French Labour Movement Research Articles

Employee-owned firms in France

Purpose France is the third country in Europe after Italy and Spain for the number of employee-owned firms, with some 2,600 worker cooperatives (SCOPs). The authors propose a comprehensive review of SCOPs and any barriers to their expansion.Design/methodology/approach The authors analyse relevant legislation; review the rich empirical economic literature on SCOPs; and offer new descriptive empirical evidence comparing SCOPs and other French firms.Findings SCOPs benefit from a consistent legal framework and a well-structured and supportive cooperative movement. Cooperative laws allow attracting external capital, provide barriers against degeneration and encourage profit allocations that favour investment and labour. SCOPs are distributed across a wide range of industries; are larger than conventional firms, as capital intensive, more productive and survive better. Despite this good performance their number remains modest, perhaps because of information barriers.Research limitations/implications An examination of the Italian and Spanish experiences and the relationship between SCOPs and the French labour movement might contribute to explaining the modest number of SCOPs.Originality/value The first comprehensive review of French worker cooperatives in four decades and the first with extensive comparative data on SCOPs and conventional French firms. With some of the best data on worker cooperatives in the world, findings have international relevance.

Talking Out of Revolution: Henri Krasucki and Jacques Chirac’s Secret Pigalle Negotiations and the Resolution of the French General Strike of May–June 1968

At the height of the French general strike of May–June 1968, future president Jacques Chirac, then Secretary of State for Employment, initiated a series of secret meetings with Henri Krasucki, deputy general secretary of the Confédération général du travail, meetings which arguably lay at the origins of the Grenelle agreements and hence the end of the strike. This article seeks to peel apart the various competing and contradictory layers of memory and mythology around the Chirac–Krasucki negotiations, exploring the paradoxes of this encounter and its legacy in historical context. Chirac’s own accounts of the episode have often been taken more or less at face value, as the same few questionable sources are recycled in popular texts. By contrast, the individual who had most interest in keeping quiet about such manoeuvres was Krasucki, who is generally eclipsed by Georges Séguy in memories of the CGT’s role in May. Krasucki’s complex relationship with French labour movement activism as an assimilated Polish-Jewish immigrant and frequent visitor to Moscow places him at the margins of many accounts of May 1968. Yet Krasucki’s silence was less total than it appeared: he did engage in memory transmission of his alternative version of events in private, among fellow communists. Light will thereby be shed on how two very different men sought, with a surprising degree of success, to cross the profound political, class and Cold War lines that lay between them. These discussions explain something of the flexibility which enabled the Gaullist state to avert its revolutionary overthrow.

Disillusioned with the Labour Movement: Late Marx and the Prospects of Revolution in Western Europe

ABSTRACTRecent research has emphasised how Marx’s views underwent profound change after 1870. Its major focus has been on how Marx’s increasing interest in developments in Russia culminated in his adoption of the Russian populists' belief that the country might reach socialism without passing through the stage of capitalism. Less attention has been devoted to Marx’s later attitude towards the prospects of proletarian revolution in Western Europe. This paper attempts a more detailed explanation of Marx’s approach to the development of the labour movement in Britain, France and Germany during the 1870s. It also aims to show that he no longer expected a forthcoming revolution carried out by the organised working class in the most advanced Western European countries. First, Marx complained of the lack of revolutionary spirit in the British proletariat; moreover, he criticised the immaturity of the French labour movement; finally, he rejected the eclectic ideology of German social democracy, which was on the rise.

Wij zijn geen crapuul! Jacob Kats' strijd als vroegsocialistisch theatermaker redenaar en journalist

Jacob Kats, a weaver, emerged as a playwright, an orator and a journalist very soon after Belgium became independent. He spoke up for his fellow workers in all these capacities and thus participated in the first social struggles in Belgium. This article highlights several events in 1836, when Kats enjoyed initial success with his documentary theatre avant la lettre, in which he focused on his personal life and that of his fellow workers. Also, in the same year, Kats established a socialist periodical, Den Waren Volksvriend(The True Working-Class Friend), in which he denounced social abuse. And he set up a public meeting with workers and sympathizers to talk about social rights and obligations in an orderly way. However, material progress was not the only issue Kats was concerned about. Social struggles in the newly-independent Belgium were also about the intellectual, artistic and political emancipation of the working class, as has been indicated by Jacques Ranciere’s La nuit des proletaires, a study about the early French labour movement.

Syndicats, mouvements et dynamique d'émancipation : le défi de la nouvelle radicalité

The article analyses the relations between trade-unions, associations and partisan movements inFrance today. These relations would appear to be characterised by a degree of mistrust which the crisisaffecting political projects of emancipation has accentuated. The growing autonomy of the French labour movement in relation to the existing political movements represents a major shift. Trade-unionsnow cling to their independence, regarding it as an essential element of their legitimacy. The principleaccording to which there is no prior hierarchy governing the relation between the agenda of social issues and the agenda of the political is the precondition for any form of cooperation. If trade-unionistsand activists in associations call for a « normalisation » of their relations with political parties, theyrefuse any invitation to engage in any “co-elaboration” of projects, which would cause them to assumeresponsibility for decisions which are not their prerogative. What they urge is a strategy of resonancerather than a strategy of alliance : confrontation rather than subordination.

Ethnic Institutions Reconsidered: The Case of Flemish Workers in 19th Century France1

Abstract Traditional perspectives on ethnic institutions tend to consider mainly their role in the preservation of the cultural and social fabric of ethnic communities. Increasing evidence indicates that ethno‐institutional effects are often more varied and complex. France's first industrial‐era immigrants, massively crossing the border from Belgian Flanders during the second half of the 19th century, are a case in point. Immigrant Flemish workers introduced a new type of institution to the French working class: socialist cooperatives. These would have a long‐term impact not only on the immigrant Flemish community itself, but also on the larger labour movement, on the region, and on the country as a whole. Three elements were important in this process of institutional cross‐fertilization: Belgian workers’ rich institutional repertoire; the coincidence of their settlement with the rise of the French labour movement; and the fact that their institutional innovation was easily transferable.

From Guinea Pig to Prototype: Communist Labour Policy in the Paris Metal Industry, 1922-35

The factory occupations that followed the electoral triumph of the Popular Front in May 1936 opened a new chapter, perhaps the most important chapter, in France's labour history. Barricaded inside their occupied factories, the defiant strikers overthrew the 'divine right' of the patronat, forced the government to legalize a labour-centric system of industrial relations, and spurred the unionization of nearly half the French working class. In many ways, the factory occupations of 1936 marked the institutional and moral birth of the modern French labour movement. At the same time, they constituted one of the great triumphs of western communism. For it was the communist-led Paris Metal Union, standing at the epicentre of the vast strike wave, that succeeded in sweeping car, aircraft and mechanical-engineering workers into its organizational net, thereby creating the first viable unionization of French industrial labour. With a quarter of a million of the nation's most strategically-situated workers behind them, communists acquired jurisdiction over the heights of French industry. This communization of industrial labour did not, however, result simply from intervention in the strike movement of 1936. Rather, it was the culmination of a 15-year effort to unionize the ranks of French industry.1

Chirac's Challenge: Liberalization, Europeanization, and Malaise in France

Mitterrand's Legacy, Chirac's Challenge J.T.S. Keeler & M.A. Schain - Presidents, Premiers and Models of Democracy in France J.T.S. Keeler & M. A. Schain - Constitutional Politics and Malaise in France A.Stone - The Many Styles of Policymaking in France F.Baumgartner - Business, the State and the End of Dirigisme V.Schmidt - Does the French Labour Movement Have a Future? M.Kesselman - Conflict and Consensus in French Education J.Ambler - Reforming French Health Care Policy D.Wilsford - Sexual Harassment, Gender Politics and Symbolic Reform A.Mazur - The Limits of Malaise in France M. F.Toinet - The Maastricht Referendum and the Party System A.Appleton - National Interest, European Integration and Malaise D.Cameron - Index

Labour at War: France and Britain 1914-1918.

Abbreviations Note on terms List of figures and tables The context The 'Choice of 1914': Labour participation in the national efforts during the war Responding to the war: the French labour movement and wartime problems Planning the post-war world: the French labour movement and reform 1915-1916 Consolidating reformism: the French labour movement 1917-1918 The road to 'reconstruction': the British labour movement and post-war reform 1914-1918 Labour reformism in wartime: a comparison The international dimension The reckoning: l'apres-guerre and the longer-term legacy Appendices Bibliography Index

Book Reviews

The Crisis of Labour: Industrial Relations and the State in Contemporary Britain David Coates Philip Allan Manufacturing Change: Industrial Relations and Restructuring Stephanie Tailby and Colin Whitston The Competitiveness of European Industry Arthur Francis and P. K. M. Tharakan Routledge Managing People at Work Peter Makin, Cary Cooper and Charles Cox Strikes Richard Hyman Macmillan The Seamen—a history of the National Union of Seamen Arthur Marsh and Victoria Ryan Malthouse Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroot's Perspective W. Rand Smith Macmillan Individual Employment Law Barry Titman and Peter Camp

Review. Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective. Smith, W. Rand

Journal Article REVIEWS Get access Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective. By W. RAND SMITH. Basingstoke—London, Macmillan. 1987. xiii + 272 pp. £35.00. JOLYON HOWORTH JOLYON HOWORTH BATH Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar French Studies, Volume XLIV, Issue 1, January 1990, Pages 108–109, https://doi.org/10.1093/fs/XLIV.1.108 Published: 01 January 1990

REVIEWS

Journal Article REVIEWS Get access Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective. By W. RAND SMITH. Basingstoke—London, Macmillan. 1987. xiii + 272 pp. £35.00. JOLYON HOWORTH JOLYON HOWORTH BATH Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar French Studies, Volume XLIV, Issue 1, January 1990, Pages 108–109, https://doi.org/10.1093/fs/XLIV.1.108 Published: 01 January 1990

Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots PerspectiveSmith, W. Rand. Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective . New York: St. Martin's Press, 1987.

Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots PerspectiveSmith, W. Rand. <i>Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective</i> . New York: St. Martin's Press, 1987.

Crisis in the French Labour Movement, a Grassroots Perspective

Crisis in the French Labour Movement, a Grassroots Perspective

Book Review: Labor-Management Relations: Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective

Book Review: Labor-Management Relations: Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective

Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective.

Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective.

Crisis in the French labour movement: a grassroots' perspective

To the outside observer the French labour movement has undergone a puzzling transformation in recent years. From May 1968 to May 1981 French workers and their unions appear to have changed their very character, leading many observers to speak of a ‘crisis’ in the labour movement. Consider: in May 1968, following the lead of radicalised students who were denouncing everything from campus curfews to the capitalist system, over half of all workers went out on strike. In many cases they seized factories, set up strike committees and put forth demands for workers’ control of production (autogestion). Initially caught off guard by the spontaneous strikes the two largest trade union confederations, the Communist-affiliated Confederation Generale du Travail (CGT) and the formerly Catholic Confederation Francaise democratique du Travail (CFDT), soon joined the strikes and sought to gain control over the scope and direction of the workers’ protests.

Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective. By W. Rand Smith (New York: St. Martin's, 1987. xiii, 272p. $29.95).

Crisis in the French Labour Movement: A Grassroots Perspective. By W. Rand Smith (New York: St. Martin's, 1987. xiii, 272p. $29.95).

Marxism and the French Left: Studies in Labour and Politics in France, 1830-1981

List of Maps and Figures1 The Left in France2 The French Labour Movement in the Nineteenth Century3 The French Socialist Party 1920-19364 French Marxism 1945-19755 The Elections in 1981 in Historical Perspective Bibliography Chronology Index

Proudhon and the French Labour Movement: The Problem of Proudhon's Prominence

Proudhon and the French Labour Movement: The Problem of Proudhon's Prominence