Metropolitan France is shown in dark green, with the Saarland, under French administration until its accession to West Germany on New Year's Day 1957, depicted in light green
The French Fourth Republic (French: La Quatrième République Française) was the republicangovernment of France between 1946 and 1958, governed by the fourth republican constitution. It was in many ways a revival of the Third Republic that was in place from 1870 during the Franco-Prussian War to 1940 during World War II, and suffered many of the same problems. France adopted the constitution of the Fourth Republic on 13 October 1946.
Despite the political dysfunction, the Fourth Republic saw an era of great economic growth in France and the rebuilding of the nation's social institutions and industry after World War II, through assistance the United States provided through the Marshall Plan. It also saw the beginning of the German-French co-operation, that later led to the development of the European Union.
Some attempts were also made to strengthen the executive branch of government to prevent the unstable situation that had existed before the war, but the instability remained and the Fourth Republic saw frequent changes in government – there were 21 administrations in its 12-year history. Moreover, the government proved unable to make effective decisions regarding decolonization of the numerous remaining French colonies. After a series of crises, most importantly the Algerian crisis of 1958, the Fourth Republic collapsed. Wartime leader Charles de Gaulle returned from retirement to preside over a transitional administration that was empowered to design a new French constitution. The Fourth Republic was dissolved by a public referendum on 5 October 1958 which established the modern-day Fifth Republic with a strengthened presidency.
After the liberation of France in 1944, the Vichy government was dissolved and the Provisional Government of the French Republic (French: Gouvernement provisoire de la République française, GPRF), also known as the French Committee of National Liberation, was instituted after a unanimous request of the Provisional Consultative Assembly to be properly represented.[1] With most of the political class discredited and containing many members who had more or less collaborated with Nazi Germany, Gaullism and communism became the most popular political forces in France.
Charles deGaulle led the GPRF from 1944 to 1946. Meanwhile, negotiations took place over the proposed new constitution, which was to be put to a referendum. DeGaulle advocated a presidential system of government, and criticized the reinstatement of what he pejoratively called "the parties system". He resigned in January 1946 and was replaced by Felix Gouin of the French Section of the Workers' International (Section française de l'Internationale ouvrière, SFIO). Ultimately only the French Communist Party (Parti communiste français, PCF) and the socialist SFIO supported the draft constitution, which envisaged a form of government based on unicameralism; but this was rejected in the referendum of 5 May 1946.
A new draft of the Constitution was written, which this time proposed the establishment of a bicameral form of government. Leon Blum of the SFIO headed the GPRF from 1946 to 1947. After a new legislative election in June 1946, the Christian democrat Georges Bidault assumed leadership of the Cabinet. Despite de Gaulle's so-called discourse of Bayeux of 16 June 1946 in which he denounced the new institutions, the new draft was approved by 53% of voters voting in favor (with an abstention rate of 31%) in the referendum held on 13 October 1946. This culminated in the establishment in the following year of the Fourth Republic, an arrangement in which executive power essentially resided in the hands of the President of the Council (the prime minister). The President of the Republic was given a largely symbolic role, although he remained chief of the French Army and as a last resort could be called upon to resolve conflicts.
The wartime damage was extensive and expectations of large reparations from defeated Germany largely failed. The United States helped revive the French economy with the Marshall Plan (1948–1951), whereby it gave France $2.3 billion with no repayment. France was the second largest recipient after Britain. The total of all American grants and credits to France from 1946 to 1953, amounted to $4.9 billion.[2] The terms of the Marshall Plan required a modernization of French industrial and managerial systems, free trade, and friendly economic relations with West Germany.[3]
After the expulsion of the Communists from the governing coalition, France joined the Cold War against Stalin, as expressed by becoming a founding member of NATO in April 1949.[4] France now took a leadership position in unifying western Europe, working closely with Konrad Adenauer of West Germany. Robert Schuman, who was twice Prime Minister and at other times Minister of Finance and Foreign Minister, was instrumental in building post-war European and trans-Atlantic institutions. A devout Catholic and anti-Communist, he led France to be a member of the European Communities, the Council of Europe and NATO.[5]
Public opinion polls showed that in February 1954, only 7% of the French people wanted to continue the fight in Indochina against the Communists, led by Ho Chi Minh and his Viet Minh movement.[6]
Pierre Mendes France was a Radical Party leader who was Prime Minister for eight months in 1954–55, working with the support of the Socialist and Communist parties. His top priority was ending the war in Indochina, which had already cost 92,000 dead, 114,000 wounded and 28,000 captured in the wake of the humiliating defeat at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in early May 1954.[7]
At the Geneva Conference (1954), he made a deal that gave the Viet Minh control of Vietnam north of the 17th parallel, and allowed him to pull out all French forces. That left South Vietnam standing alone. However, the United States moved in and provided large-scale financial, military and economic support for South Vietnam.[8]
Mendes France next came to an agreement with Habib Bourguiba, the nationalist leader in Tunisia, for the independence of that colony by 1956, and began discussions with the nationalist leaders in Morocco for a French withdrawal.[9]
The intention of the new Constitution's authors was to rationalize the parliamentary system. Ministers were accountable to the legislative body, the French National Assembly, but some measures were introduced in order to protect the Cabinet and to reinforce the authority of the Prime Minister of France, who led the Cabinet. The goal of the new constitution was to reconcile parliamentary democracy with ministerial stability.
For instance, under the new Constitution, the President of the Council was the leader of the executive branch (Prime Minister of France). The President of the French Republic, elected by the Parliament (the National Assembly and the Council of the Republic), played a symbolic role. His main power was to propose a Prime Minister, who was subject to election by the National Assembly before forming a Cabinet. Only the Prime Minister could invoke a parliamentary vote on legitimacy of the Cabinet. The Prime Minister was also the only member of the executive able to demand a vote of confidence from the National Assembly (in the Third Republic any minister could call for a vote of confidence). The Cabinet could be dismissed if an absolute majority of the National Assembly's members voted against the Cabinet. Finally, the National Assembly could be dissolved after two ministerial crises in the legislature.
However, these constitutional measures did not work. In January 1947, after his election by the National Assembly and the nomination of his ministers, Prime Minister Paul Ramadier called for a vote of confidence in order to verify that the Assembly approved the composition of his Cabinet. This initiated a custom of double election, a vote for the Prime Minister followed by a vote of confidence in the chosen Cabinet, that weakened the Prime Minister's authority over the Cabinet. Cabinets were dismissed with only a plurality (not the absolute majority) of the National Assembly voting against the Cabinet. Consequently, these ministerial crises did not result in the dissolution of Parliament. Thus, as in the Third Republic, this regime was characterized by ministerial instability.
The trigger for the collapse of the Fourth Republic was the Algiers crisis of 1958. France was still a colonial power, although conflict and revolt had begun the process of decolonization. French West Africa, French Indochina, and French Algeria still sent representatives to the French parliament under systems of limited suffrage in the French Union. Algeria in particular, despite being the colony with the largest French population, saw rising pressure for separation from the Métropole. The situation was complicated by those in Algeria, such as the Pieds-Noirs, who wanted to stay part of France, so the Algerian War became not just a separatist movement but had elements of a civil war.
Further complications came when a section of the French Army rebelled and openly backed the Algérie française movement to defeat separation. Revolts and riots broke out in 1958 against the French government in Algiers, but there were no adequate and competent political initiatives by the French government in support of military efforts to end the rebellion owing to party politics. The feeling was widespread that another debacle like that of Indochina in 1954 was in the offing and that the government would order another precipitous pullout and sacrifice French honor to political expediency. This prompted General Jacques Massu to create a French settlers' committee[11] to demand the formation of a new national government under General Charles de Gaulle, who was a national hero and had advocated a strong military policy, nationalism and the retention of French control over Algeria. General Massu, who had gained prominence and authority when he ruthlessly suppressed Algerian militants, famously declared that unless General deGaulle was returned to power, the French Army would openly revolt; General Massu and other senior generals covertly planned the takeover of Paris with 1,500 paratroopers preparing to take over airports with the support of French Air Force units.[11] Armored units from Rambouillet prepared to roll into Paris.[12]
On 24 May, French paratroopers from the Algerian corps landed on Corsica, taking the French island in a bloodless action called Opération Corse.[11][12]Operation Resurrection would be implemented if deGaulle was not approved as leader by the French Parliament, if deGaulle asked for military assistance to take power, or to thwart any organized attempt by the French Communist Party to seize power or stall deGaulle's return.
Charles de Gaulle, who had announced his retirement from politics a decade before, placed himself in the midst of the crisis, calling on the nation to suspend the government and create a new constitutional system. On 29 May 1958, French politicians agreed upon calling on deGaulle to take over the government as prime minister. The French Army's willingness to support an overthrow of the constitutional government was a significant development in French politics. With Army support, deGaulle's government terminated the Fourth Republic (the last parliament of the Fourth Republic voted for its dissolution) and drew up a new constitution proclaiming the French Fifth Republic in 1958.
Alexander, Martin, and John FV Keiger. "France and the Algerian War: strategy, operations and diplomacy." Journal of Strategic Studies 25.2 (2002): 1-32.
Aron, Raymond. France Steadfast and Changing: The Fourth to the Fifth Republic (Harvard University Press, 1960)
Bell,David, et al. A Biographical Dictionary of French Political Leaders since 1870 (1990), 400 short articles by experts
Brogi, Alessandro. A question of self-esteem: the United States and the Cold War choices in France and Italy, 1944–1958 (Greenwood, 2002)
Connelly, Matthew James. A diplomatic revolution: Algeria's fight for independence and the origins of the post-cold war era (Oxford University Press, 2002)
Evans, Martin. Algeria: France's Undeclared War (2012), a scholarly history
Giles, Frank. The locust years: The story of the Fourth French Republic, 1946–1958 (Secker & Warburg, 1991)
Hitchcock, William I. France Restored: Cold War Diplomacy and the Quest for Leadership in Europe, 1944–1954 ( Univ of North Carolina Press, 1998) Online
Horne, Alistair. A savage war of peace: Algeria 1954-1962 (1977), classic narrative
Krasnoff, Lindsay. The Making of Les Bleus: Sport in France, 1958–2010 (2013)
Larkin, Maurice. France since the Popular Front: Government and People 1936–1986 (1997), scholarly survey
Lynch, Frances. France and the International Economy: from Vichy to the Treaty of Rome (Routledge, 2006)
McMillan, James F. Twentieth-Century France: Politics and Society in France 1898–1991 (Oxford University Press, 1992)
Marshall, D. Bruce. The French Colonial Myth and Constitution-Making in the Fourth Republic (1973)
Nord, Philip. France's New Deal: From the Thirties to the Postwar Era (Princeton University Press. 2010)
Pickles, Dorothy. France, the Fourth Republic (Greenwood Press, 1976)
Rioux, Jean-Pierre, and Godfrey Rogers. The Fourth Republic, 1944–1958 (Cambridge University Press, 1987), scholarly survey
Soutou, Georges‐Henri. "France and the Cold War, 1944–63." Diplomacy and Statecraft 12.4 (2001): 35-52.
Sowerwine, Charles. France since 1870: culture, politics and society (Palgrave, 2001)
Sutton, Michael. France and the construction of Europe, 1944–2007: the geopolitical imperative (Berghahn Books, 2011)
Trachtenberg, Marc. "France and NATO, 1949–1991." Journal of Transatlantic Studies 9.3 (2011): 184-194.
Williams, Philip Maynard. Crisis and Compromise: Politics in the Fourth Republic (1964)
Williams, Philip Maynard. Politics in Post-War France: Parties and the Constitution in the Fourth Republic (1954) Online
The Fifth Republic, France's current republican system of government, was established by Charles de Gaulle under the Constitution of the Fifth Republic on 4 October 1958. The Fifth Republic emerged from the collapse of the Fourth Republic, replacing the former parliamentary republic with a semi-presidential system that split powers between a prime minister as head of government and a president as head of state. De Gaulle, who was the first French president elected under the Fifth Republic in December 1958, believed in a strong head of state, which he described as embodying l'esprit de la nation.
Pierre Mendès France
Pierre Isaac Isidore Mendès France, known as PMF, was a French politician who served as President of the Council of Ministers for eight months from 1954 to 1955. He represented the Radical Party, and his government had the support of the Communist party. His main priority was ending the war in Indochina, which had already cost 92,000 dead, 114,000 wounded and 28,000 captured on the French side. Public opinion polls showed that, in February 1954, only 7% of the French people wanted to continue the fight to regain Indochina out of the hands of the Communists, led by Ho Chi Minh and his Viet Minh movement. At the Geneva Conference of 1954 he negotiated a deal that gave the Viet Minh control of Vietnam north of the seventeenth parallel, and allowed him to pull out all French forces. The United States then provided large-scale financial, military and economic support to South Vietnam.
Jacques Chaban-Delmas
Jacques Chaban-Delmas was a French Gaullist politician. He served as Prime Minister under Georges Pompidou from 1969 to 1972. He was the Mayor of Bordeaux from 1947 to 1995 and a deputy for the Gironde département.
Vincent Auriol
Vincent Jules Auriol was a French politician who served as President of France from 1947 to 1954.
Popular Republican Movement
The Popular Republican Movement was a Christian-democratic political party in France during the Fourth Republic. Its base was the Catholic vote and its leaders included Georges Bidault, Robert Schuman, Paul Coste-Floret, Pierre-Henri Teitgen and Pierre Pflimlin. It played a major role in forming governing coalitions, in emphasizing compromise and the middle ground, and in protecting against a return to extremism and political violence. It played an even more central role in foreign policy, having charge of the Foreign Office for ten years and launching plans for the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community. which grew into the European Union. Its voter base gradually dwindled in the 1950s and it had little power by 1954.
1965 French presidential election
The 1965 French presidential election, held on 5 December and 19 December, was the first direct presidential election in the Fifth Republic and the first since the Second Republic in 1848. It had been widely expected that incumbent president Charles de Gaulle would be re-elected, but the election was notable for the unexpectedly strong performance of his left-wing challenger François Mitterrand.
Provisional Government of the French Republic
The Provisional Government of the French Republic (PGFR; French: Gouvernement provisoire de la République française was an interim government of Free France between 1944 and 1946 following the liberation of continental France after Operations Overlord and Dragoon, and lasted until the establishment of the French Fourth Republic. Its establishment marked the official restoration and re-establishment of a provisional French Republic, assuring continuity with the defunct French Third Republic.
Alain Savary
Alain Savary was a French Socialist politician, deputy to the National Assembly of France during the Fourth and Fifth Republic, chairman of the Socialist Party (PS) and a government minister in the 1950s and in 1981–1984, when he was appointed by President François Mitterrand as Minister of National Education.
1958 French legislative election
The French legislative elections took place on 23 and 30 November 1958 to elect the first National Assembly of the French Fifth Republic.
1956 French legislative election
French legislative elections to elect the third National Assembly of the Fourth Republic took place on 2 January 1956 using party-list proportional representation. The elections had been scheduled for June 1956; however, they were brought forward by Edgar Faure using a constitutional sanction.
November 1946 French legislative election
Legislative election was held in France on 10 November 1946 to elect the first National Assembly of the Fourth Republic. The electoral system used was proportional representation.
June 1946 French legislative election
Legislative elections were held in France on 2 June 1946 to elect the second post-war Constituent Assembly designated to prepare a new constitution. The ballot system used was proportional representation.
1951 French legislative election
Legislative elections were held in France on 17 June 1951 to elect the second National Assembly of the Fourth Republic.
May 1958 crisis in France
The May 1958 crisis was a political crisis in France during the turmoil of the Algerian War of Independence (1954–62) which led to the collapse of the Fourth Republic and its replacement by the Fifth Republic led by Charles de Gaulle who returned to power after a twelve-year absence. It started as a political uprising in Algiers on 13 May 1958 and then became a military coup d'état led by a coalition headed by Algiers deputy and reserve airborne officer Pierre Lagaillarde, French Generals Raoul Salan, Edmond Jouhaud, Jean Gracieux, and Jacques Massu, and by Admiral Philippe Auboyneau, commander of the Mediterranean fleet. The coup was supported by former Algerian Governor General Jacques Soustelle and his activist allies.
National Centre of Independents and Peasants
The National Centre of Independents and Peasants is a liberal-conservative and conservative-liberal political party in France, founded in 1951 by the merger of the National Centre of Independents with the Peasant Party and the Republican Party of Liberty.
Guy Mollet
Guy Alcide Mollet was a French politician. He led the socialist French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO) from 1946 to 1969 and was the French Prime Minister from 1956 to 1957.
History of the French Communist Party
The French Communist Party (PCF) has been a part of the political scene in France since 1920, peaking in strength around the end of World War II. It originated when a majority of members resigned from the socialist French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO) party to set up the French Section of the Communist International (SFIC). The SFIO had been divided over support for French participation in World War I and over whether to join the Communist International (Comintern). The new SFIC defined itself as revolutionary and democratic centralist. Ludovic-Oscar Frossard was its first secretary-general, and Ho Chi Minh was also among the founders. Frossard himself resigned in 1923, and the 1920s saw a number of splits within the party over relations with other left-wing parties and over adherence to the Communist International's dictates. The party gained representation in the French parliament in successive elections, but also promoted strike action and opposed colonialism. Pierre Sémard, leader from 1924 to 1928, sought party unity and alliances with other parties; but leaders including Maurice Thorez imposed a Stalinist line from the late 1920s, leading to loss of membership through splits and expulsions, and reduced electoral success. With the rise of Fascism this policy shifted after 1934, and the PCF supported the Popular Front, which came to power under Léon Blum in 1936. The party helped to secure French support for the Spanish Republicans during the Spanish Civil War, and opposed the 1938 Munich agreement with Hitler. During this period the PCF adopted a more patriotic image, and favoured an equal but distinct role for women in the communist movement.