[1] The Institute was set up in the mid-1960s (alongside the Marxist Studies and Research Centre), as part of a process of ideological reorientation of the Communist Party.
These two new institutes encouraged more creative forms of applications of Marxism to theoretical and political problems.
[2] At the Institut Maurice Thorez communist historians were able to research without strict party control.
[3] The Institute published Cahiers de l'Institut Maurice Thorez.
[4] Georges Cogniot was the founding director of the Institute, a position he held for various years.