751.00/12–2051: Despatch
The Ambassador in France (Bruce) to the Department of State 1
No. 1653
Subject: The French political situation as of December 15, 1951
1. Introduction
As the year 1951 draws to a close, the government of René Pleven lives in a temporary state of euphoria due to the unexpectedly large majority it obtained from the National Assembly, 377 to 233, on the occasion of the first reading of the Schuman Plan ratification law.2 This gratifying vote cannot conceal the fact, however, that the Pleven government is in effect a minority government, that there exists no program at present for which a majority in the Assembly can be marshaled, and that the unresolved differences among the center parties are so deep that a crisis in the near future is quite likely. What will distinguish such a crisis from the previous ones during the life of the last National Assembly is that there is now the arithmetical possibility of a rightist government; and also that the divisions among the center parties are now not only along the lines of economic interest but also along ideological lines, thus making the reconstitution of a genuine center coalition more difficult than it has ever been since the liberation.
An analysis of the French political situation, from the point of view of the interests of the United States, must concern itself with (a) the stability, or lack of it, on the part of the present coalition—which is not the same as the stability of individual cabinets; and the stability of a possible different line-up or coalition; (b) the degree of unity that obtains, or that can be achieved, behind a French government; (c) the cooperation of the present French government, and of its likely successor, in the achievement of common foreign policy objectives; and (d) the intentions and capabilities of the present, or likely future, government in the matter of national defense. Since there are many political forces at work in France, and since the essential power of the state is held by the National Assembly to which all governments are at present directly responsible, the following simplified analysis begins with a brief explanation of the basic line-up in the French National Assembly.
2. The basic line-up
All France is divided into six parts: On one extreme is the Communist Party which obtained 26 percent of the popular vote in the June elections but which, due to alteration of the electoral law, has only one-sixth of the deputies in the Assembly. The Communist strength is due to a number of factors, among which the most important is that the French working class has been consistently disfavored in the distribution of the national income. The combination of democratic processes and enlightened employer self-interest, [Page 464] which in other countries has allowed the labor share of the national income to be increased, has not become effective in France, partly due to the predominance of agricultural interests and the more or less permanent alliance between the urban middle-class, the employers (most of them small-scale), and most of the peasantry. Because the Communist party is so strong and obviously subservient to foreign interests and because the past governments have been so weak, there exists at the other end of the Assembly a strong pseudo-Fascist party, de Gaulle’s RPF, which obtained 22 percent of the votes in the June elections and which has 120 seats, or one-fifth of the seats in the Assembly. The RPF seeks a strong government and a general abatement of the role of political parties and of Parliament. The totalitarian left and right together obtained slightly less than one-half of the votes in 1951 and have slightly more than one-third of the seats in the Assembly. The rest of the seats are held by the so-called “center parties.”
There are four groupings of center parties, and there are good reasons why they should differ among themselves: First, there exists between them the usual dividing line between right and left, between economic liberalism and the advocacy of state planning and state control, in short, between the “haves” and the “havenots”: The Socialists (106 seats) and the MRP (97) incline toward the left in economic matters, though both are rigorously anti-Communist. The Radicals (RGR, 90 seats) and the Independents and Peasants (95), on the other hand, defend the farmers and middle and upper classes, and are opposed to excessive state interference in economic affairs. This is a split that exists in all countries in which there is freedom. It would exist in France even if the constitution and the electoral system were different. But there are very few countries in Europe in which the right and the left have been forced to govern together as long as they have been in France. Because the extreme right and the extreme left together are so strong, the unnatural center coalition has had to continue ever since 1947 when the Communists were thrown out of the government and a coalition of the left came to an end. It is as though leftwing Democrats and right-wing Republicans had had to govern together, or the British Conservatives and the Labor Party. To make matters worse, however, the center parties are not two but four, and the division among them goes not only according to economic interest but also, and differently, according to ideological tradition.
The Marxian Socialists and the Catholic MRP, we have seen, are both basically leftist and republican in outlook. They are deeply separated from each other, however, by ideology, notably by what is known as the church-school issue; and the same issue divides, though to a lesser extent, the Radicals from the Independents and [Page 465] Peasants. The issue of state support for church schools, which on first sight appears so irrelevant to the major problems confronting France at the present time, is as basic an issue as the civil rights and states’ rights issue in the United States which managed to split the Democratic Party in 1948, when foreign observers also were struck by the seeming irrelevance of the issue. In France, the church had long been associated with the monarchy, and republicans had to fight it along with the kings and the aristocracy. Later, the church became associated with the destruction of French democracy. In 1850, Napoleon III had given the church a virtual monopoly on education in France, to fasten more securely upon the country an anti-republican regime. Fifty years later, the Third Republic terminated all church privileges in France and made state education non-religious, as it is in the United States. In the year that is now ending, the pendulum has begun to swing again in the other direction, and two laws have been passed which admit the principle of state aid to religious education. So far, only the camel’s nose is under the tent, but passage of those laws represented a milestone in French history and was sufficient to bring about a profound division among the center parties.
The church-school laws, which were enacted in September 1951, were voted with the help of the Gaullists, against whom the center parties had united only three months before in the national elections. The voting of those laws broke the center coalition and drove the Socialists into a position of precarious support of the government, which they refrained from overthrowing at the next opportunity only because this would have increased the likelihood of a deal between the right-center parties and the RPF. The voting of the church-school laws illustrates, in any event, that in contra-distinction to the previous Assembly the present one has a potential majority that would include the RPF. The major reason why such a coalition (which would be largely confined to the RPF, Independents, Peasants, and Radicals) has not been brought about so far is that de Gaulle insists upon acceptance of his program by his potential coalition partners—in other words, that he wishes them to capitulate to him rather than join him in a conventional-type coalition.
3. Stability, and lack of it
The French, for reasons closely bound up with the history of democracy in their country—they have had unfortunate experiences with “strong” government—are operating under a constitution which attaches virtually no penalty to the overthrow of a cabinet. Only under very closely circumscribed conditions is the parliament dissolved in the event it votes a government out of office. Consequently, [Page 466] the changing of individual cabinets is hardly an index of governmental stability: Cabinets can succeed each other which are virtually identical and which pursue virtually identical policies. What matters from the point of view of governmental stability is the continuity of coalitions. What distinguishes the present situation from that which prevailed immediately before the June elections is that not only the coalition itself is precarious, but a different coalition can eventually come into being.
It is an arithmetical fact of this Assembly that no three of the four diverse center party elements have between them a majority. The present government bases itself only on three, with the fourth, as we have seen, grudgingly lending support. Whenever the RPF combines with the Socialists on an economic issue, with the Communists going along for tactical reasons of their own, the government is outvoted and, if it puts the question of confidence, voted out of office. The government was thus outvoted in the first reading of the escalator wage law in November, at which time it announced that it would put the confidence question when the law returns from the Council of the Republic. This issue and the budget issue, both of them economic in nature, can bring about the fall of the government in the near future. Another issue on which the Gaullists, Socialists, and Communists might combine their forces and bring the government down might be the issue of the European Army, which is at present still gestating. In any event, when the Pleven government falls—and no French government lives long under the present type of constitution—the ensuing crisis is likely to be long (it was four weeks before the present government could be constituted), and the question will become acute as to whether a government with the RPF can be constituted.
If de Gaulle were suddenly to be removed from the scene, or if his control over the RPF were weakened, the formation of a successor government to the one now in office would be a relatively simple matter: The 120 deputies of the RPF would in all likelihood join up with the Independents, Peasants, Radicals and some MRP to form a moderately rightist government. The Socialist party would then become a constructive opposition, which might enable it to recover a portion of the working-class support that it has lost over the last years because it never could afford to follow outright opposition policies for fear of creating a hopeless deadlock or upsetting the regime; and the government, being more homogeneous than the previous governments and less fearful of endangering the basic republican fabric of France, would be able to embark upon consistent long-range policies akin to those which a conservative government in any other democratic country would follow. The result would be a more purposeful attack on France’s economic [Page 467] problems, with consequent beneficial effects in reducing Communist strength, and an enhancement of the moral standing of the Socialist Party, with the same kind of beneficial long-range effects.
Because de Gaulle is not only alive, however, but in good health and in control of the bloc of 120 RPF votes in the National Assembly, the problem presents itself in an entirely different light: If the RPF were to enter a coalition in the normal manner in which other parties enter coalition governments, on the basis of compromises between divergent programs and interests, de Gaulle would lose the prestige that accrues to him as the potential leader of a government standing “above the parties”, which he advocates. Moreover, if he or one of his lieutenants were to take the helm of such a government only to be overthrown in the usual manner in which French governments are voted out of office, the loss of his prestige would be such as to virtually finish the RPF as a movement.
Consequently, de Gaulle still insists not only upon leadership and control of an eventual coalition government, but also upon acceptance beforehand, by his potential “coalition” partners, of a program that involves the strengthening of the executive, so that it could not be overthrown as easily as have been past French governments. Putting it more bluntly, de Gaulle at present desires a blank check for power and will not settle for anything less. From his point of view, he is correct in asking for such a blank check, for there are many among the center parties who would be delighted to see a Gaullist-led coalition government brought into being in the conventional manner precisely because they would wish to overthrow it at the first opportunity and thereby discredit the General and eventually pry off a sizeable portion of his following.
The kind of government sought by de Gaulle, under the conditions envisaged by him, can only be created in France under the impact of a grave crisis, under the influence of a strong shock which might exasperate a sufficient number of deputies to the point where they would be willing either to dissolve the Assembly and call new elections or to try the Gaullist experiment as the only remaining remedy. De Gaulle thus has a vested interest at this time in economic collapse, permanent deadlock among the center parties, prolonged crisis and the threat of military disaster. He might also, at the appropriate time, attempt to create and foster an emergency atmosphere to put pressure on the center deputies in the Assembly. But in the absence of such a “coup d’amalgam”, such a shock that might produce a new line-up, the requisite number of centrist deputies (nearly 200 would be needed) are not likely to buy a Gaullist-led coalition on de Gaulle’s terms. Because many Gaullist deputies know this, there is a growing movement [Page 468] among them to ask the General to reduce his terms, accept the risks of a more conventional coalition, and move his men into government offices. As time goes on, and as it becomes more apparent that de Gaulle’s gamble of “everything or nothing” may not pay off, the dissension in the RPF can be expected to increase, until the choice confronting the General may be a split in his own forces or a relaxation of his own terms for the formation of a right-center government.
As the year draws to a close, the situation thus presents itself as a race, as it were, between the disintegrating tendencies of the center (Pleven) government, and the incipient disintegrating tendencies of de Gaulle’s RPF. Cracks are appearing in the government, notably in connection with the budget, but cracks have also appeared in the RPF: On the occasion of the vote on the Schuman Plan, seven (out of 119) RPF and affiliated deputies proved no longer susceptible to Gaullist discipline. Under normal conditions, this could be the beginning of a serious schism, but as the government falters and stumbles, the RPF may regroup its forces again in the hope of being in on the kill and the subsequent division of spoils. At the present time, only a very prolonged crisis appears likely to produce the kind of capitulation that de Gaulle is seeking. If the government stumbles and falls, but is able to pick itself up again relatively quickly and can reconstitute itself with the same centrist elements, the disintegrating tendencies of the RPF may overtake those of the center parties; in which case a more conventional type of right-center government, built with the help of debris of the RPF, would become a possibility.
4. What unity is obtainable?
Because most governmental decisions in the last years have been, and had to be, the result of compromises between the divergent center parties, and because the crucial problems of a redistribution of economic burdens and of constitutional reform have proved incapable of solution by compromise, the fact is often lost sight of that the center parties have in general pursued fairly consistent policies since they started to govern together: They are united on basic foreign policy objectives and on the basic necessity of a strong defense effort. They are still united on the necessity of pursuing the war in Indochina, on keeping up a minimum long-range reconstruction program, and in particular, as the recent confidence vote has shown, on pursuing a long-range policy of European integration. These policies are not identified with any one party, however, and no government has as such benefited from any widespread feeling of loyalty on the part of the voting public. On the contrary, it can be said that the prevailing public attitude toward [Page 469] the present government and all its recent predecessors is one of resigned exasperation and support for the lesser evil. Even the 52 percent of the country who voted for the center parties in the June elections are aware of the essential weakness of the center governments, their seemingly petty internal divisions, and in particular their inability to master the problem of inflation.
Does this mean that the public at large, a majority of the voting population, would welcome a strong government if de Gaulle could succeed in creating one by legitimate means? There is at present no indication that this is so. If there were an acute crisis—a new Korean war, for instance, closer to France—there would probably be a widespread acquiescence in a surrender of democratic freedom in order to obtain a stronger French government. In the event of such an emergency, there might be sighs of relief on the part of many people even if de Gaulle cut through the constitutional processes and made an end with the quarrels of the innumerable groups in the Assembly. But this would be a reaction under emergency conditions.
A Gaullist government would never be accepted by the Socialist Party, nor by a majority of the basically leftist MRP. The suspicions vis-à-vis de Gaulle are so strong on the left (and the left in France, if one includes the Communists, still represents more than 50 percent of the voting public), the basic belief in republican institutions is still so strong not only on the left but also among substantial elements even on the reactionary right, that a Gaullist government would only seemingly involve a greater degree of unity: It has been said that the recent elections, which artificially reduced the representation of the Communists, “broke the thermometer and then pretended that the temperature of the patient had dropped.” This is partly true—although minorities, even strong minorities, are in most democratic countries not represented proportionately in parliament. If de Gaulle were to come to power, however, if he were to outlaw the Communists, rule by decree, silence the democratic opposition and proceed to build a “strong France”, one might say that the internal pressures and divisions of France would continue, only the pressure gauge (and safety valve) would have been removed. In the absence of an effective legitimate opposition, the temptation on the part of the Socialists to go underground, to affiliate in some form with the Communists, to draw other republican elements into a new kind of Popular Front, would be strong, even though it would not be immediately apparent.
The irony of the situation is that many of the program points advocated by de Gaulle, notably with respect to a reform of the constitution, are widely recognized to be reasonable and necessary, but would meet with furious resistance from the left and parts of the [Page 470] center because of distrust of the General and the RPF, of their future plans, of the manner in which they would implement such reforms if de Gaulle were to come to office. It can therefore be said that while there is disunity at present, there would also be disunity, of a different kind, if de Gaulle were in control; but that, if the RPF were to break up some time, a good number of the objectives of de Gaulle which look toward creating the conditions for a stronger executive in France, might well be achieved. By a tragic twist of history, de Gaulle, whose major emotional appeal to Frenchmen is the call for national unity, has become the major element that prevents a broader unity from being brought about in France at the present time.
5. Prospects for foreign policy and national defense
As long as the present type of government remains in office, one can expect a combination of basic cooperativeness within the Atlantic alliance, inefficiency, slow but steady progress in the armament effort, and a pursuit of the French policies that look toward European integration through a functional approach. The present government is straining at the limits of what is politically, and perhaps economically, possible in the field of defense under present conditions, and it is embarked on a policy with respect to the European Army which will also subject to tremendous strain the cohesion between the center parties and the cohesion within those parties. The center parties have not yet faced up to the likely disastrous repercussions that would occur if the European Army should fail of acceptance—the new and still more impossible dilemmas that would face the French in their relations with Germany and with the United States. It is too early, therefore, to speculate regarding the obstacles that stand in the way of the achievement of that particular policy.
With respect to France’s economic capacity and willingness to make increased sacrifices for national defense both in Europe and in Indochina, one can predict, however, that under the present type of government a reaction may develop, as it has in Great Britain, against what is believed to be an excessive rate of armament and an excessive commitment of the French economy to tasks which are believed by many to be beyond the capabilities of France. In the Radical Socialist Party, the school of thought that would write off the Indochinese war or transfer the commitment in whole or in part to the United States or the United Nations, centers around the figure of Mendés-France. The Socialists might under certain conditions rally to such policies of cutting back the French overseas commitments, even though at present the Socialist Party is still behind the war effort in Indochina. If a reaction along such [Page 471] lines were to occur, it would probably be greeted with glee by the French spokesmen of neutralism and by the advocates of appeasement policies, but if it became of any importance it would be essentially a nationalist reaction and a reaction of elements that are most fearful of the inflationary pressures on the French economy—a reaction that would in any event draw its principal strength from groups that are solidly committed to the Atlantic alliance and to the policy of a build-up of deterrent forces in Europe.
What, however, if there were to occur the complete change in the governing majority and in the type of government, as it is sought by de Gaulle? According to his electoral platform and his propaganda appeals, there would ensue a vastly increased defense effort. The ensuing buoyed-up national self-confidence would restore internal credit, prices would be stabilized and the living standard of the workers (partly due to the “association” of capital and labor) would be at least maintained or increased even while the heightened armament activity went forward. As France’s prestige, well-being, and sense of security increased—still according to the RPF—Communist strength would decline, aside from the fact that rigorous measures would be taken against “separatist” activity. Actually, however, a government run by the RPF would only be able to arrest inflation by applying rigorous economic controls, which initially it would be unlikely to do because the imposition of such controls would still further lessen the support behind it.
More likely, a government in which de Gaulle has the deciding word would begin in office by throwing certain benefits to the workers in an attempt to create a greater degree of unity behind it. Such a policy, if not coupled with a corresponding decrease in the income of other classes, would do little to stop inflationary tendencies and would hardly enable defense production to be substantially increased. The redistribution of the national income, coupled with rigorous controls that might make a larger defense effort possible, could only be expected from an RPF government that was secure in its tenure of power. As has been shown above, such a security of tenure is not at present in the cards for any government led by de Gaulle, except temporarily under disaster conditions.
In the foreign policy field, any French government coming into office after a defeat of the European Army (“Pleven”) plan would probably be no longer capable of materially influencing the course of events in Germany. It might, by refusing to countenance a German defense contribution also outside of a European Army, provoke the rupture of the Allied High Commission and even of NATO, but it would probably have lost a direct influence on the future development of joint defense policies in Europe—regardless of whether it was a rightist or center government. This is a contingency, [Page 472] however, which involves so many consequences that to discuss it would far transcend the framework of the present analysis. In any event, it can be said that if a right-center coalition government were to come into being before the final decision had been reached on the European Army, it would probably substantially follow the foreign policies of the present coalition.
If, on the other hand, the present coalition were to be followed by an outright Gaullist government, one can expect new conditions being interposed to a German defense contribution, or in any event an issue being made of Franco-German equality. Such a government might demand the supreme direction of land and air defenses in Europe for France and would ask a renegotiation of the accords under which the U.S. is permitted to build up the common defense through installations in France and North Africa. In short, the best that can be expected from a successor government to the present type of government, is a continuation of its basic foreign policies. A straight rightist government in France would not only be of doubtful effectiveness as far as increasing the French short-run military effort is concerned, but it would reduce, rather than increase, the unity among the western powers in Europe.
6. Summary and conclusions
The Pleven government continues to rest on a shaky foundation. Passage of the church-school laws has marked a turning point in French politics by dividing the center parties and illustrating the possibility, which did not exist before the June elections, of forming a right-center government with de Gaulle’s RPF. The major obstacle to the formation of such a government is de Gaulle himself, who is not prepared at this time for a coalition government over which he would not have full control. The kind of government sought by de Gaulle is only likely to come about by a profound shock and in an emergency atmosphere. Within the RPF, there is a growing movement to ask the General to reduce his terms and to accept the risks of a conventional kind of coalition. As the year draws to a close, the situation presents itself as a race, as it were, between the disintegrating tendencies of the center (Pleven) government, and the incipient disintegrating tendencies of the RPF. If the present coalition falls apart but is able to reconstitute itself relatively quickly with the same centrist elements, the disintegrating tendencies of the RPF may overtake those of the center parties, and a right-center coalition government (in which de Gaulle would not be dominant) may eventually be brought into being.
From the point of view of unity behind a government, while the present type of government had behind it only slightly more than one-half of the voters, a Gaullist-led government would not have [Page 473] the acceptance of a larger portion of the population. Although the present government is often disunited and moves slowly and by compromises, it has followed a consistent policy in defense and foreign affairs and is likely to continue to do so. Difficulties are looming up in the latter field in connection with the European Army, but a different kind of government is not likely to produce less difficulty in that regard. A possible incipient trend may exist which looks toward a scaling-down of the French defense effort, or a shifting of the burden in Indochina. Even if this trend were to become accentuated, it would be carried forward by groups that are fully committed to the concept of collective defense within the framework of NATO. A rightist government is not likely to simplify the problem of dealing with France in the defense and foreign affairs fields.
What long-range hopes exist for the development of more cohesiveness of the political forces and for greater effectiveness of the republican institutions of France, reside in reform of the constitution and of the electoral law, both of which are widely recognized to be in need of overhauling and revision. This does not mean that France can ever be expected to develop a two-party system or a pattern of conducting its affairs resembling that of the United States. But in the short run, some progress might be made in the direction of creating a better balance between the legislative and executive branches of the government, provided the republican institutions themselves do not appear endangered by such reform. Because of the fear of a fascist dictatorship, important progress in constitutional reform in a democratic direction, can only be expected if the prospect of a straight Gaullist government recedes into the background. Some basic change in the governing coalition is likely to occur in the coming year. As 1951 draws to a close, therefore, the race described above, between the disintegrating tendencies of the center coalition and the disintegrating tendencies of the RPF, has a certain dramatic import: The year 1952 may show whether France will have an opportunity to improve and eventually to perfect its republican institutions.