In May of 1936, the Popular Front won the French general elections. A wave of strikes erupted in the weeks following the election. During what was at that time the most massive general strike of French history, French workers won huge concessions from the ruling class, including the 40 hour weeks and – for the first time – paid vacations !

These events have become a myth amongst the French Left and workers movement, linked to victory and progress in the minds of many Left activists and radical workers. But, as communist revolutionaries, our duty is not to commemorate but to understand the reality of this process, which all the reformists leaderships since 1936 made their best effort to hide and distort. 

We need to understand what really was the Popular front? Why did it ultimately collapse? What was the significance of the strikes of May and June 1936? Why were most of their conquests quickly contested and destroyed? Why did this historic period of mobilisation of the French working class ended with the instauration of a bonapartist dictatorship under Marshall Petain? And, most importantly, what lessons can these events offer to all those who want to overthrow capitalism today?

Reading List

• Leon Trotsky – “A Program of Action for France” (1934)
• Leon Trotsky – “The Decisive Hour in France” (1938)
• Rob Sewell – “Under a false flag: Stalinism and ‘Popular Frontism’ – a trap for the working class” (2024)
• Leon Trotsky – “Whither France?” (1934-1936)
• Leon Trotsky – “France at the Crossroads” (1936)