Léon Jouhaux, Louis Saillant and the national and international in transnational trade unionism

Abstract

The history of transnational trade unionism has been analysed in terms of mutual assistance, regulating global capital, augmenting the legitimacy, prestige and power of unions and their leaders, and providing avenues for states to prosecute national interests. From the 1920s to the 1980s, international organisations of trade unionists constituted a site of struggle between the antagonistic philosophies of transnationalism and trade unionism of Communists, social democrats and liberals, the USSR and the capitalist democracies. This paper traces how two conflicting transnationalisms shaped primarily by national factors developed in French unions and were reflected in international bodies during the first half of the twentieth century. Through exploration of the life histories of two leaders of French labor, Léon Jouhaux and Louis Saillant, it examines changing and clashing conceptions of trade unionism and transnationalism. The paper depicts the fluidity of allegiances and the role human agency driven by national considerations played in the cooperation and conflict between Communists and their opponents which culminated in the split in the Confédération Générale du Travail in 1947 and the disintegration of the World Federation of Trade Unions in 1949.

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Richard Croucher and Tony Carew for comments on earlier drafts of this paper.

Notes

^1.Logue, Towards a Theory of Trade, 35; Harrod, Trade Union Foreign Policy, 47.

^2. For a discussion, see Logue, Towards a Theory of Trade. International activity was typically insulated from rank-and-file control.

^3.Tosstorff, “Moscow versus Amsterdam,” 79–97.

^4. The term has been used to describe the pre-1914 Second International: Callahan, Demonstration Culture, xviii–xiv and passim. It is also used by Peter Waterman who notes ‘the combination of high internationalist principle with low nationalist action’ adopted by transnational union leaders: Waterman, Globalization, Social Movements, 27.

^5. See Van Goethem, The Amsterdam International, 39–41, 88–104; Tosstorff, “Moscow versus Amsterdam,” 79–97. Many leaders of US trade unionism were more accurately ‘liberal’ than ‘socialist’ or ‘social democratic’.

^6. An extensive literature includes Carew, Labour under the Marshall Plan; Weiler, British Labour; and MacShane, International Labour. For a synoptic essay, see Carew, “A False Dawn,” 167–84.

^7. AFL leader George Meany who prided himself on equal antipathy to Communism and fascism, unyielding opposition to unfree trade unionism and contempt for unity with Communists asked in 1945: ‘What could we talk about? The latest innovations being used by the secret police?’ Robinson, George Meany and His Times, 131–2.

^8.Kendall, TheLabour Movement, 287; Taft, TheAFL, 235–40.

^9. Quoted in Van der Linden, “The Past and Future,” 531.

^10.Allen, Trade Union Leadership, 288–312; Citrine, Two Careers. Van Goethem argues the Trades Union Congress (TUC) hoped creation of an allied power union coalition would secure formal representation in the peace negotiations: Van Goethem, “Labour's Second Front,” 663–81. It failed to do so: TUC, Report 1945, 117–9.

^11. The AFL affiliated to the IFTU in 1937 partly to pre-empt affiliation by the CIO which it considered ‘a left-wing splinter’. It opposed dissolution of the IFTU and refused to join the WFTU because of the presence of the Communist unions and CIO: Taft, TheAFL, 236–54. For the CIO, see Logue, Towards a Theory of Trade, 27–8; and Leventhal, Communism, Anti-Communism and the CIO.

^12. For Tanner, a fellow traveller, see MacShane, International Labour, 149–54.

^13. Another case was Italy; see Romero, The United States.

^14. The alternative Catholic tradition embodied in the Confédération Française Démocratique du Travail is not addressed in this paper: for an introduction, see Kendall, TheLabour Movement, 65–8.

^15. Quoted in Van Goethem, The Amsterdam International, 101.

^16. Quoted in Bergounioux, Force Ouvrière, 85.

^17. See Logue, Towards a Theory of Trade; Busch, The Political Role, 2–8.

^18. See Stovall, TheRise of the Paris, passim.

^19. For biographical details, see Georges, “Jouhaux”; Georges, Tintant, and Renauld, Léon Jouhaux: trente ans; and Georges, Tintant, and Renauld, Léon Jouhaux dans le Mouvement.

^20.Milner, TheDilemmas of Internationalism, 148.

^21. See Thorpe, “The Workers Themselves”, 1–28; Friedman, “Revolutionary Unions,” 155–81.

^22. Quoted in Thorpe, “The Workers Themselves”, 19.

^23.Siwek-Pouydesseau, “Les Syndicalistes,” 77–9; Ridley, Revolutionary Syndicalism, 184–6; and Stearns, Revolutionary Syndicalism, 73–102. The Charter of Amiens is reprinted in Lorwin, TheFrench Labour Movement, 312–3.

^24.Dreyfus, “The Emergence,” 27–71; Milner, TheDilemmas of Internationalism, passim.

^25.Ridley, Revolutionary Syndicalism, 184–6; Becker, “Jouhaux: Le 4 Août,” 14–18.

^26. They became confidantes and collaborators. For many years, they were at the centre of a group of French social democrats who occupied posts in international organisations. Jouhaux successfully nominated Thomas as first director of the International Labor Organization (ILO): http://www.ilo.org/century/lang-en/index.htm, accessed February 20, 2013.

^27.Georges, “Jouhaux,” 124.

^28.Dreyfus, “The Emergence,” 60–71.

^29.Lorwin, TheFrench Labor Movement, 53.

^30.Van Goethem, “Conflicting Interests,” 84–5.

^31.Milner, TheDilemmas of Internationalism, 148, 230–8.

^32.Thorpe, “Workers Themselves”, 152–3, 176–9; Courtois and Lazar, Histoire du Parti Communiste, 34–67; and Tosstorff, “Moscow versus Amsterdam,” 80–4.

^33.Georges, Tintant, and Renauld, Léon Jouhaux: Trente Ans, 101–3; Courtois and Lazar, Histoire du Parti Communiste, 73.

^34.Tucker, French Revolutionary Syndicalism, 183–7; Lorwin, TheFrench Labor Movement, 60–3; and Fine, Towards Corporatism, passim.

^35.Thorpe, “Workers Themselves”, 244–68.

^36.Van Goethem, The Amsterdam International, 36–9, 86–96.

^37.Courtois and Lazar, Histoire du Parti Communiste, 118–58; Lorwin, TheFrench Labor Movement, 70–2; Kendall, TheLabour Movement, 41–3; and Georges, Tintant, and Renauld, Léon Jouhaux dans le Mouvement, 140.

^38.Van Goethem, The Amsterdam International, 98.

^39.Taft, TheAFL, 235–7. Stalin's dissolution of RILU illustrated the standing of Russian unions and the subordination of its foreign affiliates to Soviet policy: Tosstorff, “Moscow versus Amsterdam,” 91–3.

^40.Georges, Tintant, and Renauld, LéonJouhaux dans le Mouvement, 411–4; Taft, TheAFL, 238–9; and Van Goethem, The Amsterdam International, 100–2.

^41.Prost, La CGT, 82–100; Tiersky, French Communism, 54–95; and Jackson, ThePopular Front, passim.

^42.Tiersky, French Communism, 89.

^43.Writings of Leon Trotsky, 91.

^44.Siwek-Pouydesseau, “Les syndicalistes,” 83–4; Ehrmann, French Labor, 144–7; and Courtois, Le PCF dans La Guerre, 12–39. The Neo-Socialists influenced by the planning of Henri de Man quit the SFIO in 1933.

^45. Quoted in Kendall, TheLabour Movement, 47; Courtois, LePCF dans la Guerre, 41–80. The PCF's Russian patriotism was demonstrated in secret negotiations with the Germans in 1940 and its claims, couched in anti-Semitic phraseology, that it had contributed to the defeat of France and if L'Humanité was legalised would remain neutral over the occupation: Besse and Pennetier, Juin 1940, 10–13.

^46.Wohl, French Communism, 344; Pierre, “Saillant, Louis André,” 62–4.

^47. For biographical details, see Pierre, “Saillant, Andre,” 62 and Pernot, “Louis Saillant”. See also Georges, Tintant, and Renauld, LéonJouhaux dans le Mouvement, 101.

^48.Pierre, “Saillant, Louis André,” 63–4; Georges, Tintant, and Renauld, LéonJouhaux dans le Mouvement, 251, 259.

^49.Pernot, “Louis Saillant,” 3–5; Courtois, LePCF dans La Guerre, 21.

^50.TUC, Report 1944, 275–9.

^51. The Manifesto is reprinted in Lorwin, TheFrench Labor Movement, 315–20; Courtois, Le PCF dans La Guerre, 5, 148, 179.

^52. Quotes from Lorwin, TheFrench Labor Movement, 315–20.

^53.Van Goethem, The Amsterdam International, 260, 278.

^54.Pernot, “Louis Saillant,” 4.

^55.Les Accords du Perreux; Moriaux, La CGT, 86.

^56.Courtois, LePCF dans La Guerre, 291.

^57. Ibid., quoting Colonel Passy.

^58. Memorialised in Robert Guédiguan's 2009 film The Army of Crime.

^59.Pernot, “Louis Saillant,” 7.

^60. Ibid.

^61.Moriaux, La CGT, 88; Siwek-Pouydesseau, “Les Syndicalistes,” 83–5; and Rieber, Stalin and the French Communist Party, 220–316.

^62.Lorwin, TheInternational Labor Movement, 206–7.

^63.TUC, Report 1946, 397.

^64.Van Goethem, The Amsterdam International, 247–8; Pernot, “Louis Saillant,” 8–9. The TUC withdrew its nomination of Schevenels after Jouhaux agreed Saillant's appointment would remain under review: TUC, Report 1946, 134.

^65. Quoted in Caute, TheFellow-Travellers, 208.

^66. Ibid.

^67.Jackson, France: The Dark Years, 473, 516.

^68.Clinton, Jean Moulin, 190. Belin was the leading CGT activist serving Vichy.

^69. It is unlikely Saillant would have known details of the PCF's record exposed in the 1990s, the secret negotiations with the Nazis and the murder of opponents: see note 42 and Broué and Vacheron, Meurtres au Maquis.

^70. Quoted in Lorwin, TheFrench Labor Movement, 99. There is no evidence Saillant supported insurrection, as against the PCF's peoples' democracy-style gradualism. Given his SFIO background and belief in unity, he may have found encroachment appealing: see Courtois, LePCF dans La Guerre, 462–8; Rieber, Stalin and the French Communist Party, 212–37.

^71.Robrieux, Histoire Intérieure, Tome II, 49, 55, 173.

^72.MacShane, International Labour, 254.

^73.Carew, “A False Dawn,” 169.

^74.MacShane, International Labour, 126–7.

^75.Allen, Trade Union Leadership, 290–1.

^76. Ibid., 291; Kendall, TheLabour Movement, 148–58; and Millon, Mexican Marxist.

^77.Crémieux-Brilhac, La France Libre, 946; Courtois and Lazar, Histoire du Parti Communiste, 204–30.

^78. The events of 1946–1947 are detailed in Lacroix-Riz, La CGT. See also Rieber, Stalin and the French, 220–6. Jouhaux was ambivalent about the PCF's removal from government; Wald, TheUnited States, 97–99.

^79.Haslam, Russia's Cold War, 82–3, 94. For background, see Romero, TheUnited States and Brogi, Confronting America.

^80. Jouhaux and four confederal secretaries called for a return to work during the strikes of November 1947: Robrieux, Histoire Intérieure, Tome II, 251–2.

^81.Lacroix-Riz, LaCGT, 319–27; Georges, Tintant, and Renauld, LéonJouhaux dans le Mouvement, 330–1.

^82.Allen, Trade Union Leadership, 290 note 1. But by the end of 1948, Jouhaux was planning the ICFTU with the British: Weiler, British Labour, 328 note 189.

^83.Wald, TheUnited States, 103. For general developments, see Godfrey, Fate of the French Non-Communist Left.

^84.Romero, TheUnited States, 88.

^85.Pernot, “Louis Saillant,” 6.

^86.Taft, TheAFL, 355.

^87.Leventhal, Communism, Anti-Communism and the CIO, 228–9; Romero, TheUnited States, 119.

^88.Carew, “A False Dawn,” 179. Tensions intensified as the executive bureau changed from 5 non-Communists and 4 Communists in 1945 to 3 non-Communists and 6 Communists in 1948 and the executive committee from 11-11 in 1945 to 8-14 by 1948.

^89.Weiler, British Labour, 328 note 192. In 1948 Deakin described the Communist Party as ‘the declared enemy of the British working class.’: Allen, Trade Union Leadership, 280. Saillant claimed unless the ITSs were integrated, ‘the WFTU would be paralyzed and impotent’, TUC, Report 1946, 277.

^90.Carew, Labour under the Marshall Plan, 70–9.

^91. Quoted in Weiler, British Labour, 122–3.

^92.Allen, Trade Union Leadership, 311–2.

^93. See Calhoun, TheUnited Front.

^94.Georges, Tintant, and Renauld, LéonJouhaux dans le Mouvement, 411–4.

^95. For such criticism see MacShane, International Labour, 3–5, 278–86.

^96. It is similarly artificial to segregate and grade ‘internal’ and ‘external’ factors promoting the CGT split. Marshall Aid became an internal issue. With strike policy it ignited the longstanding antagonisms between the Communists and their opponents.

^97. MacShane's criticism of earlier writers is contrived. Henry Pelling's short history of British unions, which perforce touches the WFTU in passing, is included in an artificial orthodoxy which neglects the pre-existence of anti-Communism. So is Taft whose study of the AFL stressed that organisation's longstanding hostility to Communism. Weiler arguably overestimates manipulation of union leaders by the state, but Carew's reticence on pre-existing antagonisms in a text devoted to Marshall is scarcely culpable. MacShane's overstatements at the start of his book are more satisfactorily reprised at the end. For example: ‘It is wrong to argue that [Socialist-Communist hostilities] were created or even resurrected by the Cold War’, MacShane, International Labour, 5, may be compared with ‘the Cold War … grew from existing political divisions that resurfaced as soon as the fighting stopped’ ibid., 279. Hyman, “Praetorians and Proletarians,” 191, note 32, notes the positions of MacShane and historians he criticises are complementary: ‘MacShane explains the fragility of the WFTU, Carew and Weiler why the break came and in the manner that it did.’

^98.MacShane, International Labour, 123, 170, 295–6; and see Carew, Labour under the Marshall Plan; Hogan, TheMarshall Plan.

^99.http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel-prize/peace/laureates/1951/jouhaux-bio-html (accessed October 20, 2012).

^100.Fejtö, TheFrench Communist Party, 146.

^101.Kriegel, TheFrench Communists, 292–3.

^102.Pernot, “Louis Saillant,” 12.

^103.Georges, “Jouhaux,” 129.

^104.Radosh, American Labor. For Jouhaux and the AFL, see, Milner, TheDilemmas of Internationalism, 112–3.

^105. Variations on this theme are found in two contemporary plays, Alan Bennett's An Englishman Abroad and Julian Mitchell's Another Country, both based on Guy Burgess's exile in Moscow.

^106.Busch, The Political Role, 4–5

^107. Ibid.; Radosh, American Labour; and Scipes, AFL-CIO's Secret War, 83–112.

^108.Croucher and Cotton, Global Unions, 34–6.

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John McIlroy

John McIlroy is a Professor of Employment Relations at Middlesex University Business School. He was formerly Professor of Industrial Relations at Keele University and Reader in Sociology at The University of Manchester. He co-edited Trade Unions in a Neoliberal World (2010); Histories of Labour: National and International Perspectives (2010); The Struggle for Dignity: Industrial Politics and the 1926 Mining Lockout (2nd ed., 2009); The Post-War Compromise: British Trade Unions and Industrial Politics 1945–64 (2nd ed., 2007); and The High Tide of British Trade Unionism: Trade Unions and Industrial Politics 1964–1979 (2nd ed., 2007). His books include Trade Unions in Britain Today (2nd ed., 1995). His writing has appeared in Past and Present, Journal of Contemporary History, International Review of Social History, American Communist History, History Workshop, European Journal of Industrial Relations and the British Journal of Industrial Relations. For 25 years, he organised classes for trade unionists.