The Communiast Party of Guadeloupe has always been historically strong on the islands, it was founded in 1958 and has been historically one of the strongest parties on the islands. In the 1968 elections to the French National Assembly, the GCP received 37.3 percent of the vote; one of the three deputies elected from Guadeloupe in the French Parliament was a Communist.
In 1971 the GCP occupied a significant role in ten of the 34 municipalities of Guadeloupe; it headed eight of them.