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Some Comments on the Nature of the Nationalist Revival in France before 1914

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2008

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It is frequently asserted by students of the history of the Third French Republic that the years before 1914, and especially from 1911 to 1914, were a period of nationalist revival, a somewhat exceptional period when politics were dominated by a novel concern for national unity, prestige, and power; by calls for order, tradition, and discipline; and by catchwords connected with all these things. I propose to inquire first into the social aspect of this apparent change in the ruling ideology of the Republic, and then into the background and nature of the Nationalist movement.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis 1958

References

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page 221 note 1 They accepted the Nationalist alliance as they accepted any alliance with Right or Centre, e.g. as it suited them. Compare maps 13 and 15 in Goguel, F., Géographie des Elections françaises, Paris 1951Google Scholar, and Siegfried, A., Tableau Politique de la France de l'Ouest, Paris 1913, p. 417Google Scholar, to understand how lukewarm those Western regions where nobility was dominant were in supporting, say, the economic policies of the Right, whereas they reacted strongly on issues of national interest or prestige which affected their patriotic outlook.

page 221 note 2 In the Sables d'Olonnc, for instance, the Action française allied with Catholic and bourgeois interests in 1914 to secure the defeat of Henri Bazire, successor of Drumont as editor of La Libre Parole and leader of a rival movement on the Right.

page 222 note 1 Thus we find the Catholics putting up “a free-thinking Republican” as they did at Rennes in 1914 to secure the defeat of a distrusted Catholic like Louis Deschamps, or indulging in intramural struggles like those which preceded the election of Paul Simon at Brest against another Catholic candidate. Cf. Delourme, P., Trente-cinq ans de politique religieuse, Paris 1956, Ch. VII, passim.Google Scholar

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page 224 note 1 Ibid., P. 743; the similarity to the Poujadist appeal might well be noted.

page 224 note 2 Siegfried, A., Mes Souvenirs de la 3e République, Paris 1946, passimGoogle Scholar; Agulhon, M. in George, P., etc., Etudes sur la Banlieue de Paris, Paris 1950.Google Scholar

page 225 note 1 Poincarism was the respectable Nationalism of 1912–1914, which “allowed all good men to come to the aid of their party” by providing a leader acceptable to good Republicans.

page 227 note 1 La Terre et les Morts, Paris 1899, p. 12.Google Scholar

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page 229 note 1 Cf. Barrès, , Roman de l'Energie NationaleGoogle Scholar; Romains, , Hommes de Bonne Volonté; France, op. cit.Google Scholar; Bulletin de l'Amitié Charles Péguy, passim.

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page 230 note 1 Cf. some instances of this attitude in Hazard, P., L'Ame française à la veille de la guerre, in: Revue internationale de l'enseignement, LXXIV, 1920Google Scholar; Curtius, E. R., Die literarischen Wegbereiter des neuen Frankreichs, Potsdam 1920Google Scholar; Cairns, J. C., Letters and International Politics, 1911–1914, in: University of Toronto Quarterly, XXIII, 1954Google Scholar; Bourne, R. S., Maurice Barrès and the Youth of France, in: Atlantic Monthly, CXIV, 1914.Google Scholar

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page 231 note 3 P. 283.

page 231 note 4 Péguy, , Paris 1948, I, p. 246.Google Scholar

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page 233 note 1 Cf. Barois, Jean, L'Age Critique, I.Google Scholar

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page 234 note 3 Heberle, R., Social Movements, New York 1951Google Scholar, Introduction, passim, tells us what a vague thing a “movement” might be, sometimes a mere trend or tendency, sometimes a factor in producing a trend, sometimes a response to a trend, sometimes a political party, sometimes something much less formal than that. Though to speak of a Nationalist party in connection with this period would give the wrong impression, it is correct to speak of a Nationalist movement because it qualifies under Professor Heberle's definition as “integrated by a set of constitutive ideas or an ideology”.

page 235 note 1 Variot, J., Propos de Georges Sorel, Paris 1935.Google Scholar

page 235 note 2 Cf. de Lyon, Le Progrès, 03 19, 1913Google Scholar; L'Humanité, , 05 26, 1913.Google Scholar

page 235 note 3 Lettres de la Princesse Radziwill, Bologna 1934, IV, 77.Google Scholar

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page 236 note 2 Parole, La Libre, 12 6, 1911.Google Scholar

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page 237 note 1 London 1944, p. 35 and passim.

page 238 note 1 Op. cit., p. 419.