Secretariat of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the

Secretariat of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union 

a party organ elected by the plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU to direct ongoing work, chiefly to select personnel and verify the fulfillment of party decisions (Rules of the CPSU, 1975, art. 38). The Secretariat operates through the Central Committee and its various departments.

The statute for the organization of a secretariat was introduced in a resolution of the Eighth Congress of the RCP(B) in March 1919, which assigned the Secretariat the task of establishing a number of departments of the Central Committee. The Secretariat was confirmed as a party organ by the Rules of the RCP(B) adopted by the Eighth All-Russia Party Conference in December 1919 (see KPSS v rezoliutsiiakh, 8th ed., vol. 2, 1970, pp. 73 and 129).

The Secretariat took shape as a guiding collective body within the Central Committee after the Ninth Congress of the RCP(B) in 1920. In 1919 the office of executive secretary was established in the Secretariat; in 1922 it was renamed the office of general secretary, and from 1953 to 1966 it was called the office of first secretary. In April 1966 the office of general secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU was restored.