- Pierre Monatte
Pierre Monatte (
15 January 1881 -27 June 1960 ) was aFrench trade union ist who worked in theprinting industry ("ouvrier du livre"). He was the responsible of the "Confédération générale du travail " (CGT, Generation Confederation of Labour) at the beginning of the 20th century, and founded its journal "La Vie ouvrière " (Workers' Life) on5 October ,1909 . Monatte has been considered one of the great figures ofrevolutionary syndicalism .During
World War I , Pierre Monatte opposed the "Union sacrée " national bloc, and resigned in 1915 from the confederal instances. Monatte often referred himself toFernand Pelloutier and did not disguise his anarchist sympathies, although he drifted away from this current ofSocialism after theInternational Anarchist Congress of Amsterdam in 1907. During this congress, Monatte argued in particular withErrico Malatesta concerning the methods of organisation: invoking the 1906Charter of Amiens which established the principle of "political neutrality" of the trade-unions, Monatte considered syndicalism itself to be revolutionary, while Malatesta advocated the creation of some sort of anarchist organisation to superate internal conflicts among the workers' movement itself [ [http://www.fondation-besnard.org/article.php3?id_article=225 Monatte and Malatesta's speech during the 1907 Congress] fr icon] .Heading the internal opposition in the CGT, he founded in April 1919 the "
Comités syndicalistes révolutionnaires " (Revolutionary Syndicalist Committees) inside the CGT. In 1923, he joined theFrench Communist Party (PCF) and was close toBoris Souvarine andAlfred Rosmer . Along with them, he was excluded at the end of 1924 of the party at the occasion of an internal purge against "leftist"s elements of the party who supportedLeon Trotsky . Then, Monatte founded in January 1925 the journal "La Révolution prolétarienne " (The Proletarian Revolution), along withRobert Louzon . The journal enjoyed an appreciated audience among trade-unionists and left-wing activists during theinter-war period .Bibliography
Colette Chambelland, "Pierre Monatte, Une autre voix syndicaliste", coll.: Part des Hommes, Éd. de l'Atelier, 1999, ISBN 2708234609
References
External links
* [http://www.marxists.org/archive/monatte/index.htm Pierre Monatte] on the
Marxist Archives (texts, etc.) en icon
* [http://revolutionproletarienne.wordpress.com Journal "La Révolution prolétarienne"] fr icon
* [http://www.pelloutier.net Several texts on and by Monatte] fr icon
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
