The word ‘syndicalism’ is simply French for trade unionism. The Syndicalist movement of a generation ago (Revolutionary Syndicalism, as it is usually called) had, however, a special character. It grew up in France during the nineties as a reaction against the parliamentary socialism that allowed such men as Millerand to represent the workers in the Chamber and to lead them along paths acceptable to the bourgeoisie. The figure chiefly associated with it was an Anarchist, Fernand Pelloutier, and, though he died prematurely in 1901, the reorganization of the Confédération Général du Travail (or C.G.T.) in the year following his death completed his work.

This Syndicalism was in the first place a movement that aimed at uniting all workers, whatever their political or religious opinions, in one body and in giving to that body a new fighting spirit. They were to reject all corporate political action and to keep entirely to the industrial sphere. Here they would rely upon their own resources and their own men, refusing the assistance of bourgeois journalists and intellectuals. They would cultivate a strict discipline and their only weapon would be the strike, which would be thorough and violent.