You remember this kind of chart.
This showed you the, kind of the basic
families of political beliefs right after the war.
Fascist diminished, National Conservatives,
Liberals, Social Democrats, Democratic Socialists, Communists.
So, here's a pie chart, showing you the
results of the French legislative elections in November 1946.
Right wing monarchist stuff, it's off the radar of French politics.
There are some Gaullists who are beginning to
organize on the right, disdainful of the party
politics represented by the pre-war era, but in this new Fourth
French Republic that replaced the Third Republic destroyed in the war,
this is a very leftist orientation. You see the
communists are at the very height of their power;
they'll never get more votes than this in a French legislative election.
The Democratic Socialists, pretty strong. And the Social Democrats, quite
strong.
The big three make up the dominant coalition in
1947, with the communist sharing power in the French government.
But because of the break over the Marshall Plan, the big three break.
The communists launch a general strike in 1947.
They're pushed out of power.
Instead, the Social Democrats form the hub of what will become a new
coalition of ruling parties in France.