Planning the Post-War World: The French Labour Movement and Reform, 1915–1916

Abstract

When the French labour leaders considered that the social problems spawned by the war had a post-war relevance, they developed a tendency to consider the war's wider significance for the future of society. In so doing, they tried to relate the major features of the war from their perspective — the political self-mobilization of organized labour, the munitions effort, the possibilities for peace — to past doctrines and to more permanent preoccupations of organized labour. This chapter examines the efforts of the labour leaders and the central institutions of the Confédération Générale du Travail (CGT), the Parti Socialiste (PS), and the co-operative movement in developing a programme of post-war reforms.