrounds, were members of the CP.
The CP seemed like an organisation that was receptive to new ideas and John decided to join the CP rather than one of the other far-left organisations. The CP seemed less sectarian and it had a presence in industrial disputes, and was part of a world movement, which gave it more credibility. Feminism also had had an impact on the CP. He joined in 1974 and took training courses and also taught them
He recalled that there were 'two cultures' in the party: 'on the one side, younger, university-educated people, and then there was a working-class Communist Party, which was very much orientated towards industrial struggles.
John became more aware of the division between the two groups when he moved to Manchester, to do his PhD, in the autumn of 1975. He was at Manchester University for two years and it became apparent then that the Party was becoming factionalised. He came to realise that their differences were less about what policies they wanted but were more about the tempo of reform.
John became a member of a Trotskyist study group in London, from about 1975 to 1977. This met in Betty Reid’s house. She was one of the old guard but people like Monty Johnstone, and people of John’s age also attended. They wanted to engage intellectually with critics of the Party, who often had misleading perceptions about Trotskyism.
When he was at Manchester he was being supervised by Norman Geras who was in the IMG. It was partly Norman Geras’s influence that caused John to align himself with the IMG. He felt it was now more open and more variegated, and it also seemed intellectually dynamic. The IMG ran a candidate membership scheme and people had to be associated for six months before they could be taken seriously. That was John’s final flirtation with organised Marxist groups. In 1975 he started his PhD which was concerned with the history of Trotskyism. He wanted to find out what it was really about, but by 1981, when he finished he had come to the conclusion that all those strands of Leninism whether Trotskyist or Maoist or CP, were fundamentally flawed. His thesis became his book “British Trotskyism” which then became “The far left in British politics”.
A more detailed synopsis of the interview exists as a pdf document. This can be viewed at the WCML
There are several publications by John in the WCML collection.
Details about the tape may be obtained from the British Library web site.
John Callaghan was born in 1952 in Cheshire
John’s family lived in Gorton, Manchester. His father had joined the Young Communist League in 1937 so John was brought up in a household where the views expressed were Party views although he did not realise it at the time. His mother had been a shop steward at Robertsons’ jam factory in Glasgow for a while.
John went to Openshaw Tech (an all-boys’ school), and then to the new Moston Brook Comprehensive School for his 6th-form education. He started the debating society, out of his own interest, and usually played a prominent part in the debate. His first demonstration was against the Springbok Tour. He also remembered discussing with his family the Civil Rights Movement in the USA and the baton charges in Northern Ireland, and Czechoslovakia in 1968.
John chose to go to LSE because of its left-wing reputation; although it was actually much more right-wing than he expected, the staff in particular. John was a member of the Socialist Society and joined IS in 1971, but was in it for only about 18 months.
He recalled a very active feminist presence, also the beginnings of the gay liberation movement. There were student occupations and agitation over the Vietnam War and a demonstration over Bloody Sunday in Derry.
John went to Essex after leaving LSE on the recommendation of his tutor. It was quite different from LSE, being a campus university with a big campaigning CP presence.
John joined the CP after leaving Essex in 1974 when he was living in the East End of London, in a house where nearly everybody, although from very different backgrounds, were members of the CP.
The CP seemed like an organisation that was receptive to new ideas and John decided to join the CP rather than one of the other far-left organisations. The CP seemed less sectarian and it had a presence in industrial disputes, and was part of a world movement, which gave it more credibility. Feminism also had had an impact on the CP. He joined in 1974 and took training courses and also taught them
He recalled that there were 'two cultures' in the party: 'on the one side, younger, university-educated people, and then there was a working-class Communist Party, which was very much orientated towards industrial struggles.
John became more aware of the division between the two groups when he moved to Manchester, to do his PhD, in the autumn of 1975. He was at Manchester University for two years and it became apparent then that the Party was becoming factionalised. He came to realise that their differences were less about what policies they wanted but were more about the tempo of reform.
John became a member of a Trotskyist study group in London, from about 1975 to 1977. This met in Betty Reid’s house. She was one of the old guard but people like Monty Johnstone, and people of John’s age also attended. They wanted to engage intellectually with critics of the Party, who often had misleading perceptions about Trotskyism.
When he was at Manchester he was being supervised by Norman Geras who was in the IMG. It was partly Norman Geras’s influence that caused John to align himself with the IMG. He felt it was now more open and more variegated, and it also seemed intellectually dynamic. The IMG ran a candidate membership scheme and people had to be associated for six months before they could be taken seriously. That was John’s final flirtation with organised Marxist groups. In 1975 he started his PhD which was concerned with the history of Trotskyism. He wanted to find out what it was really about, but by 1981, when he finished he had come to the conclusion that all those strands of Leninism whether Trotskyist or Maoist or CP, were fundamentally flawed. His thesis became his book “British Trotskyism” which then became “The far left in British politics”.
A more detailed synopsis of the interview exists as a pdf document. This can be viewed at the WCML
There are several publications by John in the WCML collection.
Extent1 Cassette tape
Physical descriptionNWA copy
LanguageEnglish
Archival historyThe Communist Party of Great Britain Biographical Project, part-funded by the Economic and Social Research Council covers the full period of the party's existence (1920-1991) and deals with all aspects of its work including industrial work, educational and cultural activities as well as local and international campaigns. The audio recordings of more than 150 interviews with members and former members of the Communist Party of Great Britain, conducted between October 1999 and September 2001 by a group of historians based at Manchester University have now been deposited in the British Library Sound Archive.
Related object
Persons keywordCallaghan, John, Communist Party of Great Britain, British Library National Sound Archive
SubjectCommunism, Students, Marxism, Trotskyism
Conditions governing accessOpen
Levelfile
Normal locationZ (Room 24)