Communist Party of Vietnam

The Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) is the sole legal party of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV). Founded in 1930 by Ho Chi Minh, the CPV dominantly established the government of Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV), before becoming the sole ruling party when its state was known as the North Vietnam in 1954 after the First Indochina War and all of Vietnam in 1975 after the Vietnam War. Although it nominally exists alongside the Vietnam Fatherland Front, it maintains a unitary government and has centralized control over the state, military, and media. The supremacy of the CPV is guaranteed by Article 4 of the national constitution. The Vietnamese public generally refer to the CPV as simply "the Party" (Đảng) or "our Party" (Đảng ta).

The CPV is organized on the basis of democratic centralism, a principle conceived by Russian Marxist revolutionary Vladimir Lenin. The highest institution of the CPV is the party's National Congress, which elects the Central Committee. The Central Committee is the supreme organ on party affairs in between party congresses. After a party congress, the Central Committee elects the Politburo and Secretariat, and appoints the general secretary, the highest party office. In between sessions of the Central Committee, the Politburo is the supreme organ on party affairs. However, it can only implement decisions based on the policies which have been approved in advance by either the Central Committee or the party's National Congress. As of 2017, the 12th Politburo has 19 members.