Lecture 17 - The Popular Front

A plethora of Far Right and fascist organizations emerged in the wake of World War I. Economic depression, nationalism, anti-Semitism and xenophobia all played a part in this upsurge. On the left, the tension between communist revolutionaries and socialist reformers was reconciled, for a time, in the Popular Front government of Leon Blum. While the Popular Front would eventually fall, it pioneered many of the reforms and progressive measures that French workers enjoy today. **Reading assignment:** Sowerwine, Charles. France since 1870: Culture, Politics and Society, pp. 121-192. Bloch, Marc. Strange Defeat.