The Stalin Society is a British discussion group for individuals who see

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili; 5 March 1953) was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin, his death in 1953. He held power as General Secret ...

as a great Marxist–Leninist and wish to preserve his legacy. The society originated as a consequence of the

dissolution of the Soviet Union The Soviet Union was formally dissolved as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. Declaration No. 142-Н of ...

and what the members perceived as a subsequent increase in the criticism of Stalin. According to the Stalin Society's website, " e Stalin Society was formed in 1991 to defend Stalin and his work on the basis of fact and to refute

capitalist Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their use for the purpose of obtaining profit. This socioeconomic system has developed historically through several stages and is defined by ...

, revisionist, opportunist and

Trotskyist Trotskyism (, ) is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Russian revolutionary and intellectual Leon Trotsky along with some other members of the Left Opposition and the Fourth International. Trotsky described himself as an ...

propaganda directed against him".

Organisation

The society is based on individual membership but political groups such as the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist–Leninist), and the Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist–Leninist) are notably prominent within it. Many have pointed to a considerable overlap of membership with

Arthur Scargill Arthur Scargill (born 11 January 1938) is a British trade unionist who was President of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) from 1982 to 2002. He is best known for leading the 1984–1985 UK miners' strike, a major event in the history o ...

's Socialist Labour Party, including Scargill himself.Andy McSmith and Severin Carrell
"Stalin apologists drink to the memory of Uncle Joe"
''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'', 2 March 2003 The Stalin Society's chair, Harpal Brar, for instance, was at one time a member of both organisations (although he subsequently left the SLP to head the CPGB-ML). Through Brar, the society was also linked to the Association of Communist Workers. One of the Stalin Society's founders, Bill Bland, was expelled in an organizational dispute. Kamal Majid, a founding member of the Stalin Society, is a patron of the

Stop the War Coalition The Stop the War Coalition (StWC), informally known simply as Stop the War, is a British group that campaigns against the United Kingdom's involvement in military conflicts. It was established on 21 September 2001 to campaign against the impe ...

Views on excess mortality during Stalin’s leadership

The Stalin Society upholds traditional Soviet views on a number of controversial events that took place in the Soviet Union under Stalin's leadership. The

Holodomor The Holodomor, also known as the Ukrainian Famine, was a mass famine in Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, Soviet Ukraine from 1932 to 1933 that killed millions of Ukrainians. The Holodomor was part of the wider Soviet famine of 1930–193 ...

, a famine that killed millions of Ukrainians in 1932–33 and which was part of the Soviet famine of 1930–1933, is said to have resulted from poor weather conditions and sabotage by rich peasants. The belief that Stalin intentionally brought the Holodomor about in order to break the Ukrainian national spirit is attributed to 1930s anti-Soviet propaganda perpetuated by Ukrainian nationalists and McCarthyists.John Puntis
"The Ukrainian famine-genocide myth"
July 2002 The

Great Purge The Great Purge, or the Great Terror (), also known as the Year of '37 () and the Yezhovshchina ( , ), was a political purge in the Soviet Union that took place from 1936 to 1938. After the Assassination of Sergei Kirov, assassination of ...

, a campaign of political repression in the Soviet Union in 1936–38, is regarded as a fair legal process designed to thwart an anti-Soviet coup, for which the numbers of imprisoned and dead have been exaggerated by anti-Soviet propagandists.Mario Sousa
"Lies concerning the history of the Soviet Union"
March 1999 The

Katyn massacre The Katyn massacre was a series of mass killings under Communist regimes, mass executions of nearly 22,000 Polish people, Polish military officer, military and police officers, border guards, and intelligentsia prisoners of war carried out by t ...

, a mass execution of Polish figures in 1940, is said to have been committed by

Nazi German Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a totalitarian dictat ...

forces who captured Polish prisoners of war held by the Soviets. Nazi propaganda is said to have been responsible for its attribution to the Soviets.Ella Rule
"The Katyn Massacre"
July 2002

21st century

The society continues to hold public meetings. The Stalin Society has produced many booklets on subjects including

CPSU The Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU),. Abbreviated in Russian as КПСС, ''KPSS''. at some points known as the Russian Communist Party (RCP), All-Union Communist Party and Bolshevik Party, and sometimes referred to as the Soviet ...

purges, famines and

George Orwell Eric Arthur Blair (25 June 1903 – 21 January 1950) was an English novelist, poet, essayist, journalist, and critic who wrote under the pen name of George Orwell. His work is characterised by lucid prose, social criticism, opposition to a ...

Other groups

The "Stalin Society of Pakistan" was formed in 2013 and has a website and Facebook account. The society has claimed on Facebook that it "stands for communist revolution in Pakistan" and on its website it states that it is "not a political party but an academic venture" which aims to "refute anti-Stalin propaganda and revisionism". Stalin Societies have also been formed in the United States and Canada, Tunisia, India, Italy, Ireland, and Argentina, and an International Stalin Society was formed in 2014.

References

External links