The Socialists and the Workers of Paris: The Amicales Socialistes, 1936–40

Abstract

The Popular Front's victory in the legislative elections of April-May 1936 caused a great sense of relief and then a joyful upsurge of hope and idealism in its supporters. Spontaneously, thousands of workers began to occupy shops and factories. On June 4, when the Blum government came to office, the strikes had begun to paralyze the economy. In the next two weeks, perhaps because it was clear that the Blum government was not going to suppress the strikes but rather to negotiate an end to them, perhaps because by that time it was also clear that neither the Confédération Générale du Travail nor the Communist and Socialist parties would try to take advantage of the situation for an insurrectionary purpose, the strikes spread like wildfire throughout the country. Hundreds of thousands of workers apparently wanted to guarantee, through “direct action”, that the benefits of the Matignon accords and of the promised legislation would apply in their industry or region. It was in these conditions that the Blum government managed to get the conservative Senate's approval for the most progressive social reforms of the Third Republic.