League for the Fifth International

The group was founded in 1984 as the Movement for a Revolutionary Communist International by Workers Power, a faction that was expelled from the International Socialists in 1974/1975.^[2] Its first members groups were Workers Power in Britain, the Irish Workers Group, and Gruppe Arbeitermacht (GAM) in Germany. The international is dominated by the British section, Workers Power.^[1]

The positions taken by these groups was referred to by John Kelly as Radical Trotskyism, which he states is: "a [Trotskyist] family that shared the commitment of the WRP and others to Orthodoxy but rejected their claims to that title by tracing the roots of ideological degeneration back to 1940." Workers Power and the Irish Workers Group stated that a new international needed to be built on its own programme, instead of creating one from the existing political internationals.^[3]

On 19 December 2025, L5I announced it had participated in the Third World Congress of the International Socialist League (LIS) and that they had agreed to join the LIS on the basis of a newly agreed common programme.^[4] The former members of the L5I now appear on the list of LIS affiliates, and there have been no articles posted since the announcment.^[5]

The League publishes a quarterly English-language journal entitled Fifth International. The majority of writers for this appear to be from the British group, although other sections publish journals in their own languages. Revolutionärer Marxismus is the German-language journal. The League previously published the journal Permanent Revolution, a more theoretical journal which looked at tactics that communist organisations use, theories of imperialism, and similar questions. This was followed by Trotskyist International which, although still theoretical, also looked more at current affairs.^{[citation needed]}

The L5I listed the following organisations as sections:^[6]

More information Country, Name ...

Country	Name	Misc.	Ref
Austria	Arbeiter*innenstandpunkt		[7]
Great Britain	Workers Power	Formerly Red Flag. Entered the Labour Party in 2015.	[8][9][10]
Germany	Gruppe ArbeiterInnenmacht	Formerly Gruppe Arbeitermacht.	[11]
Pakistan	Revolutionary Socialist Movement		[12]
Sweden	Arbetarmakt		[13]
Switzerland	Marxistische Aktion Schweiz	Formerly Gruppe Was Tun	[14]

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As of 2017, the L5I had five affiliated organisations (Austria, Brazil, Germany, Sweden, UK), but claimed to have four additional affiliates.^[15]

Groups that share a common history with L5I

More information Country, Name ...

Country	Name	Misc.	Ref
Austria	Der Neue Kurs	Split from Arbeiter*innenstandpunkt in 2006	[16]
Brazil	Liga Socialista	Appears to be defunct[citation needed]	[17]
Great Britain	Permanent Revolution Tendency	Split from Workers' Power in 2006, dissolved in 2013	[18]
Czech Republic	Socialistická organizace pracujících	Appears to be defunct[citation needed]	[citation needed]
New Zealand	Communist Workers' Group	Split from L5I in 1995	[19]
Sri Lanka	Socialist Party of Sri Lanka	Split from L5I in 2020	[20]
Russia	Movement Towards Socialism		[21]
United States	Workers Power USA	Appears to be defunct	[22]

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• List of Trotskyist internationals
• Revolution (political group)
• Fifth International