FRE320: France between the Wars

Le Front populaire

Introduction

The term Front Populaire first came into being in July 1935 to designate the electoral pact between the French Socialist Party (SFIO), the French Communist Party (PCF) and the le Parti Radical in preparation for the legislative elections of 1936. Its original name was le Rassemblement populaire, but it soon became more commonly known as le Front populaire or le Front popu.

The Front Populaire then, was a broad coalition of the Left and centre-Left and of the major trade unions. A unified Left had been a difficult thing to achieve after WW1. Maurice Larkin has argued that the Left had a hard time in stablishing itself in France. A large peasantry, late industrialization and with it a relatively small urban working class compared to Great Britain meant that Socialism was relatively poorly established in France, despite the Paris Commune representing the first socialist government in Europe (Larkin 1988 p.45). The combined forces of the middle classes and the peasantry, who tended to vote conservatively, tended to keep the French socialist party out of serious contention

A number of factors facilitated the creation of le Front Populaire: the economic crisis, the internal threat from far Right (exacerbated by the anti-parliamentary violence of 6th February 1934) and the international fascist menace and threat of war. These combined factors made possible what had appeared impossible: a unified Left. The Front Populaire remains a powerful reminder to the Left today of the strength of unity. The Front Populaire has become a major reference point in the history, or perhaps, mythology, of the French Left. It represented a moment of solidarity and hope for the working classes and stood as a counter to the memory of the crushed Communards of 1871 (click here for photographs of the Mur des fédérés, a place of pilgrimage for the French Left).

The Split on the Left

Such a unity had been impossible after the Russian Revolution of 1917. One major consequence of events in Russia (Communists overthrew Tsar to create first Communist state) was to cause a split in the French Left. Some on the Left saw the revolution in Russia as a model for what should happen in France whilst others took a more cautious approach. At the Annual Congress of the French Socialist Party in Tours in December 1920, part of the party broke away to form what would become the PCF with a new allegiance to Moscow, whilst the remainder stayed faithful to the ideals of the French Republic. This led to problems of allegiances: should Socialists enter coalitions with Communists or would it alienate their own voters not to mention other less left-wing coalition partners?

The French Communist Party was born in 1920 when over half of the Socialist Party decided to adhere to the Comintern, created by Lenin in 1919. In practice this meant that the line taken by the Communist Party in France was not one formulated at home but, rather, by the Comintern in Moscow. French Communists did, however, have a representative on the Comitern.

The Comintern had, by the 1930s, lost much of its former autonomy and was increasingly under the control of the Soviet Communist Party led by Stalin. In the late 1920s, the Comintern advocated a policy of classe contre classe. This meant an attack on the enemies of revolution. The principal enemy of the Communists were the Socialists who were perceived to be inescapably betraying the interests of the working class, bolstering the power of the bourgeoisie and delaying the inevitable revolution and dictatorship of the proletariat.

The French communists did reach out to members of the French Soclists party - not the leadership but the base of grass-roots supporters. The rank and file of the Socialist Party were invited to align themselves iwtih Communist positions. This tactic was known as plucking the Socialist turkey - plumer la volaille socialiste   (Winock 1990 p.88)

Any talk of an alliance between communists and socialists against the growing fascist menace was dismissed as the socialists were seen by the communists as, in fact,  fascist themeselves. Here's an example of this language to give you an idea of the tone:
 

Défendre la République, dit Blum? Comme si le fascisme, ce n'était pas encore la République, comme si la République, ce n'était pas déjà le fascisme.
Paul Vaillant-Couturier, L'Humanité (week after 19 February 1934)


The point being made here was that it was impossible for the Republic to counter the fascist menace as the Republic was itself fascist. Your only hope is to ally yourself to the Comminust position in defence against fascism. Here is the Communist leader, Maurice Thorez, on this point:
 

Le succès de notre  lutte contre le fascisme, la victoire définitive du prolétariat contre la bourgeoisie exigent, non l'accord, mais l'attaque constante et impitoyable contre le Parti socialiste, agence de la bourgeoisie dans les rangs de la classe ouvrière.
Maurice Thorez, 1 April 1934 (Quoted in Winock: 1990 p.88)


This hard line didn't last long and in his closing speech at the Communist Party conference of the 26th June 1934, Thorez used very different language to articulate the need for what he called une unité d'action with Socialists against fascism.

Why this sudden change? Well, the major shift in policy came, as one might expect, from Moscow. The Soviet influence on PCF policy was still dominant. The Comintern changed its line, moved away from a policy of class war - classe contre classe. The revolutionary struggle against the Socialists was modified to a more concilatory position. The shift in policy was almost certainly motivated by Stalin's fears of Hitler's expansion eastwards and the perceived need to create an alliance with western European democracies to keep Germany in check.

The French Socialists were surprised by the apparant sudden change of heart and attributed it, quite rightly to the changes in the foreign policy of the Soviet Union. They were happy, however, that another major party of the Left was willing to enter into an anti-fascist alliance and, on the 7th July 1934 the French Communist and Socialist parties signed a pacte d'unité d'action.

The Communists leader, Maurice Thorez was the first to use the phrase front populaire in a speech in October 1934, although speech was actually written by Eugene Fried, the French permanent representative of the Comintern. The Comintern, seeing the success of its change in policy, sought to continue it in other countries. At the 7th Congress in 1935 it became official policy. Soon, other similar alliances between Communists and Socialists began to form, most notably in Spain.
 

Electoral Victory of le Front Populaire

The legislative elections of 26 April 1936 witnessed the involvement of 84.3% of the electoration, the highest proportion of electoral involvement since 1914. The Right lost ground for which even the advances of extreme Right parties could not compensate. The middle classes felt that their interests were best preserved by existing parties within the system of parliamentary democracy, with many voting for le Parti Radical. Thanks to some disciplined tactical voting in the second ballot (i.e. voting for the Left-wing party with the greatest chance of winning), the Front populaire was elected with sufficient seats to form a government.

At the head of the Front populaire was Léon Blum, who was the leader of the French Socialist Party. France had, for the first time in its history, a government led by the Socialists. Blum was a committed Internationalist with Jewish origins. His politics and cultural background made him a natural target of the Far-right (for Charles Maurras of L'action francaise he was a `juif allemand naturalisé ... est un homme à fusiller, mais dans le dos').

It was the first real attempt to improve the conditions of France's working class, to oppose the inequality of French society in which a minority controlled France's assets and wealth, and to resist the growing fascist menace in Europe. Coalition government, however, is a difficult thing to manage at the best of times and it was fraught with tensions and conflicts in the context of the mid-1930s. One can discern four distinct phases to the Front populaire in power:


Blum's First Coalition Government
 

Blum's first coalition government was formed of Socialists and Radicals and lasted between 4th June 1936 and 21st June 1937. Intrestingly, the Communists stayed out of government, even though they polled 15% of the vote, due to their revolutionary scruples. Attempted ambitious programme of reform. Socialists had only 20% of the vote - so they had a problem getting all their programme through parliament. The Communists had another 15%, but 35% was hardly a mandate and some of the measures alarmed the members of the Parti Radical who were part of the coalition government. Since the Parti Radical was the party of the middle classes it was anxious about any reforms that would cost money and increase taxation.

The Front populaire was initially sucessful in introducing an ambitious programme of social reform:
 


The Culture of le Front popu

The Front populaire was also decisive in creating a new cultural environment for writers, artists and filmakers through grants and other forms of state subsidy. Working-class people's increased leisure time meant that there was an even greater audience for cultural and sporting events. Les colonies de vacances, are a good example if the initiatives of le front popu. Many of the books and films of 1936 explicitly celebrate the strength of worker solidarity and shown the struggle against capital (e.g. Renoir's Le Crime de Monsieur Lange). The poetry of Jacques Prevert is another example of the cultural celebration of le Front popu.
 

The local councils of many working class areas, many in the Paris suburbs, espressed a desire for a new kind of France and supported the creation of the front populaire. Many of their ambitious projects were only completed after the Front populaire's electoral victory like La Maison du Peuple in Clichy, a Paris suburb designed by Marcel Lods and Eugene Beaudoin (who also designed La Cité de la Muette housing estate in Drancy). This was an ambitious attempt to introduce high quality modernist architecture into everyday life and to create a multi-purpose space for working-class people.
 

The Decline of the Front populaire
 

Serge Berstein has argued that four main factors contributed to the collapse of the Front populaire:
 


1) Right-wing Opposition

Although the Front populaire sought to combat the rise of the Far Right in France, it is one of the paradoxes of the coalition that it actually increased during the 4 years of the Front's existence as a government. Anti-Semitism, a stable of most parties and leagues of the Far Right, increased with the influx of Jewish migrants into France and found, in Léon Blum, a new hate figure. Publications like L'Action française and Gringoire stepped up their anti-Semitic diatribes. France was being undermined by a complot juif  led by the Internationalist Jew, Léon Blum.

Blum was not the only figure of hate for this resurgent Far Right. Roger Salengro, the Socialist Major of Lille and Ministre de l'intérieur was targeted in a press campaign of vilification in which he was accused of being a World War I deserter and spy. Although cleared of all allegations and defended vigorously in parliament, he was driven to suicide on 17 November 1936.

The press of the centre Right also played a role in cranking up the climate of hostility to the Front populaire with numerous articles alleging a complot communiste within government. Newspapers like Le Figaro, Le Temps, Le Matin and Le Journal des débats all carried alleged scoops and editorials claiming that the PCF had a powerful, malign and secret influence on government. Such fears were taken seriously or, in one infamous case, exploited for political purposes. In 1937, members of Eugène Deloncle's Comité secret d'action révolutionnaire (also known as la Cagoule) planned a coup d'état and used the fear of Communist influence to justify it. The plot was uncovered and the conspirators were arrested.

One of the first actions of Blum's government was to dissolve the leagues of the Far Right that had been responsible for so much of the street violence of the mid-1930s. Leagues such as Colonel de la Roque's Croix de Feu didn't just disappear, but reinvented themselves as legitimate political parties. The Croix de Feu, for example, became the Parti social français (PSF) and had between 1936 and 1940 a membership of between 600,000-800, 000. Other overtly fascist parties emerged in this period. Jacques Doriot's Parti populaire français (PPF) is a notable example.

The street violence between Left and Right continued too. In March 1937, there were protests against a proposed meeting of the PSF in Clichy. Their right to meet was defended by the police but a riot ensued in which an estimated 5 to 7 people were killed and around 200 wounded. Serge Bernstein has described France as living in 'une atmosphère de guerre civile larvée' (Bernstein 1993 p.132)
 
 

2) Disillusionment of the Left

There was much discontent within both the SFIO and the PCF at the moderate reforms undertaken by Blum's first government. Blum's problem was keeping all his coalition partners happy. The ambitious reforms wanted by the Left cost money which would inevitably have to be paid for in the form of higher taxation. Since the Parti Radical was the party of the middle classes, it was anxious about any reforms that would cost money and increase the tax burden of its middle-class support. There was also fierce competition for treasury funds in the context of rising international tensions and the need to modernize France's military.

Moreover, many on the Left felt that the conditions were ripe for revolution. The waves of stikes and factory occupations of June 1936 led many on the Left to believe that capitalism was in serious crisis and that the time was right for a revolution. Interestingly, such views came not from the PCF but from the 'Gauche révolutionnaire' wing of the SFIO. In a editorial in Le Populaire, the SFIO newspaper, Marceau Pivert, the leader of 'Gauche révolutionnaire' faction declared that 'tout est possible'. Capitalism could be overthrown and the dictatorship of the proletariat installed. The SFIO leadership were alarmed by such arguments and claimed that they did not have the mandate for such radical change. In 1937, the 'Gauche révolutionnaire' was disssolved and Pivert was expelled from the party.

Foreign policy was another area of Left-wing discontent, especially France's policy towards Spain. There were more general tensions within the coalition between, on the one hand, the pacifism of many who sought to avoid another disasterous war, and, on the other, between those who were committed to the ani-fascist struggle. This was a square that could never be circled. Avoiding war meant appeasing rather than opposing fascism. Blum was caught in this dilemma and his response was to increase spending on rearmament as a deterrent to fascist aggression. Blum and Eduoard Daladier, Ministre de la Défense nationale, both agreed to raise the budget for military spending from 9 to 14 billion francs.

Spain was the main subject of internal dissent. On 17 July 1936 rebel soldiers seized a number of large towns in Spanish Morocco. The next day, the military rebellion spread to mainland Spain. A number of Right-wing officers were opposed to the Left-wing Spanish Popular Front government which had won a majority in the general parliamentary elections of February 1936 and sought to overthrow it. By the end of July the rebels, known as Nationalists, had made significant territorial gains. In that month, General Franco, who would shortly become supreme military commander and head of state, approched Mussolini (19 July) and Hitler (22 July) for military assistance in toppling the legitimate Republican government. Mussolini agreed to the request and sent the rebel 12 bombers. Independantly of this, Hitler also consented to assist Franco and sent 30 Junkers transport plans and 6 Heinkel fighters. Both Mussolini and Hitler appreciated the Nationalists' anti-communist stance and were also keen to test military equipment, men and tactics. The Comintern were alarmed and acted quickly. On 26 July they created a fund to support the popular Front in Spain. Maurice Thorez played in instrumental role in organizing this in France. On 31 July, the Comité International de l'Aide au Peuple Espagnol was created.

The French government was also alarmed by developments in Spain. If Franco was victorious then France would be surrounded by three states antagonistic to the Left. They also feared national security and possible Italian military bases in the Balearics, threatening France's access to North Africa.  Spain became an especially acute problem for Blum on 19 July 1936 when the Spanish Prime Minister sent him a telegramme requesting arms and aircraft from France. The following day Blum met with two members of the cabuinet, Yvon Delbos and Edouard Daladier, both Radicals, to discuss the request. All three agreed to consent to the Spanish appeal for arms. They agreed because of the clear political affinities between the French and Spanish Popular Fronts. The French Front populaire, like its Spanish cousin, felt under threat from the Far Right and both countries had seen violent street confrontations between Left and Right.

However, Blum was soon obliged to change his position. At a prearranged meeting in London with representatives of the British government on 23-4 July, the British made clear their opposition to France sending arms and aircraft to Repoublican Spain. Britain favoured non-intervention as this was the strategy that appeared to best avoid increasing the tension with Germany and Italy and best protected Britain's considerable investments in Spain (approximately 40% of overseas investment in Spain came from Great Britain). When Blum returned to France, the news that France was planning to assist Spain was headline news in the Right-wing press, increasing tensions at home. Blum denied the agreement and the arms and aircraft were swiftly and secretly dispatched to Spain. On 31 July, Great Britain declared its neutrality and imposed an arms embargo on Spain. As France was a major ally of Great Britain, it was obliged to follow suite. Its new tactic was to create a Non-Intervention Agreement that it managed to get the USSR, Germany and Italy to adhere to (August), at least in principle.

The Left in France were understandably infuriated by Blum's change of heart and tactic towards their comrades in Spain. On 6 August 1936, Maurice Thorez publically condemned the policy of non-intervention. The shift represented a betrayal of the proletariat and a craven capitualation to fascism. «Des canons, des avions pour l'Espagne» became the rallying cry of the communists and CGT members. Factions within the SFIO like 'la Gauche révolutionnaire' and 'la Bataille socialiste' were also bitterly opposed, fracturing the unity of the Front populaire. Blum was forced into a number of public defences of his policy, including his famous speech at Luna-Park.
 
 

3) Economic Problems

The Front populaire was plagued by continuing economic problems and fierce internal debates about how the government should spend its money: should a large proportion go on reinvesting in and modernizing the army in the context of the growing and very real threat of another war in Europe? However, if money were to directed here, this would limit the government's ability to introduce more progressive social reform.

Inability to bring about significant change quickly enough led to a series of strikes throughout France that embarrssed Blum and his Socialist colleagues. In June 1936 an estimated 2 million workers were involved in industrial actions, strikes and workers sit-ins. In response to this, the government helped negotiate the Matignon agreement on 7th June 1936. This asserted the principle of compulsory collective bargaining and sanctionned an average pay rise of 12%.

By May 1938, the average wage had increased by 47.5%.  (Larkin 1988 p.55). However, higher wages and the compulsory 40 hour week increased production costs and this was passed on directly to consumers. As a result, the cost of living rose by 46% between May 1936 and May 1938. Women and civil servants lost out as their wage increases were lower than average and therefore had less spending power. Industrial action, increasingly labour costs and the forty hour week damaged France's ability to re-arm. Industrial production decreased by 4-5% between May 1936 and May 1937. In Germany it grew 17% over the same period. Interestingly, France saw industrial growth of 8% in 12 months preceding Front Populaire (Larkin 1988 p.59).
 
 

4) Defection of the middle classes

Much of the French bourgeoisie were alarmed at the policies of Le Front populaire in 1936 just as many of the French working classes would be disappointed by the Daladier government's reversals of those reforms in 1937.

removal of capital from France - real fear of financial meltdown
insufficient gold to cover money in circulation

franc losing value

inflation on the rise

pay rise meant to stimulate demand - however, production stagnated and businesses passed on higher production costs to consumers, thus negating the pay rises

thought that 40 week would reduce employment - workers in 8 hr shifts - the proble was that most of the unemployed were unqualified workers unable to work oni the shistfts

outmoded equipment meant htat they couldn't cope with the demands of shift  work

forced devaluation in September 1936

February 1937 Blum makes a famous speech in which he explains the necessity of une pause in the government's ambitious programme of social reform

cuts in public spending
 

Blum doesn't really nuderstand middle-calsses and their fears. The néo-Socialistes like Marcel Déat saw m-c as victims of capitaliosm but Blum rejected these arguments
 

fear of communist menace - strikes, Spain

fear at consequences of government policy - small businessmen, shareholders, civil servants etc.

Further Reading
 

S. Bernstein, La France des années 30 (Paris: Armand Colin, 1993) 2nd ed.

D. Borne and H.Dubief, La Crise des années 30 (Paris: Seuil, 1989) 2nd ed.

M. Larkin, France since the Popular Front: Government and People 1936-1986 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988)

J. Macmillan, Twentieth Century France: Politics and Society 1898-1991 (London: Edward Arnold, 1992)

P. Neville, France 1914-1969: The Three Republics (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1995) 30-77

D. Tartakowsky, Le Front populaire: la vie est à nous (Paris: Gallimard, 1996)

R. Vinen, France 1934-1978 (London: Macmillan, 1996) 8-24

M. Winock (ed.), Les années 30: de la crise à la guerre (Paris: Seuil, 1990)
 


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Text & concept: Tony McNeill
The University of Sunderland
Last updated: 21/04/2001