| Reviews / Comptes Rendus | Labour/Le Travail, 54

Reviews / Comptes Rendus

Paul B. Miller, From Revolutionaries to Citizens: Antimilitarism in France, 1870–1914 (Durham and London: Duke University Press 2002)

THE ROLE of the French antimilitarist Left in the years before World War I and its apparent "collapse" in the face of the nationalist surge in 1914 has for decades been widely debated by historians. Drawing on a wide variety of primary and secondary sources, Paul B. Miller provides a fascinating new departure on the role of antimilitarism in French political culture and society. In addition to a thorough study of newspapers and journals associated with the antimilitarist Left, Miller consulted military, police, municipal, and governmental administration archives to answer this central question: "How was it that the French left, which succeeded in creating the most antimilitarist culture and society in pre-World War I Europe, came to accept and, in many instances, support war in 1914?" (2) The French antimilitarist Left, placing itself as the primary force standing against militarism, and, by extension, the Third Republic after 1870, had by 1914 found itself defending the Republic and the humanist strain of the French revolutionary tradition. The overarching theme of the book, therefore, is the journey that the antimilitarist Left followed from "revolutionaries to citizens" during this period.

To answer this central question and chart the transformation of the antimilitarist Left from the fringes of the political culture of the Third Republic to its mainstream, Miller provides a useful context for antimilitarism within France and Europe generally. France was unique in that its "combination of republican government, military tradition, and revolutionary political culture" (5) created a complex and variegated antimilitarist Left that included anarchist, syndicalist, and socialist characteristics. In uniquely French fashion, the antimilitarists benefited from the democratic political culture of the period that led to a proliferation of journals and newspapers that transmitted the antimilitarist message to the public, while enduring government surveillance and repression that was mild compared to the situation in Germany, Russia, and Austria-Hungary, where antimilitarist activity was severely punished.

Miller's argument that the anti-militarists journeyed down the road from revolutionaries to citizens is best expressed by his insistence that high-profile events (the Dreyfus Affair being only one of many) fixed public attention on the antimilitarist message and placed the antimilitarists as the defenders of the revolutionary tradition of social and political justice. However, he resists falling into the trap of taking the antimilitarist rhetoric at face value. Instead, he makes a convincing case that perception was more powerful than reality. This is clear when he discusses the tendency of the police to overestimate the cohesiveness of the antimilitarists, while the antimilitarists themselves more often than not misunderstood their own influence on French society. Nevertheless, the antimilitarists were able to capitalize on events to a surprising degree. The most persuasive examples Miller uses surround the affiche rouge affair and the revolt of the 17th Infantry.

The affiche rouge affair of 7 October 1905 surrounded the activities of members of the Association Internationale Antirnilitariste (AIA) who littered Paris with an antimilitarist affiche aimed at army conscripts. The contents of the document called on conscripts to disobey orders and fire on their superiors in defense of their exploited brethren, the workers. Most disturbing to many observers was the call for soldiers to strike and carry out an insurrection in the event of mobilization for war. Miller skillfully uses this event to illustrate the response of the government, the military authorities, and conservative press and their fear that antimilitarism was a significant threat to the security of the nation. On the flip side, the defendants in the ensuing trial drew support from even moderate socialists, including Jean Jaurès, who argued that the AIA had taken a daring stand against the use of soldiers to suppress strikes (despite Jaurès' condemnation of the language of the affiche calling for the murder of officers). The level of strike activity was so high in France by 1905 that the anti-militarists, no matter how violent their message, "were at their most persuasive when protesting the use of troops to suppress strikes, an issue viewed universally as an immoral affront to their basic rights as French citizens." (77)

Miller employs the mutiny of the 17th Infantry during the winegrowers' revolt in the Midi in 1907 to demonstrate that soldiers themselves were often active participants in events that reflected public perceptions of the military. Economic hardships in the Midi caused widespread demonstrations, and the bloody response of the army on 19 and 20 June led to violence and the death of six civilians at Narbonne. The response of the 17th regiment, filled with local soldiers and garrisoned nearby, was telling; the soldiers joined with the civilian population against their officers to protest the Narbonne massacre. Although Miller admits that no clear link between the soldiers and the antimilitarist propaganda existed, the antimilitarists were successful in presenting the mutiny to the public as a defense of the civil rights of the protesters against an irresponsible military establishment. Concomitantly, they presented this as a sign that they were acting freely as "citizens" and as the social conscience of the Republic.

By 1914, as Europe stood on the brink of war, the antimilitarist Left had completed its journey. In Miller's view, they had taken the correct stance that the war would be a great blow to humanity, and many feverishly embarked on a last ditch effort to stop mobilization. Whereas in the decades after 1870 the antimilitarists had stood on the fringes of French political culture and society through their sharply antipatriotic and revolutionary propaganda, by 1914 they were now focusing on war itself and "its cruelty, its indifference to human life, and its capacity to reverse the 'progress' of European civilization, which included the bourgeoisie." (207) The antimilitarist acceptance of the war occurred not because of a broad "collapse" of this variegated movement in the face of nationalism but rather a realization that its members now identified with the democratic values of the Republic, no matter how flawed. Finally, the defense of France and its democratic tradition against an aggressive Germany is what propelled the antimilitarist enthusiasm for the war. In order to demonstrate this point, Miller introduces the reader to antimilitarists such as Gustave Hervé, who had spent time in prison for his radical antimilitarism. By the feverish summer of 1914, however, Hervé was a staunch supporter of war against Germany in defense of the Republic.

Miller's thesis is solidly argued. The book's shortcomings are minor and do not detract from the validity of the author's conclusions. The Epilogue is a bit forced and gives the reader the impression that the author is rushing to restate his thesis, when it is often stated effectively in the previous chapters. Also, the interesting graphics from the syndicalist publication La Voix du Peuple leave the reader looking for more visual material from the plethora of antimilitarist publications and public documents that the author effectively analyzes throughout the book.

Overall, Miller has written a compelling study of antimilitarism in France that will no doubt rank as an important contribution to the field. The style of writing is clear, and the compelling narrative kept this reviewer anxiously turning pages, a rare feat in a scholarly monograph.


Lawrence H. Davis Salem State College

Content in the History Cooperative database is intended for personal, noncommercial use only. You may not reproduce, publish, distribute, transmit, participate in the transfer or sale of, modify, create derivative works from, display, or in any way exploit the History Cooperative database in whole or in part without the written permission of the copyright holder.