Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- List of abbreviations and French political groups
- 1 Introduction
- 2 A historiographic overview
- 3 International comparisons
- 4 Notables
- 5 Bourgeois parties and the female electorate
- 6 Organized business and politics
- 7 Administration
- 8 Opposition nationale
- 9 The Parti Républicain de la Liberté
- 10 Machine à ramasser les Pétainistes? The Mouvement Républicain Populaire and the conservative electorate
- 11 The Rassemblement des Gauches Républicaines
- 12 The Rassemblement du Peuple Français
- 13 Independents and Peasants
- 14 The Groupement de Défense des Contribuables
- 15 Conclusion
- Appendix. The electoral law of 1951 and apparentements
- Bibliography
- Index
12 - The Rassemblement du Peuple Français
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 July 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- List of abbreviations and French political groups
- 1 Introduction
- 2 A historiographic overview
- 3 International comparisons
- 4 Notables
- 5 Bourgeois parties and the female electorate
- 6 Organized business and politics
- 7 Administration
- 8 Opposition nationale
- 9 The Parti Républicain de la Liberté
- 10 Machine à ramasser les Pétainistes? The Mouvement Républicain Populaire and the conservative electorate
- 11 The Rassemblement des Gauches Républicaines
- 12 The Rassemblement du Peuple Français
- 13 Independents and Peasants
- 14 The Groupement de Défense des Contribuables
- 15 Conclusion
- Appendix. The electoral law of 1951 and apparentements
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Comme tous les mal aimés, ce RPF dont je devenais le fonctionnaire semble voué à l'oubli de ceux qui l'ont vécu. De rares thèses de spécialistes, bien peu de souvenirs.
Edmond Michelet's remark on the attention given to the Rassemblement du Peuple Français (RPF) is only partly true. The two most important leaders of the RPF were de Gaulle, who founded the movement in April 1947, and Jacques Soustelle, who became its secretary. Neither of these men devoted more than a few pages of their memoirs to the description of the movement's activities. However, the RPF has been the subject of three distinguished academic books since its dissolution, and has attracted extensive discussion in more general works on the Fourth Republic. There are several reasons for this interest. Firstly, the sources for the RPF are exceptionally good, and access to the movement's archives has been granted to a number of historians. Secondly, the RPF contained a number of eminent political analysts, notably Raymond Aron, and other writers, such as René Rémond, felt sympathetic to Gaullism. Thirdly, de Gaulle's importance during the Second World War and later during the Fifth Republic encouraged analysts to see the RPF as part of a continuing tradition long after the other parties of the Fourth Republic had been consigned to the dustbin of history. Fourthly, the RPF's ambitions to win an absolute majority in parliament and its attempt to establish a direct relation with the electorate, as opposed to one mediated by notables or party organization, made it seem familiar to those who assumed that an ‘Anglo-Saxon’ party system was the ‘natural’ pattern of politics.
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- Bourgeois Politics in France, 1945–1951 , pp. 216 - 233Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1995