The Commune of 1871: the Great Venture in Female Citizenship

Abstract

Of all the rebellions and revolutions that occurred in nineteenth-century Paris the Commune of 1871 saw the greatest and most recorded participation of women, which brought both praise from the Communards themselves and vituperative criticism from the enemies of the Commune) In a sense this higher participation is not surprising, for unlike the troubles of July 1830, February and June 1848 and December 1851, which were all over in a matter of a few days, the Commune lasted nearly ten weeks. The Revolutions of July 1830 and February 1848 had quickly and successfully replaced one regime by another; the rebellions of June 1848 and December 1851 had failed in their attempts to institute or defend the principle of a radical popular republic. The Commune differed from all these previous insurrections: the initial rebellion of 18 March 1871 did not rapidly founder in defeat, as had the June Days and the rebellion of December 1851 against the coup d’état. It survived and developed long enough to establish its own revolutionary governmental structures and propaganda, in an uneasy dualism with the legal Government of National Defence. But unlike the Revolutions of July 1830 and February 1848 the Commune did not ultimately effect a complete, permanent change of regime.