[page 14]
The French
in
Dave Webb charts the rise and fall of the French Socialist Party
in flux
and the prospects ahe:
SEETAL
CENTER PLUS JAMAIS
PARISES
right-wing government in 1986. New explosive lovements lie ahead Students demonstrate
HE FRENCH SOCIALIST Party (PS) seems
T to be shattering into pieces aiter its electoral
debacle in March, when the seats of 200 Socialist deputies evaporated in a wave of discontent.
Now the very future of the PS is in question. In an unprecedented move, just a month before the election, a former prime minister Michel Rocard announced his plan for a 'Big Bang in French politics, for the formation of a new party of Socialists, dissident 'reformed' Stalinists, ecologists,
human rights activists and the so-called 'centre'. It was hardly guaranteed to inspire confidence in the Socialists winning the election. In the event the biggest bang so far was the sound of Rocard himself being booted out of the Assembly.
A virtual civil war has raged in the PS since his announcement, followed by his 'coup' to seize control of the executive in April and the ousting of party leader Laurent Fabius.
On the other side, Jean-Pierre Chevenement,
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| former defence minister, resigned 'in disgust' from the party to form the "Citizens' Movement. He could possibly attract support from leftward-looking workers in the future, although that is not happening at present. Rather it is defectors from the right-wing of the Communist Party (PCF) who have joined him. Chevenement has leaned towards his nationalist tendencies of late. His resignation as defence minister during the Gulf war was not to oppose the war, but for France to take an independent from US imperialism.
Whatever the outcome of the PS congress in July, which will discuss Rocard's proposition, the party will have changed dramatically. Like many of the socialist parties in Europe the PS is now regarded by many as being part of the 'establishment. Scandals over money paid to party members by private companies, the sinking of the Greenpeace ship, and the use of HIV contaminated blood in transfusions for haemophiliacs, re-inforced this attitude.
This corruption was compounded by the miserable capitulation to big business in the running of the economy. When elected in 1981 unemployment, then about one million, was top of the PS agenda. The government immediately set about a wideranging programme of nationalisation. During this election unemployment passed three million, 10% of the population. The Socialists, especially after the two years of right-wing government from 1986-88, just carried on the right's policy of denationalisation, albeit at a slower rate. Living standards have fallen and France has now plunged into recession.
ideologically by the collapse of the Stalinist states, Rocard.
The question remains: how will French workers build a genuine leadership to measure up to their traditions of struggle?
The new right-wing government, with its crushing parliamentary majority, should remember the lessons of the past. In 1968, after ten years in power, they faced the wrath of the population. A movement beginning with university students protesting against the crisis in education, developed into a strike involving ten million workers. Although only 10% were unionised, 50% of the workforce came out on strike. All the ingredients existed for the overthrow of capitalism.
However, the leadership of the Communist Party and the trade unions refused to carry out struggle to take control of society into the hands of the working class. They pushed the movement towards purely 'economic demands', rather than a political overthrow of the capitalist class. In the following elections the PCF vote fell from 5m including the old to 4.4m. The Left Federation, Socialist Party, the SFIO, also lost 570,000 votes. In contrast, the United Socialist Party (PSU), led by Rocard but pushed to the left by the events France • 14 Rocard and Mitterand.
of May 1968, almost doubled its vote to 874,212. An opportunity to transform society had been lost. But the great events of 1968 were a turning point for the parties of the left. Within a year the old Socialist Party, the SFIO, had decided to disband.
HE FRENCH SECTION of the Second International (SF1O) was formed in 1905. At the Tours Congress in 1920, swayed by the victory of the Russian revolution, a majority voted to affiliate to the new Communist (Third) International and form the French Communist Party. However, the minority who remained in the SFIO saw their fortunes favoured compared to the PCF. While in 1922 the PCF had 130,000 members to the SFIO's 30,000, the SFIO outpaced the PCF electorally and, later, in membership:
as the PCF, following Stalin's line, first attacked the SFIO as 'social fascists' and then tail-ended the 1930s Popular Front.
It was not until the elections of 1945, when they won 26% of the vote, that the PCF became the dominant workers' party. This was a result of the role played by Communist militants in the underground resistance which meant that by 1944-45 the PCF were seen as the main party of struggle against the Nazi occupiers.
The SFIO in the meantime formed coalitions with the MRP (Christian democrats) and the Radicals, trying to become a 'third force' between the PCF and the Gaullists. Whilst officially spurning reformism for 'class struggle', the SFIO participated
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in coalition governments carrying out counterreforms. In 1956 the Socialist-led government of Guy Mollet reversed the party's policy over Algeria, supporting fully the settlers and local military against the Algerian workers and peasants.
By the end of the Fourth Republic in 1958 the SFIO had become totally discredited. De Gaulle's Fifth Republic drastically changed the political system, with a presidential government taking much of the power away from parliament. De Gaulle attempted to hold down the working class with a semi-authoritarian regime, whilst trying to unify the right-wing forces. At the same time, under the impact of the long post-war boom, French industry began to develop. The percentage of small farmers and peasants fell from 21% in 1954 to 7% in 1975. This led to a huge influx into the major cities and a decisive increase in the working class population.
The SFIO, discredited and with dwindling membership, attempted through Gaston Deferre, mayor of Marseilles, to form an alliance with the 'centre'. His failure in negotiations with the MRP, Radicals and the mushrooming "political clubs', alongside enormous pressure from the ranks of his own party, led the SFIO to an alliance with the Communists.
A 'mini-federation' of the SFIO, some of the Radicals and Francois Mitterand's supporters in the Convention of Republican Institutions club (CIR), formed the Federation of the Left, with Mitterand forcing De Gaulle to a second ballot for the presidency in 1965, and signing an electoral agreement with the PCF for the legislative elections in 1967.
The events of May 1968, however, smashed this federation. Due to the treacherous role of the PCF and Socialist leaders, many small left groups mushroomed in French society. Following the left's electoral defeat in June 1968, and then the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia, rifts blew up again between the PCF and the SFIO, and within the PCF itself. Many worker militants also left the Communist union, the CGT, for the CFDT, formerly the Catholic union federation, going on to fill out the new Socialist Party when it was set up in 1971.
The 1969 presidential elections saw no common candidate of the left, with the PCF getting 20% and the Socialists 5%. This was the lowest level ever for the Socialists and the SFIO decided to disband later that year. From a membership of 355,000 in 1945 the SFIO had collapsed to only 70,000 by 1970.
T WAS AT a 1971 congress in Epinay that
the current Socialist Party was formed, out of
a fusion of the old SFIO, the CIR, CERES (a left-wing group led by Chevenement) and a number of independents. Mitterand overthrew the SFIO old guard and was installed as First Secretary of the new Socialist Party.
A set of legislative proposals
left-wing
government would enact in its first term was signed with the PCF, and the 1973 elections saw the Union of the Left, with both parties doing well. Mitterand lost the second ballot in 1974 by only 1%, after the death of President Pompidou. Michel Rocard then led an influx into the PS from the PSU.
During the 1970s the relationship between the PS and the PCF fluctuated. By the Metz Congress in 1979 the PS leadership was split. Mitterand's supporters wanted to reaffirm the Union of the Left, while Rocard called for a more 'independent' line.
c_ar 1968: a turning point for the left.
At the Congress the CERES group backed Mitterand and their leaders were readmitted to the party secretariat. This was a decisive step as the new Projet Socialiste', written under the close direction of Chevenement, became the new party programme, promising much more radical change than any previously.
CERES, although very much an intellectual group, played a key role in pushing the policy of the PS to a left-reformist position and also in building a stronger base in the working class. One of its members, Georges Sarre, from the postal workers' union, brought a number of trade union activists into the party. He set about the establishment of workplace branches, the number of which grew from 54 in 1971 to over 800 by 1974. The growth of CERES, especially after 1968, after 1968, reflected the possibility for small groups with a radical programme to grow rapidly in a time of crisis.
The 1981 presidential election campaign saw D'Estaing and Chirac fighting to be the right's
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candidate. Mitterand was presented as 'the tranquil force, but with the PS emphasising the fight against unemployment. Supported by the PCF in the second round, Mitterand won with 51.75% of the vote and the left then swept to power in the parliamentary elections.
Significantly for the PS it gained in areas where it had previously been weakest, often at the expense of the PCF. Youth and workers, especially in Paris and its suburbs, switched to the PS. Compared to only 15% in 1973, in the working class Paris region the PS won 33% in 1981. In the country as a whole their share of the working class vote rose from 27% to 44%, whilst that of the CP fell from 36% to 24%.
Despite this position of strength the Socialist government turned from reforms to counter-reforms, under pressure from the capitalist class. The leaders of the main trade union federations (CGT, CFDT and FEN) accepted a wage freeze. Hundreds of thousands of redundancies took place in the steel and car industries alone. Attacks were launched on social security, education and the public health system.
By the 1986 elections all enthusiasm for the left government had faded. Chirac, leader of the RPR Gaullist party, came to power and immediately launched an onslaught against the working class. Thinking that the Socialists' electoral defeat had cowed the workers and youth the bosses seriously miscalculated. Firstly one million students demonstrated in Paris against education cuts. This spurred workers to take action against the government, notably the rail workers. The Socialists' return to power in 1988 was purely as a result of this movement from below against Chirac's government.
T the pal mae missive par famendary magenty
'HE NEW RIGHT-WING government should
the polls. The massive parliamentary majority does not reflect a stronger base in society. Already within the first few weeks the police, believing they have carte blanche to attack immigrants, killed four immigrant youth. The response was thousands of youth rioting on the streets.
Current economic forecasts are for a contraction by 0.75% in the first half of 1993. Domestic demand is weakening as export orders did last year. Business investment is expected to diminish by 11% in volume this year, while production capacity is greatly under-utilized.
Privatisation of state-run industries planned by Balladur's government will mean an enormous exacerbation of unemployment. The labour minister has forecast that 340,000 jobs will go before 1994. With recently announced tax rises, the government's popularity in opinion polls has already fallen substantially.
In this light, although they lost their one MP in the recent elections, the National Front (FN) of Le Pen has been able to attract support. All parties, from the Gaullists to the PCF, have
France • 16
pandered to racism. The right-wing parties tried to outdo the FN in their racist language to win 'popular support. Although with relatively low support the FN is a danger to workers, youth and immigrants through attacks on homes, meetings and individuals, and will only be combated through a serious, concerted struggle.
But this leaves the question of which avenues workers will take to defend themselves against the bosses' attacks. The trade unions are down to a membership of under 10%, with last year seeing the lowest number of days lost through strike action for decades.
However, the volatility of the French working class has been seen on numerous occasions throughout history. While traditionally only a small proportion of workers have been organised, when movements have started, as in 1936 or 1968, millions of unorganised workers have been drawn in. Huge explosions are entirely possible despite the right-wing parliamentary majority. The government will be one of crisis, over the economy, Europe, and between • the main two right-wing parties. Workers and youth will be forced to defend past gains with the struggle set to move back onto the streets.
These formations vel rapidly,
did in
develop rapidly, as
did in the
could the PS 1970s.
At present it remains unclear which organised political expression will be found by the movement. The PS will certainly not exist as the same party that grew from the early 1970s. Rocard's new party could possibly retain the name of the PS but it seems more likely he will create a social democratic, liberal-type party on a right-wing programme.
With that scenario Chevenement's group, alongside sections of the CP, Greens, etc, may become a pole of attraction around which workers could move politically, possibly under the name of the PS. Despite his present nationalist stance Chevenement also called on workers to campaign against privatisation on the night of the election defeat. The CP itself will probably decline, with splits to the right and the left. These tendencies have already begun to open up in the last few months.
With the vacuum which exists these formations could come under pressure from a movement of workers and could develop rapidly, as the PS did in the 1970s. For Marxists in this situation the task will be to intervene in the day-to-day struggles of workers, for example, against privatisation, government attacks and the rise of racism, putting forward a clear programme of action, an explanation of the crisis in the system, and the need for its overthrow.