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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 November 2008
The World Federation of Trade Unions (W.F.T.U.) was one of the most hopeful ventures of all the Communist front organisations. Unlike some of the other fronts the Russians did not create it. They captured the W.F.T.U. after it was established, and had a good start. Once captured, however, the W.F.T.U. represented merely an extension of the pattern of the earlier Red International which had been created by the Comintern following World War I as a vehicle to reach the working masses of the world and rally them to Moscow. But like its predecessor—dissolved in 1937—the W.F.T.U. has also failed to make significant inroads among the workers in western countries and win control over them. While it has affiliates in the west, the French Confédération Générale du Travail (C.G.T.) and the Italian Confederazione Generale Italiana del Lavoro (C.G.I.L.) being the most outstanding examples, the W.F.T.U. does not at all dominate these movements. Rather, control for the most part is exercised through the local Communist parties, some of which, while still very much an integral part of an international apparatus, have won some measure of autonomy from Moscow.1
Page 551 note 1 Cf. Morris, Bernard S., ‘Communist International Front Organizations’, in World Politics (Princeton), IX, I, 10 1956, pp. 76–87.Google Scholar
Page 551 note 2 See Beling, Willard A., Pan-Arabism and Labor (Cambridge, Mass., 1960), pp. 85–95,Google Scholar and ‘Political Trends in Arab Labor’, in Middle East Journal (Washington, D.C.), XV, I, 1961, pp. 29–39,Google Scholar for a summary of Communist labour organisations in the Arab world.
Page 552 note 1 In brief summary, it should be recalled that following World War I international labour had regrouped in essentially two camps. The International Federation of Trade Unions (I.F.T.U.), with headquarters in Amsterdam, represented a reconstructive mentality: ‘The war is over-get on with reconstruction.’ The other, the Red International, subscribed to the credo of the Third International which endorsed revolution by force to establish a dictatorship of the proletariat. World War I, according to its doctrine, was merely the springboard for further revolution. See Lorwin, L. L., The International Labor Movements: history, policies, outlook (New York, 1953),Google Scholar and Windmuller, J. P., American Labor and the International Labor Movement: 1940–1953 (Ithaca, N.Y., 1955).Google Scholar
Page 552 note 2 Finidori edited other Communist sheets in Tunisia, e.g. L'Aube social, La Bataille sociale, and Le Combat social.
Page 552 note 3 Quoted in Le Petit Matin (Tunis), 17 11 1925.Google Scholar
Page 553 note 1 The trial was considered at the time a sensation and enjoyed considerable press coverage. See particularly the coverage in Le Petit Matin, passim.
Page 553 note 2 Cf. Garas', Félix remarks on Lucien Saint, French Resident at this time in Tunisia; Bourguiba et la naissance d'une nation (Paris, 1956), P. 52.Google Scholar
Page 553 note 3 Later attempts to confuse in world opinion the Neo-Destour with Communism did not work. Julien, Charles-André noted that ‘it fooled no one’; L'Afrique du nord en marche: nationalisme musulman et souveraineté française (Paris, 1952), p. 288.Google Scholar Articles 87 and 89, paragraphs 2, 3, and 91 of the Penal Code were applied in the charges.
Page 553 note 4 Le Petit Matin, 13 and 17 November 1925.
Page 554 note 1 See al-Haddad, Tahir, The Tunisian Workers and the Appearance of the Trade Union Movement (Tunis, 1927), pp. III ff.Google Scholar (in Arabic).
Page 554 note 2 Cf. Ibrahim, 'Abd al-Baqi, Social Laws (Tunis, 1956), vol. I, p. 164 ff.Google Scholar, for text of decree (in Arabic).
Page 554 note 3 Cf. Plum, Werner, Gewerkschaften im Maghreb: U.G.T.T.—U.M.T.—U.G.T.A. (Hanover, 1962), p. 21,Google Scholar for background.
Page 555 note 1 For further treatment of the two internationals, cf. Lorwin, op. cit. and his ‘The Structure of International Labor Activities’, in The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science (Philadelphia), 03 1957, pp. I–II;Google Scholar also Windmuller, op. cit.
Page 555 note 2 Nationalism, of course, was the overriding consideration in the establishment of the U.G.T.T. and was reflected in the fact that while membership was open and, in fact, some other nationals—including Frenchmen—did affiliate with the new movement, it was for all practical purposes Tunisian.
Page 556 note 1 Mission (Tunis), 5 05 1949.Google Scholar Cf. ‘Rapport sur les relations extérieures' of the U.G.T.T. fourth national congress; ibid. 13 April 1949. Expressions of this sort also indicate why the U.G.T.T. was attracted to the peace movement. It participated in the creation of a Tunisian Committee for Liberty and Peace and was also active in the World Congress of the Partisans of Peace.
Page 557 note 1 See Lichtblau, George E., ‘The Communist Labor Offensive in Former Colonial Countries’, in Industrial and Labor Relations Review (Ithaca), XV, 3, 1962, pp. 376–401,Google Scholar for a general treatment of the subject.
Page 557 note 2 The U.S.T.T. noted: ‘We do not consider it as a rupture but, on the contrary, as a common effort which should continue’, Le Petit Matin, 14 11 1946.Google Scholar
Page 557 note 3 In a communiqué issued shortly after its founding the U.S.T.T. announced: ‘Only the Bureau confédéral and the Comité confédéral national of the C.G.T. of necessity shall make decisions on the Tunisian labour problem. Moreover, it should be remembered that the Union des syndicats de Tunisie was not dissolved, but that a statutory and sovereign congress modified its structure.’ Ibid. 9 November 1946.
Page 558 note 1 Protectorate forces, using arms to break up a U.G.T.T.—called strike, killed a number of the striking Tunisian workers and wounded many more, including Habib Achour, present U.G.T.T. secretary-general.
Page 558 note 2 Indicating its feelings, the U.S.T.T. stated: ‘This demagogic and provocative strike does not have the character of a labour strike for the economic good of the workers of the state.’ Le Petit Matin, 2 08 1947.Google Scholar The U.G.T.T. replied in kind by condemning the U.S.T.T., whose ‘odious attitude’, it charged, covered its own non-existence and revealed its readiness ‘to dance on the corpse of the U.G.T.T. and take its place’. Ibid. 13 August 1947.
Page 559 note 1 See U.G.T.T. congress reports, passim.
Page 559 note 2 The W.F.T.U. resolution, which was announced in a U.S.T.T. communiqué in Le Petit Matin, 19 July 1947, represented a tactical victory for the U.S.T.T.
Page 559 note 3 Ibid. 20 June 1947; W.F.T.U., Rapports sur la situation en Tunisie, presented to the bureau and the executive committee in Prague, 2–706 1947.Google Scholar
Page 560 note 1 Ibid. See also Fischer, Georges, ‘Syndicats et Décolonisation’, in Présence africaine (Paris), 34–35, 10 1960–01 1961;Google ScholarMission, 5 May 1949, which carried a summary of the reaction of the Congress.
Page 560 note 2 Mission, 4 August 1947.
Page 560 note 3 From a U.G.T.T. report signed by Ferhat Hached; ibid. 28 July 1950.
Page 560 note 4 The Tunisian Communist Party had affected a nationalist posture relatively early in anticipation of the W.F.T.U.'s change in orientation. Note its pronouncement, for example, concerning a strike in 2948: ‘This battle is part of the struggle of all the Tunisian people for the suppression of the protectorate régime, for a truly Tunisian national assembly, and a Tunisian government, in a word for a free Tunisia, sovereign and democratic.’ Le Petit Matin, 22 April 1948.
Page 561 note 1 Cf. Fischer, op. cit.
Page 561 note 2 U.G.T.T. communiqué; Le Petit Matin, 22 04 1949.Google Scholar
Page 562 note 1 Mission, 20 October 1949.
Page 562 note 2 Le Petit Matin, 53 April 1947.
Page 562 note 3 Ibid., March 1947. A U.S.T.T. communiqué complained bitterly of the 'pressures and threats of all kinds which prevent the workers from belonging to our U.S.T.T. unions’.
Page 562 note 4 Cf. Lichtblau, op. cit.; also World Trade Union Movement, passim; and W.F.T.U., The Peoples Demand National Independence (London, n.d.).Google Scholar
Page 563 note 1 Pour la renaissance du mouvement syndical, pour le défense des inténts des travailleurs (Tunis, 1961), p. 6:Google Scholar ‘It is worth noting, moreover, that the labour movement was able to unite its ranks, thanks to the efforts displayed in this direction by the Union syndicale des travailleurs de Tunisie (U.S.T.T.), which decided to dissolve itself so that the labour movement could appear a united bloc.’
Page 563 note 2 Ibid. p. 7. The Tunisian Communist Party ruefully noted the controls which the U.G.T.T. had set up.
Page 563 note 3 Cf. World Marxist Review (Toronto), 07 1962, pp. 68–70.Google Scholar
Page 563 note 4 La Tribune du progrés represented itself simply as a left-wing organ of legitimate opposition. It was directed by Dr Slimane Ben Slimane, a former Destour leader, who had been a companion in captivity of Bourguiba during the struggle for independence.
Page 564 note 1 Ahmed Tlili's statement at the time is of interest: ‘Despite our opposition to Communism, we will never approve—contrary to what has taken place in the other North African countries— the dissolution of Communist Parties.’ Le Monde (Paris), 8 12 1962.Google Scholar
Page 564 note 2 Mission, 16 June 1949.
Page 564 note 3 See Ech-Chaab (Tunis), 5 12 1959, p. 52,Google Scholar for text of Ferhat Hached's signed article, dated 22 June 1955. In the meantime, the U.G.T.T. had also ceased its contacts with the Communist-front peace organisations. See fourth U.G.T.T. congress, ‘Rapport sur les relations extéieures’, in Mission, 13 04 1951.Google Scholar After the session at Rome in October 1949 of the World Council of the Partisans of Peace, the U.G.T.T. cut its ties with the movement, ‘which has deceived the faith which was placed in it and which does not respond any longer to our aspirations.’
Page 564 note 4 I.C.F.T.U., Free Labour World (Brussels), 05 1960.Google Scholar
