ISSN:
1873-0841
Source:
Cambridge Journals Digital Archives
Topics:
Economics
Notes:
The great strike movement in France in the summer of 1936, which took its peculiar form of action in a series of stay-in strikes, can only be explained by the general state of mind of the French working-class in the spring of 1936. France had found itself for the last two years in a state of growing social and political fermentation. The danger of the militant social and political reaction, which manifested itself particularly clearly in February 1934, had roused the socially and politically progressive elements in France and enabled the reconciliation of the two great labour parties. It also surmounted the discord in the trade-unions and led to the formation of the “Popular Front”, which gained a glorious victory at the elections of deputies on April 26th and May 3rd 1936. In the course of this development of events the social consciousness of the working-class was strengthened. The feeling no longer to have to accept meekly the privations they had had to suffer during the years of depression, and no longer to stand deprived of their rights by their employers, gradually grew stronger. The beginning of 1936 marked a tremendous growth of the membership in the trade-unions and everywhere in the working-class there was a state of ferment. Characteristic of this development is, above all, the fact that in the beginning of the movement of 1936 the material claims, the claims for raising wages, often played a less prominent part and fell back behind the aspiration for mitigation of the social inferiority of the working-class, that is to say, the actual acknowledgement of the workman's right to join a trade-union, the realization of the system of collective contracts, the admittance of representatives of the workers in the different industries.
Type of Medium:
Electronic Resource
URL:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1873084100000161
Permalink
