Developing in the early 1970s, the RCG grew out of the "Revolutionary Opposition" faction of the International Socialists (IS), (forerunners of the Socialist Workers Party), being strongly influenced by the politics of Roy Tearse. When the leading figures of the "Revolutionary Opposition", the name itself only first appearing in print in their appeal document, were expelled from the IS its members met to decide on their course of action, and disagreements between Tearse's allies and the majority of the faction around David Yaffe rapidly surfaced. The result was that Tearse's supporters formed the Discussion Group which led a quiet life for a number of years inside the Labour Party before dissolving. Meanwhile, Yaffe and his comrades proceeded to found the Revolutionary Communist Group in 1974.