The programme of the National Council of the Resistance (French: ), commonly abbreviated as CNR programme and originally titled Les Jours heureux par le CNR, is a French text unanimously adopted by the National Council of the Resistance on March 9 1944.
This document, spanning fewer than ten pages,Read the full text in Full text of the National Council of the Resistance programme, adopted in clandestinity on March 15, 1944 consists of two parts: an "immediate action plan," addressing the actions of the French Resistance in preparation for the Liberation of France, and "measures to be implemented upon the liberation of the territory," a government programme encompassing measures for post-war purges and long-term reforms, such as the restoration of universal suffrage, nationalizations, and the establishment of social security.
The second part has garnered more historical attention, as most of its programmatic proposals shaped debates and general policy between the 1944 Liberation and early 1946. Unlike other government programmes, a distinctive feature of the CNR programme is its adoption by the full spectrum of political groups represented within the French Resistance.Claire Andrieu, Le programme commun de la Résistance, des idées dans la guerre [The common program of the Resistance, ideas in wartime] (in French), Les éditions de l'érudit, 1984, ,
Summary of the programme
Immediate action plan The first part, the "immediate action plan," begins with observations and emphasizes the necessity of armed struggle and recognition of Charles de Gaulle and the authority of the French Committee of National Liberation (CFLN):
A significant portion of the text is dedicated to the creation of Departmental Committee of Liberation (CDLs). The roles of these committees are distinguished from those of the French Forces of the Interior (FFI), whose responsibilities are also defined.
Measures to be implemented upon liberation In the second part, "measures to be implemented upon the liberation of the territory," the programme first addresses "ensuring the punishment of traitors and the removal, in the realms of administration and professional life, of those who collaborated with the enemy or actively participated in the policies of collaborationist governments" and the confiscation of property belonging to traitors and black market profiteers.
Other measures Additional measures include:
Political reforms, such as the restoration of democracy, universal suffrage, and freedom of the press; Economic measures, inspired by planism, characterized by "the establishment of a true economic and social democracy, requiring the eviction of large economic and financial feudalisms from the direction of the economy", commonly referred to as nationalizations, and expressed in the text as "the return to the nation of major monopolized means of production, the fruit of collective labor, energy sources, subsoil wealth, insurance companies, and major banks"; Social measures, including significant wage adjustments, the restoration of independent trade unionism and shop stewards, and "a comprehensive social security plan, aimed at ensuring all citizens a means of subsistence in cases where they are unable to secure it through work, with management entrusted to representatives of the stakeholders and the State".
History of the programme's development The first part of the CNR programme has few precedents in French history, as it concerns the organization of an armed insurrection under foreign domination, a situation unprecedented in modern France. The second part, "reforms to be implemented upon liberation," aligns with the tradition of joint government programmes. The first such programme was the "Réunion de la Montagne" published in April 1849. Its preamble highlighted the role of programmes in democratic processes. Generally, right-wing factions, described as "empirical and conservative,"Pierre Mendès France, La République moderne [The modern Republic], 1962, p.110, cited by René Rémond, Les droites en France [Rights in France] (in French), Aubier, 1982, p.371, were less inclined to develop programmes. Charles de Gaulle himself expressed doubts about the utility of political programmes when elected president of the Provisional Government of the French Republic. While the left-wing tradition was more open to government programmes, the only historical precedents before 1940 were those of 1849 and 1936.
1935–1936: Programme of the National Conference of the Popular Front From 1934, convergence within the left, initially in an anti-fascist perspective and later within the National Conference of the Popular Front, which united left-wing forces supporting the Popular Front, the establishment of a joint programme was not straightforward. The inclusion of nationalizations, often termed "socializations," was a demand of the socialists from the French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO), met with reluctance by French communists, as articulated by Maurice Thorez in a January 1935 article in L'Humanité: "The smallest action is worth more than twelve programmes (...) what Marx meant to convey, what Lenin and the Bolsheviks understood (...) is that what matters most is to act." During the adoption of a joint programme by the National Conference of the Popular Front, established on June 17, 1935, to prepare for victory in the 1936 legislative elections, the communists, supported by the radicals, favored a minimalist approach to nationalizations. The resulting compromise provided only for "the nationalization of war industries," and the term "nationalization" was avoided for the Bank of France, despite its impending nationalization. Léon Blum persisted until 1942, while imprisoned in Puy-de-Dôme, in advocating for a government programme, as evidenced by letters to his socialist friends and de Gaulle.
January 1943: Programme of the Socialist Action Committee Events at the onset of World War II, such as the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, the , and the Phoney War, created a divide between socialists and communists, which only resolved by late 1942 through direct contacts between the Socialist Action Committee (CAS) and the Communist Party, both operating clandestinely. The communists prioritized national unity and alliance with Gaullist resistance over forming a clandestine Popular Front. Consequently, the CAS independently published Our Programme in January 1943, the first post-war political programme from a clandestine party, outlining five sets of measures, including women's suffrage, the "total elimination of trusts from national life," the "progressive elimination of competition and profit," the "nationalization of credit and banks, insurance companies, key industries, and foreign trade," and the maintenance and improvement of pre-1939 labor laws. Months later, the socialists, fully aligned with de Gaulle, proposed a "Common Programme" to the French Resistance at the National Council of the Resistance, formed on May 27, 1943, which dropped the abolition of competition but introduced worker and technician participation in management. This programme was likely not discussed by CNR members, as it was overshadowed by a programme from the French Committee of National Liberation (CFLN), presented by on July 15, 1943.
July 1943: Laffon Project of the CFLN The Laffon project closely resembled the socialist programme, possibly due to contributions from London-based socialists like André Philip or . It is unclear whether all CFLN members were aware of the project. The Laffon project included an Economic and Social Charter advocating dirigisme, defined as "the orientation and control of production by the State for the benefit of the community," requiring "the prior elimination of economic feudalisms." The term "socialization" was used instead of "nationalization" for major credit-distributing banks. The charter limited worker participation in company management to technical aspects but provided for profit-sharing, either individually or for social initiatives. Internationally, the Laffon project proposed "surrenders of national sovereignty" to a "superior Community of States" or "Universal League," an idea also present in the socialist programme.
, the communist representative at the CNR, opposed the Universal League concept and the economic aspects of the Laffon project, criticizing its "lack of Marxism," according to historian . Right-wing CNR representatives, such as Joseph Laniel of the Democratic Alliance and Louis Marin of the URD, opposed the Laffon project for opposite reasons. Laniel favored a return to complete liberalism within a national framework, while Marin reportedly called it a "Nazi, fascist, and Vichyst project." The project received favorable responses from other CNR organizations, but the National Front tipped the balance toward rejection, advocating a unanimous stance to avoid alienating any French Resistance members. Communist Pierre Villon, representing the National Front at the CNR, played a key role in the adoption of the final text in March 1944.
September 1943: CGT Programme The representatives of the trade unions, CGT and CFTC, supported the Laffon project. After the 1939 split, the confederal and communist (unitary, recalling the CGTU) factions had reconciled and reunified following the . The Post-War Action Programme proposed by Louis Saillant on behalf of the CGT to the CNR in September 1943 included sections agreed upon by both factions, such as restoring republican legality, but also sections with separate motions. For instance, the closed shop principle, granting unions a monopoly on hiring, was proposed only by the communist unitaries, while the ex-confederals favored state primacy in employment offices and dismissal authorizations, with unions in a supervisory role. Another disagreement concerned the future of the Industrial organization committees, public professional syndicates established by Vichy, reflecting the corporatism and dirigisme of the National Revolution. The confederals proposed reforming these committees by expelling "trusts" and strengthening state and union roles, while the unitaries demanded their complete abolition, arguing they reinforced "trusts."Henri Rousso, L'économie, pénurie et modernisation [The economy, scarcity, and modernization], in La France des années noires [France during the dark years] (in French), eds. Azéma and Bédarida, éditions du seuil, 1st edition 1993, pocket edition 2000, , pp.473-475,
November 1943: the National Studies Committee report While the CGT document necessarily contains contradictions due to the divergent expressions of the two tendencies, another document also published in the fall of 1943 contains enough contradictions to render it completely unusable. This is the Report on Post-War Economic Policy prepared by the National Studies Committee, created under the name Committee of Experts in June 1942, at the initiative of Jean Moulin and François de Menthon. The voluminous 1943 report, often called the Courtin Report, was the work of nine members of the Committee, including René Courtin, Pierre-Henri Teitgen, and Emmanuel Monick. According to Claire Andrieu, the Courtin report is torn between its liberal convictions and its desire to satisfy "public opinion," which was unanimously judged to favor nationalizations. In the PCF's "Remarks," which tear the report apart, it appears that the PCF was interested in nationalizations, presenting them as a means to "free France from the anti-national and anti-social domination of the men of the trusts." This apparent acceptance of nationalizations without the prior abolition of the capitalist regime was a novelty for the PCF, which definitively rallied to this idea at the beginning of 1945.
December 1943–January 1944: discussion of the National Front project