JUST over 100 years ago in 1920 on Christmas Day in Tours, delegates to the SFIO (French Section of the Workers International, the left wing of the Socialist Party) filled the Loire city’s indoor riding academy and opened the way to the foundation of the French Communist Party (PCF).

Eighteen years previously, in 1902, the French Socialist Party (PSF) was founded when Jean Jaures, an independent socialist politician, was eventually elected its leader.

Jaures, founder of the socialist daily l’Humanite, always opposed war and fought for a unified socialist movement.

But following his assassination in 1914, the PSF abandoned its anti-militarist position and supported WWI.

The devastation and the butchery of that war and at the same time the growth of the Confederation Generale du Travail union — the CGT — led to a series of strikes and a general strike from 1917 on.

That resulted in the socialist-led government agreeing to the eight-hour day but severe repression from the state and the employer class ensued — their imperialistic ethos was looking to further develop France’s colonial empire.

The socialists’ subsequent defeat in the 1919 November elections resulted in a split of the socialist movement.

Yet new hope was coming from Russia and its successful Bolshevik Revolution, which had ended war, was giving power to the workers and their soviets, local workers’ councils.

The establishment of the Third Communist International (Comintern) in 1919 was supported by the leadership of the SFIO and in February 1920 a committee of French socialists initiated exploratory discussions with members of the Third International.

In March that year, Les Bulletins Communistes (Communist Newsletters) were launched to spread Bolshevik ideas.

Three months later, Louis-Oscar Frossard, both a socialist and communist politician and who became secretary-general of the French Communist Party and Marcel Cachin, a French communist and first editor of l’Humanite, visited Russia to join the second congress of the Communist International.

It was held from July to August 1920 and ahead of it Lenin sent out a number of documents, including his 21 Conditions to all socialist parties as prerequisites for any group wanting to become affiliated to the International.

They called for the demarcation between communist parties and other socialist groups and instructed the Comintern sections not to trust the legality of the bourgeois states.

The two French representatives announced their personal support for the Third International and proposed to recommend that the SFIO should affiliate to their socialist counterparts.

Frossard opened the 1920 Congress in Tours and four days of discussion followed, culminating in an all-night debate three days later.

There were three motions before delegates on December 30, with Paul Vaillant-Couturier — an inspirational  delegate — acknowledging Lenin’s 21 Conditions and speaking in favour of the Cachin-Frossard motion to join the Comintern.

He was well supported by the young delegate Ho Chi Minh, future leader of North Vietnam, and a supporting telegram from the chair of the Communist International Alexander Zinoviev.

Also present, unexpectedly, was German revolutionary communist Clara Zetkin, who had been refused an entry visa by the French authorities as a representative of the Third International and who called on delegates to oppose compromise and reformism.

After much discussion and debate, the majority voted for the motion and agreed to join the Third Communist International.

The French Communist Party was first known as the French Section of the Communist International but the new communist party, which celebrates its centenary this year, would need to determine its road to socialism.

This included its anti-imperialist and anti-war policies, support for decolonisation, policies on women and to ensuring that it was and continues to be fully representative of the working class as opposed to the PSF which, despite its revolutionary proclamations, was never able to rethink its reformist, class-collaborationist policies.

French communists today trace the birth of their party as far back as the 1789 French Revolution.

The radicalism and revolutionary spirit of the dispossessed social classes at that time has never ceased to have an influence, despite setbacks and the abandonment of their demands.

It was heavily influenced too by the Paris Commune, which only 50 years prior to the foundation of the PCF, established a radical socialist, anti-religious and revolutionary government in Paris from March 18 to May 28 1871, when it was eventually defeated.

The events of the Tours Congress had a major impact on French workers and the developing international revolutionary movement.

French communists had found a new radicalism in the birth of the Bolshevik revolution which led them to form their own revolutionary party.

Since its foundation, the PCF has continued to make a significant contribution to domestic and international politics.

It played a leading role pre-war in the the Popular Front and in the resistance to Nazi invasion in WWII and supported the Soviet war effort.

Internationally, it supported the wars of liberation from French colonialism in its colonies in Algeria and Vietnam and domestically fought to better the conditions of workers.

Municipal and national elections saw communist ministers in government such as Maurice Thorez, leader of the French Communist Party and deputy prime minister of France from 1946-47, along with communists elected to the National Assembly and at local level.

In 1972, the PCF signed a common programme with the socialists, which included nationalisation and progressive economic, political and military reform.

It led to the election of Francois Mitterrand’s socialist government, with communist ministers, in 1981.

But they left the cabinet in 1984 and two years later Mitterrand changed course.

In 2009, the PCF formed an electoral alliance, the Front de Gauche (Left Front) with a left-wing minority of the PS, led by Jean-luc Melenchon. This alliance continued until 2012.

Fabien Roussel, the recently elected party national secretary, is committed to the party’s new programme which calls for a change of direction and reaffirms the party’s staunch opposition to capitalism adopted at its 38th Congress.

It coincided with the first demonstration of the yellow vests movement in November 2018, which was actively supported by the PCF.

Today, with nearly 50,000 members and, Covid permitting, more than half a million people set to take part in next September’s annual Fete de l’Humanite — the largest socialist festival in Europe —  French communists will no doubt make this a centenary worth remembering.