French Communist Party Research Articles

French Communism and Suburban Development: The Rise of The Paris Red Belt

In contrast with many other industrialized nations, communism has played a key role in French politics during the twentieth century. It has been especially significant in the life of the working class since 1920, having self-consciously and successfully made itself into a working-class party and often serving as the major voice of French workers in both national and local politics. Any social history of the French working class in the twentieth century must, therefore, take the French Communist Party (PCF) into account. Studies of the PCF's history, whether memoirs of Party members or more scholarly accounts, are certainly not in short supply. But for the most part, the historiography of French communism has focused on the activities of Party leaders and full-time militants, neglecting the study of the masses of French men and women who voted communist, without actively participating in or even belonging to the organization. Yet it was ultimately they, not the leadership, who gave the PCF its significance. Communist parties with leaders, committed militants, and squabbling factions have existed all over the world since the Russian Revolution. What has made French communism so important is precisely its character as a mass-based party in an advanced capitalist country. Therefore it is necessary for historians of the PCF to begin to adopt the techniques of social history in order to explain why so many French workers have voted communist since 1920. It is the aim of this article to make a contribution to such a project by analysing the growth of a communist political consensus in the Parisian suburb of Bobigny during the inter-war years.' In order to understand the social history of French communism, one must consider the Paris suburbs, notorious since the 1920s as the Paris Red Belt. Since the founding of the PCF in 1920, the Paris suburbs have constituted the bedrock of its national electoral base;

Drieu La Rochelle and Ascetic Aestheticism

Pierre Drieu La Rochelle, novelist, poet, essayist and political journalist, was a major spokesman for French fascism in the late 1930s, a propagandist for Jacques Doriot's Parti Populaire FranCais which had some 100,000 members in 1937 (the French Communist Party had only 80,000 members). Drieu was also a Nazi collaborator during the Second World War. His novel Gilles (1939) was undoubtedly the most famous French fascist novel written during the 1930s, a work which Drieu had hoped would rival the leftwing novel, L'Espoir [Man's Hope] written by his close friend Andre Malraux. Drieu is only one example among many in the 1930s of a superior writer, steeped in the riches of European literature, who was attracted to fascism.' One of the questions that caused me to study Drieu in the first place, a naive question no doubt but one which still think worth asking, is how could an intelligent, cultivated writer like Drieu, who once declared I am above all an artist, have succumbed to an ideology so full of ugliness? This question, with which have dealt at length elsewhere, is present as well in this brief examination of Drieu's aesthetic thought.2 Part of the answer is this: Drieu sought a spiritual regeneration of France that was fundamentally ascetic at base, an asceticism that was culturally rooted in both Catholic and military values.3 On a deeper, more personal level, Drieu also practiced an emotional asceticism or an affective puritanism, especially where women were concerned, an asceticism that condoned moral indifference at best and physical violence at worst toward those he considered decadent in French society, including decadent women. Various kinds of asceticism, in other words, permeated his political, social and economic thought-and his aesthetic thought as well. Proust's comment that tout se relate, that everything relates to everthing else, is particularly applicable in Drieu's case. Drieu's politics and aesthetics were part of a consistent vision, a coherent totality, that affected all aspects of his thought, the basic undertow being Drieu's obsession with what he repeatedly called decadence and his own ardent (and guilt-ridden) desire to combat it. The great sin, in his eyes, was the non-spiritualized hedonism that pervaded French culture and that doomed the French soldier, unlike the Nazi storm trooper, to feminine weakness. Drieu was something of an expert on the subject since he felt

Génération et histoire politique

Generations and political history, Jean-Francois Sirinelli. The interest which political history has shown in the notion of generation is recent. Because history has renewed itself by exploring new areas which include cultures, ideas and mentalities, generations have become both topics and analytical tools. The concept can no longer be assimilated simply to age classes or age effects or even of youth ABSTRACTS Couple and génération, a history of hâte and love, Jessica Scale The couple changes over a long time-span which présents more continuity than rupture between générations. This reality sets it apart in two ways from the idea of génération : 1) the concept of génération is supported by a fascination with the dialectic in which the social dynamic émerges from the inter-generational conflict 2) the idea of génération. But the generational approach can not be founded on the principle of crystallization at a certain âge, of behavior and orientations which in fact are not fixed for ever. Nevertheless, while everything in the couple is opposed to the generational conflict, the heuristic power of the notion of génération is not reduced. Three marriage âges in a single century, Martine Sau^ay During the 20th century there may hâve been three patterns ; establishment-marriage, in which émotions can enter in conflict with the institution ; merger-marriage after 1945, which is very demanding of the couple ; post-1968 association-marriage, which unités more autonomous individuals. Feminist de-mands seem to hâve played a major rôle in this history of the couple. Générations and political history, Jean-François Sirinelli The interest which political history has shown in the notion of génération is récent. Because history has renewed itself by ex-ploring new areas which include cultures, ideas and mentalities, générations hâve be-come both topics and analytical tools. The concept can no longer be assimilated simply to âge classes or âge effects or even of youth or cohort. Because they produce cleavages, within the various structures of politics, because they are exacerbated at times of crisis, and because they call into play phe-nomena of social memory, generational me-chanisms hâve become indispensable in the analysis of politics. Communist générations, Philippe Buton The concept of génération, understood as cohort of affiliations, with singularities marked by références to différent founding events and social profiles, whose specificity is experienced as such, does help understand the development of the French Communist Party. " Génération of the war ", " party of métal workers ", " party of those executed " during the war, party of " Maurice Thorez ", then of the Union of the Left, successive strata illustrate the changes of the Party within the Bolchevik mold, which remained unchanged since the graft of the 1920s. Socialist générations ? Alain Bergounioux From the SFIO of the Congress of Tours and the Popular Front to the Socialist Party of the Epinay Congress and the 1980s, can the history of French socialists be analysed in terms of générations ? The hypothesis is often tempting, considering, for example movements such as the neo-socialism of the 1930s or the minorities revolting against the SFIO of Guy Mollet during the Algerian war and in the 1960s. A more elaborate analysis reveals however, if not the inap-propriateness, at least the limits of such an approach. The development of party socia-lism seems to hâve resulted more from strictly political parameters than from possible generational cleavages. 182

Les générations communistes

Communist generations, Philippe Buton The concept of generation, understood as cohort of affiliations, with singularities marked by references to different founding events and social profiles, whose specificity is experienced as such, does help understand the development of the French Communist Party. " Generation of the war ", " party of metal workers ", " party of those executed " during the war, party of " Maurice Thorez ", then of the Union of the Left, successive strata illustrate the changes of the Party within the Bolchevik mold, which remained unchanged since the graft of the 1920s.

The French communist party: An historic decline?

The French communist party: An historic decline?

The French Communist Party and Europe: the idea and its implementation (1945–1985)

Abstract. The attitude of the French Communist Party to European integration falls into three distinct phases. From being seemingly sympathetic in the immediate postwar years, it switched to uncompromising opposition in 1947. In 1962 it began to moderate its position to take account of changed political circumstances. The article analyzes the ideological and environmental determinants of PCF policies and attitudes through to 1985, and reviews the strategies and campaigns employed by the party to advance its point of view.

How do the Political Effects of Pictures Come About? The Case of Picasso's Guernica

This article' is not concerned with the history of Guernica 's creation nor with the uniquely welldocumented process of its making, which have been discussed on numerous occasions.2 Nor do I intend to deal with the controversies over the correct interpretation of the symbols in the picture, those endless disputes concerning the precise meaning of the bull and horse.3 Rather, I wish to offer a few observations about the political effect of the work, and then try to indicate what general conclusions we might be able to draw from this. Picasso painted the picture on commission from the Spanish Republic and its Popular Front government for the Spanish pavilion at the International Exhibition held in Paris in 1937. Unlike most other nations, the Spanish Republic did not represent itself in the exhibition in terms of its economic power, but in terms of its cultural values, among which works of art of the avant-garde took pride of place (Picasso, Calder, Miro, Gonzalez and others had all offered works of art). In this way the Spanish Republic embattled as it was by the fascists enlisted international solidarity with the help of artists. Though the Spanish pavilion was first opened in June 1937, too late to be included in the illustrated guides, and though the press hardly took any notice of it, its impact, and in particular that of Picasso's work, seems to have been considerable. If one is to believe the observations published in the Cahiers d'Art, the basic content of the picture was readily recognised by the visitors, who were in no way an artistic audience.4 Picasso himself called the picture his answer to the bombing of the Basque town of Guernica after which he named his painting by the German fascists.5 Guernica was then on everybody's lips and had come to serve as a symbol of the victims of the fascist terror.6 Not surprisingly, Picasso's picture was criticised, as was the whole avant-garde, both by the left and the right. Much more surprising, however, is the amount of spontaneous acclaim it received, both from the left and from the liberal bourgeoisie. Though the organ of the French communist party, L'Humanite, refrained from taking any view on the subject, a number of communist artists expressed great enthusiasm over the picture. One only needs to think of Eluard's tributes, or the following comments by Johannes Wiusten, a German artist living in exile in France:7 Picasso's great work, the bombing of Guernica, is in no way second to Dix's trench scenes, as far as horror is concerned. (Nobody would have anticipated that abstract forms had such a realist impact! ) Art critics may consider its value for art history. What grips me about it, immediately in the same sense that there is something that severs any possible connection between the defeatist Dix and the militant anabaptist Griunewald is the bull, which raises itself up from the midst of the catastrophe; it pauses, imperturbable, in the midst of this hell. No muscle hints at flight amid the general rout. It watches out, its sharp horns at the ready, its tail nervously lashing about only it does not yet see the opponent which it will fall upon in a moment....

Ideological obstacles to the political evolution of Communist systems

"History is merciless to all ideologies".1 So writes Ferenc Feher, lamenting how the Marxian dream of emancipation turned into a nightmare of authoritarian collectivism. Why have socialist states failed so miserably in their task of building the 'realm of freedom'? Some commentators, of course, argue that the Gulag represents the logical, rightful, and even inevitable outcome of Marx' project, that totalitari anism is Inherent in Marxism'.2 Other, more careful, analysts concede that the doctrine contains a degree of tension between heterogeneous strains of thought, but nevertheless conclude, with Leszek K?lakowski, that "every attempt to implement all basic values of Marxian socialism [is] likely to generate a political organisation that would bear marks unmistakeably analogous to Stalinism".3 Contrariwise, an assortment of 'Marxist' intellectuals ? Trotskyites, Eurocommunists, East-European 'revisionists' ? uphold a 'pure', liberating form of Marxism against (what they regard as) the corrupt, Stalinist perversion of the doctrine that reigns supreme in the East. Hence, Jean Ellenstein, historian and influential member of the French Communist Party, complains: "What has happened to Marxism in Russian hands . . . was a deviation from Marx' thinking and, in extreme cases, a denial and repudiation of Marxism."4 According to John Kautsky, not just Stalinism but Leninism was "a perversion or misunderstanding of Marxism ... an adaptation of an ideology born in an industrial environment to the conditions of an underdeveloped one".5 For such defenders of the classical Marxian heritage, the doctrine itself, properly construed, raises no barriers to democratic reform in Communist regimes. The expansion of partici patory procedures, even political pluralism, i.e., the free activity of oppositional forces and parties ? neither of these runs counter to the preaching of Marx. In what follows, I shall challenge this assumption and argue that Marxism, in its original version and on any plausible interpretation, does indeed impose formidable constraints on political evolution in Communist systems. The sorts of reforms advocated by the

Review. The French Communist Party: a Critical History (1920-84). Adereth, M.

Review. The French Communist Party: a Critical History (1920-84). Adereth, M.

Towards self‐liquidation? The French Communist Party in 1987

Towards self‐liquidation? The French Communist Party in 1987

Conflict and cohesion in the British labour party and French communist party

The article examines the differing organisational structures and political cultures which provide the bases for cohesion in the PCF and British Labour Party. It argues that the electoral decline of the two parties since the late 1960s, and the rise of new political forces to challenge their primacy on the Left, have generated growing internal conflict in each case. Despite the greater pressures towards unity in the PCF such conflicts have threatened the existing bases of cohesion in both parties. The article concludes by considering the possibilities of surmounting the current problems.

Five years of books on the French communist party

Five years of books on the French communist party

Musulmans et prolétaires

Over the last decade Muslim associations have experienced in France spectacular growth, symbolized by the construction of a large number of masques. Is the re-Islamization of immigrants of Muslim culture an attempt to destabilize thé host country, or does it represent a necessary step in these communities' socialization and their eventual integration in the national community ? The authors are led to present an analogy between this process and that by which the French Communist Party tried in the 1930s to stabilize, socialize and finally integrale the large immigrant worker communities ― three millions in 1931, mostly Italians, Spaniards and Poles. Each of the two phenomena ― Islam and communism ― has two essential dimensions, teleological and societal. History is demonstrating that in the case of French communism, the second dimension was stronger than the first. For Islam, the alternatives are currently abjects of an important competition and a major debate.

Chronique de la grève des mineurs du Nord/Pas-de-Calais (27 mai - 6 juin 1941).

This article comes as a sequel to two others whose goals were the study of the French Communist Party (P. CF.) in the Nord/Pas-de-Calais from Sept. 1939 to March 1941. They will have allowed us to understand the evolution of the context and notably the intermingling of the social and national levels without which the success of the May 1941 miners' strike would remain inexplicable. As regards the meaning of that strike, what controversy indeed ! Establishing the chronology of the facts is perhaps the best means to understand why and how this strike became general over the whole basin, why and how in spite of (or thanks to) repression, it lasted. The present study also endeavours to see how it was perceived by the different protagonists : the German power, the native power, the opinion, and of course the French Communist Party whose various authorities are far from achieving converging analyses ! In any case, the brutality of the repression in which the French police and the mining companies deliberately got involved opens a new period.

L'anticommunisme en France

Anticommunism in France, Jean-Jacques Becker, Serge Berstein. Following the chronology of anti-communist manifestations from 1917 to the present, the article shows that they were proportionate to the physical strength of the French Communist Party and to the feeling of danger to France dicted by the power of the USSR. This hatred and this fear played substantial part in the France's history, above all during the Popular Front and the Cold War. Under the Fifth Republic, they paradoxically favored both the veering to the right and the 1981 victory of the non-communist left.

The Rise of the French Communist Party, 1920-1947

The Rise of the French Communist Party, 1920-1947

Historic decline: The French communist party and the parliamentary elections of 1986

Historic decline: The French communist party and the parliamentary elections of 1986

Liberté, Égalité & Surtout, Fraternité?: The Struggle over Women's Liberation in the French Communist & Socialist Parties

In this article Professor Fields examines the positions the French Communist and Socialist parties have historically, and more recently, taken with regard to women's rights and gender equality. He also discusses the criticism of these positions offered by feminists within these parties. The critics are especially troubled by the parties' unwillingness to undertake serious theoretical analysis of the structure of patriarchy. Without such analysis, they say, neither party can become an effective agent for changing entrenched notions and habits about women's place and role in society.

Memory and partisan identity: the case of the French Communist Party

Abstract. The French Communist Party pays particular attention to the writing and the recounting of its own history. Its militants consent often to an important training effort. The understanding of historical memory by the dimension which connects French Communism to ‘true socialism’, would prohibit reasoning which would have an objective of re‐instating the memory of French Communists as an element of a partisan identity, rather than the falsification of which the nature of history might have been the object. Maurice Halbwach's notion of ‘collective memory’ fits this project. Consequently, some elements of the party's historical memory, especially autobiographies of communist party leaders, are compared to the opinions or life experiences collected from militants. In this comparison between published memories and oral life stories, models and constant themes appear. But one must also insist on the discrepancies between interviews, and on the differences between life stories and published autobiographies. If autobiographies provided life patterns founded on invariable elements and methods of historical interpretation, other factors were of influence, such as how long the subject has belonged to the party, the family continuity in the partisan group, school background.

Front Populaire, Front National: The Colonial Example

The popular front strategy, by which the French Communist party (PCF) came to mean a tactical alliance of the left including the Socialists and the left-leaning elements of the petty bourgeoisie represented by the Radical party, was pursued only briefly by the PCF in the 1930s, from 1934 to 1936. This is ironic, since it is by the slogan of the Front Populaire that the period of the 1930s in French history was to be subsequently known and remembered. The popular front was actually a transitional strategy between the famous (or infamous) “Third Period” of Comintern history from 1928–34, characterized in France by the class-against-class policy, and the policy of Front National, in which the PCF pursued a policy of alliance with anyone, including the right, against fascism at home and abroad. The PCF launched the national front in August 1936, and although the slogan did not catch on and was withdrawn, the party pursued that strategy for the remainder of the period until the war. But it was the popular front that would be remembered as having resulted in a wave of social legislation following the Blum government's assumption of power in June 1936 and which has ever since become a point of reference for the PCF. The wage increases, rights to unionize, paid vacations, forty hour week and nationalizations remain accomplishments for the party, to be built upon in each successive experience of participating in, or supporting the French government.