Skip to main content

Immobilism in the French Fourth Republic

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Book cover Why Democracies Flounder and Fail
  • 553 Accesses

Abstract

Polling data show that the French Fourth Republic failed because political parties and pressure groups represented so many different sectors of the public that parliamentarians were unable to achieve productive or stable governments. The resulting immobilism prompted a coup, which led to a new constitution to give more power to the executive president. There are many parallels with the immobilism of the current American political system, as described in detail within Chap. 5.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 99.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 129.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 129.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Almond, Gabriel A. (1956). “Comparative Political Systems,” Journal of Politics, 18 (3): 391–409.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Assenlain, Jean-Charles (1984). Histoire Economique de la France de XVIII e Siècle à Nous Jours, 3 vols. Paris: François Caron.

    Google Scholar 

  • Barrillon, Raymond (1955). “La Rassemblement du Peuple Française.” In Partis Politiques et Classes Sociales, ed. Maurice Duverger, pp. 277–287. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cantril, Hadley (1962). The Politics of Despair. New York: Collier.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cantril, Hadley, and David Rodnick (1956). On Understanding the French Left. Princeton, NJ: Institute for International Research.

    Google Scholar 

  • Capelle, Russell B. (1963). The MRP and French Foreign Policy. New York: Praeger.

    Google Scholar 

  • Converse, Philip E., and Georges Dupeux (1962). “Politicization of the Electorate in France and the United States,” Public Opinion Quarterly, 26 (1): 1–23.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dahl, Robert, and Charles Lindblom (1953). Politics, Economics, and Welfare. New York: Harper.

    Google Scholar 

  • Domenach, Jean-Marie (1951). “The French Communist Party.” In Communism in Western Europe, ed. Mario Einaudi, Jean-Marie Domenach, and Aldo Garosci, Part B. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Duverger, Maurice (1938). The French Political System. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1954.

    Google Scholar 

  • Duverger, Maurice (1950). L’Influence des Systemes Electoraux sur la Vie Politique. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Duverger, Maurice (1952). “Public Opinion and Political Parties in France,” American Political Science Review, 46 (4): 1069–1078.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Duverger, Maurice (1954). Political Parties: Their Organization and Activity in the Modern State. London: Methuen.

    Google Scholar 

  • Duverger, Maurice (1955). “Le parti communiste française.” In Partis Politiques et Classes Sociales en France, ed. Maurice Duverger, pp. 179–193. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ehrmann, Henry W. (1951). “The Decline of the Socialist Party.” In Modern France: Problems of the Third and Fourth Republics, ed. Edward Meade Earle, Chap. 11. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ehrmann, Henry W. (1952). “The French Peasant and Communism,” American Political Science Review, 46 (1): 19–43.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ehrmann, Henry W. (1957). Organized Business in France. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ehrmann, Henry W. (1968). Politics in France. Boston: Little, Brown.

    Google Scholar 

  • Einaudi, Mario (1951). “The Crisis of Politics and Government in France,” World Politics, 4 (1): 64–84.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Einaudi, Mario, Jean-Marie Domenach, and Aldo Garosci (1951). Communism in Western Europe. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Evans, Richard J. (2004). The Coming of the Third Reich. New York: Penguin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fauvet, Jacques (1955). “La representation politique du monde paysan.” In Partis Politiques et Classes Sociales en France, ed. Maurice Duverger, pp. 155–177. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gallagher, Orvoell (1951). “Rural French Voting Habits,” Social Research, 18 (4): 501–9.

    Google Scholar 

  • Godfrey, E. Drexel (1955). The Fate of the French Non-Communist Left. Garden City, NY: Doubleday.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goguel, François (1951). Geographie des Elections Françaises de 1870 à 1951. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goguel, François (1952). France Under the Fourth Republic. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goguel, François, and Mario Einaudi (1952). Christian Democracy in France and Italy. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goldberg, Harvey (1954). “The Myth of the French Peasant,” American Journal of Economics and Sociology, 13 (4): 363–376.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hamilton, Richard F. (1967). Affluence and the French Worker in the Fourth Republic. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Henig, Ruth (1998). The Weimar Republic, 1919–1933. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • La Palombara, Joseph (1958). “Political Party Systems and Crisis Government: French and Italian Contrasts,” Midwest Journal of Political Science, 2 (2): 117–142.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lavau, Georges (1955). “Les classes moyenne et la publique.” In Partis Politiques et Classes Sociales en France, ed. Maurice Duverger, pp. 49–84. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lavau, Georges (1958). “Political Pressures by Interest Groups in France.” In Interest Groups on Four Continents, ed. Henry W. Ehrmann, pp. 60–95. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Leites, Nathan (1959). The Game of Politics in France. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Lorwin, Val R. (1954). The French Labor Movement. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • MacRae, Duncan (1967). Parliament, Parties, and Society in France 1946–1958. New York: St. Martin’s Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Macridis, Roy A. (1958). “The Immobility of the French Communist Party,” Journal of Politics, 20 (4): 613–634.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Marabuto, Paul (1948). Les Partis Politiques et les Mouvements Sociaux sous la IVe Republique. Paris: Sirey.

    Google Scholar 

  • Merle, Marcel (1955). “Les modérés.” In Partis Politiques et Classes Sociales en France, ed. Maurice Duverger, Chap. 5. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Micaud, Charles A. (1952). “Organization and Leadership of the French Communist Party,” World Politics, 4 (3): 318–355.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Micaud, Charles A. (1963). Communism and the French Left. New York: Praeger.

    Google Scholar 

  • Neumann, Robert G. (1953). “Formation and Transformation of Gaullism in France,” Western Political Quarterly, 6 (2): 250–274.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pépy, Daniel (1955). “Note sur le mouvment républicain populaire.” In Partis Politiques et Classes Sociales en France, ed. Maurice Duverger, pp. 209–218. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pickles, Dorothy (1953). French Politics. London: Royal Institute of International Affairs.

    Google Scholar 

  • Reynaud, Jean (1958). Les Groupes de Pression en France. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Reynaud, Jean (1962). Nouvelles Études sur les Groupes de Pression en France. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Reynaud, J.-D., and Alain Touraine (1955). “La representation politique du monde ouvier.” In Partis Politiques et Classes Sociales en France, ed. Maurice Duverger, pp. 29–48. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rimbert, Pierre (1955). “Le parti socialiste S.F.I.O.” In Partis Politiques et Classes Sociales en France, ed. Maurice Duverger, pp. 195–207. Paris: Colin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rothman, Stanley (1960). “Systematic Political Theory: Observations on the Group Approach,” American Political Science Review, 54 (1): 15–33.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sartori, Giovanni (1966). “European Political Parties: The Case of Polarized Pluralism.” In Political Parties and Political Development, ed. Joseph La Palombara and Myron Weiner, pp. 137–176. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schlesinger, Joseph A. (1958). “The French Radical Socialist Party and the Republican Front of 1958,” Western Political Quarterly, 11 (1): 71–85.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stoetzel, Jean (1955). “Voting Behaviour in France,” British Journal of Sociology, 6 (2): 104–122.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Taylor, O. R. (1951). The Fourth Republic of France. London: Alden & Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Truman, David B. (1951). The Governmental Process: Political Interests and Political Opinion. New York: Knopf.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wall, Irwin M. (1991). The United States and the Making of Postwar France, 1945–1954. New York: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Williams, Philip Maynard (1958). Politics in Postwar France: Parties and the Constitution in the Fourth Republic. New York: Longmans, Green.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wright, Gordon (1951). “Communists and Peasantry in France.” In Modern France, ed. E. M. Earle, Chap. 13. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wright, Gordon (1953a). “Catholics and Peasantry in France,” Political Science Quarterly, 68 (4): 526–551.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wright, Gordon (1953b). “France.” In European Political Systems, ed. Taylor Cole, Part II. New York: Knopf.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wright, Gordon (1964). Rural Revolution in France. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wylie, Lawrence (1957). Village in the Vaucluse. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Haas, M. (2019). Immobilism in the French Fourth Republic. In: Why Democracies Flounder and Fail. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74070-6_3

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics