Georges Fontenis (27 April 1920 – 9 August 2010) was a school teacher who worked in

Tours Tours ( , ) is one of the largest cities in the region of Centre-Val de Loire, France. It is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Departments of France, department of Indre-et-Loire. The Communes of France, commune of Tours had 136,463 ...

. He is more widely remembered on account of his political involvement, especially during the 1950s and 1960s. A

libertarian communist Anarcho-communism, also known as anarchist communism, (or, colloquially, ''ancom'' or ''ancomm'') is a political philosophy and anarchist school of thought that advocates communism. It calls for the abolition of private property but retains resp ...

and trades unionist, he was a leading figure in the

anarchist movement The history of anarchism is as ambiguous as anarchism itself. Scholars find it hard to define or agree on what anarchism means, which makes outlining its history difficult. There is a range of views on anarchism and its history. Some feel anarc ...

Life

Early years

Described by one authority as "the son and grandson of militant socialists", Georges Louis Albert Fontenis was born into a working-class family in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

and grew up in the city's suburbs. As a young teenager he devoured his father's revolutionary socialist and trades union journals and newspapers and other Trotskyite and pacifist literature. He became involved with the libertarian movement during the strikes of June 1936. When he was 17 he joined the Anarchist Union, "discovered"

Bakunin Mikhail Alexandrovich Bakunin (; 1814–1876) was a Russian revolutionary anarchist, socialist and founder of collectivist anarchism. He is considered among the most influential figures of anarchism and a major founder of the revolutionary ...

and

Kropotkin Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin (; russian: link=no, Пётр Алексе́евич Кропо́ткин ; 9 December 1842 – 8 February 1921) was a Russian anarchist, socialist, revolutionary, historian, scientist, philosopher, and activist ...

, and started selling

Le Libertaire ''Le Libertaire'' is a Francophone anarchist newspaper established in New York City in June 1858 by the exiled anarchist Joseph Déjacque. It appeared at slightly irregular intervals until February 1861. The title reappeared in Algiers in 1892 a ...

on street corners.

Activism and teaching

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

was

invaded An invasion is a military offensive in which large numbers of combatants of one geopolitical entity aggressively enter territory owned by another such entity, generally with the objective of either: conquering; liberating or re-establishing con ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

during May/June 1940. Political and trades union activity was banned, with the result that various political organisations, including the Trades Union Confederation (''"Confédération générale du travail"'' / CGT) itself, "went underground", becoming progressively incorporated into the wider

French Resistance The French Resistance (french: La Résistance) was a collection of organisations that fought the German occupation of France during World War II, Nazi occupation of France and the Collaborationism, collaborationist Vichy France, Vichy régim ...

movement. Fontenis joined the "clandestine CGT", also participating actively in local syndicalist groups. By this time he was working as a primary school teacher in the north-eastern part of Paris. He was also involved after the

war War is an intense armed conflict between states, governments, societies, or paramilitary groups such as mercenaries, insurgents, and militias. It is generally characterized by extreme violence, destruction, and mortality, using regular o ...

with Marcel Pennetier and

Maurice Dommanget Maurice Dommanget (1888–1976) was a French historian of labor and socialist movements. Daniel Guérin described Dommanget as "renowned for his tireless erudition". References 1888 births 1976 deaths 20th-century French historian ...

in a relaunch of another sort of school, the École émancipée, a revolutionary syndicalist grouping of (sometimes) like-minded activists. After the teachers' strike in the Seine department in November–December 1947 Georges Fontenis briefly joined the National Labour Confederation (''"Confédération nationale du travail"'' / CNT-F), but then returned to the more mainstream National rimaryteachers' union (''"Syndicat national des instituteurs"'' / SNI) in which he continued to press the militant agenda of École émancipée. After he was arrested by the security services and his sentencing in 1957, which was part of a broader crack-down on the anarchist movement, he was reinstated into the teaching profession in 1958 and enrolled at the

École normale supérieure de Saint-Cloud École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Sav ...

, a large primary school in the western part of Paris. He became a primary schools inspector in a rural zone between 1962 and 1967 and then, in September 1967, a teacher of

Psychopedagogy Psychopedagogy is a combination of two main branches of study, pedagogy and psychology. Some of the most influential authors in this field are Jean Piaget, David Ausubel, Jerome Bruner and Lev Vygotsky. Important contributions have also been made b ...

at the teachers' training academy in

Secretary General of the Anarchist Federation (France)

After the

ended Georges Fontenis was one of the founders of the Anarchist Federation. Others included Robert Joulin, Henri Bouyé,

Maurice Joyeux Maurice Joyeux (January 29, 1910 – December 9, 1991) was a French writer and anarchist. He first was a mechanic then a bookseller, he is a remarkable figure in the French Libertarianism Libertarianism (from french: libertaire, "libertaria ...

, Suzy Chevet,

Renée Lamberet Renée Lamberet (4 October 1901 – 12 March 1980) was a French anarchist historian. Biography Lamberet was born in Paris into a family of free thinkers. As a young professor of history and geography, she collaborated with the historian Max ...

Georges Vincey Georges Vincey (died February 1960 aged approximately 60) was a French metal worker and militant anarchist. In October 1954 he became the first administrator of the newly reinvented Monde libertaire, a monthly publication produced on behalf of ...

, Aristide and

Paul Lapeyre Paul Lapeyre (28 May 1901 – 2 May 1991) was a militant anarchist, anarcho-syndicalist and free-thinker. Biography Provenance and early years Paul Lapeyre was born in Monguilhem ( Gers), a (very) small town in southwestern France. His father ...

, Maurice Laisant,

Maurice Fayolle Maurice Fayolle (8 March 1909 – 30 September 1970) was an electrician based in Versailles, best known as an influential Anarchist communism, libertarian communist militant. A couple of years before his death from lung cancer he inspired the po ...

, Giliana Berneri, Solange Dumont,

Roger Caron Roger "Mad Dog" Caron (April 12, 1938 – April 11, 2012) was a Canadian robber and the author of the influential prison memoir '' Go-Boy! Memories of a Life Behind Bars'' ( 1978). At the time of publishing, Caron was 39 years old and had spent ...

, Henri Oriol et Paul Chery. Over the next few years his life was closely aligned with that of the libertarian movement till 1957. That was the year in which he was arrested by the security services because of his support for Algerian separatists. In 1946 he was elected secretary general of the Anarchist Federation. For many in the movement his was a relatively new face which made it easier for him to find consensus because he was not a member of any existing faction. In reality, however,

Anarcho-communist Anarcho-communism, also known as anarchist communism, (or, colloquially, ''ancom'' or ''ancomm'') is a political philosophy and anarchist school of thought that advocates communism. It calls for the abolition of private property but retains resp ...

and

Individualist anarchist Individualist anarchism is the branch of anarchism that emphasizes the individual and their Will (philosophy), will over external determinants such as groups, society, traditions and ideological systems."What do I mean by individualism? I mean ...

tendencies did not sit comfortably with the federation's priorities. The individualist anarchists, led by the Lapeyre brothers and

Jean-René Saulière Jean-René Saulière (also René Saulière) (Bordeaux, 6 September 1911 – 2 January 1999) was a French anarcho-pacifist, individualist anarchist"Le courant individualiste, qui avait alors peu de rapport avec les théories de Charles-Auguste Bo ...

, organised a "letter-writing lobby". As

put it, "It was not really a structured group intended to exclude those who thought differently from them from the Anarchist Federation, but a network of letter-writing across the country which led to an identical set of results. Which is to say they pre-primed the congress in respect of the proposals they set out, outside the congress meeting". In 1948 George Fontenis teamed up with a group of exiled CNT and FAI militants to attempt the assassination of

General Franco Francisco Franco Bahamonde (; 4 December 1892 – 20 November 1975) was a Spanish general who led the Nationalist forces in overthrowing the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War and thereafter ruled over Spain from 193 ...

. The plan involved purchasing an aircraft, which could not be done successfully by a Spanish passport holder. Fontenis provided his name and nationality for the purchase of a small aeroplane, intended to be used to bomb a pleasure boat occupied by the "Causillo" in San Sebastián Bay. The attempt failed. In February 1951 Fontenis was briefly arrested in connection with the affair, but soon released because alleged (but fictitious) links to the plotters could not be demonstrated.

Libertarian Communist Federation (''"Fédération communiste libertaire"'')

At the start of 1950 a group of militants around Serge Ninn and Georges Fontenis set about establishing a communist libertarian group - described by

as a "clandestine party inside the Anarchist Federation", and by another commenter as "a kind of secret ginger group" - which they called the Organisation of Battle Planning (''"Organisation Pensée Bataille"'' / OPB), as a tribute to

Camillo Berneri Camillo Berneri (also known as Camillo da Lodi; May 28, 1897 – May 5, 1937) was an Italian professor of philosophy, anarchist militant, propagandist and theorist. He was married to Giovanna Berneri, and was father of Marie-Louise Berneri a ...

and his 1936 book "Pensée et bataille". OPB members decided to keep their organisation's existence secret. In May/June 1952, at the Anarchist Federation congress at Bordeaux, they moved to expel the Lapeyre brothers,

and

. The bitterness engendered and Georges Fontenis' centrality to the acrimonious affair meant that for many years afterwards he would be singled out for demonisation in the speeches and writings of traditionally more mainstream anarchists. At the congress in Paris in May 1953 the libertarian communist faction prevailed. The congress adopted the "Declaration of Principles" project which asserted the libertarian communist objectives of the organisation. Unable to agree on a new name for the relaunched organisation at the time, it was only after a members' referendum in December 1953 that the French "Anarchist Federation" became the "Libertarian Communist Federation", with 11 of the 16 regional groups (comprising between 130 and 160 individual activists) under the direction of the OPB. The

Individualist anarchists Individualism is the moral stance, political philosophy, ideology and social outlook that emphasizes the intrinsic worth of the individual. Individualists promote the exercise of one's goals and desires and to value independence and self-relia ...

and some of the communist libertarians regrouped separately around

who had found the tactics adopted by the OPB unacceptable, and set about creating a new "breakaway" Anarchist Federation. It was also in 1953 that George Fontenis wrote "Manifesto of libertarian communism - essential problems", which has been described variously as "Leninist", "avant gardist" and/or "Bolschevist". In August 1954 the "Kronstadt" libertarian-communist group published a memorandum condemning the secretive structure and the Leninism of the wider "Libertarian Communist Federation", and were, in 1955, expelled. During 1954 Fontenis himself had increasingly diverted his focus and that of the federation to political and "logistical" support for the "Algerian insurrection". In January 1956 the Libertarian Communist Federation submitted a list of ten "revolutionary candidates" for the national legislative elections. Georges Fontenis was one. The next year the Libertarian Communist Federation was destroyed by state authorities. Several leading figures in it were arrested and detained as part of an attack on the survival of the "Poujadist Movement".Jean-René Genty, L'immigration algérienne dans le nord pas de calais 1909-1962, Éditions L'Harmattan, 1999, p. 200. Georges Fontenis was one. The next year he was released as part of a wider amnesty enacted by President de Gaulle. There followed a dozen years during which very little was heard either of the libertarian communist movement or of Georges Fontenis.

After the "May '68 events"

In 1968 Georges Fontenis was a co-founder of the "Communist Libertarian Movement" (''"Mouvement communiste libertaire"'' / MCL) which shortly afterwards became the "Communist Libertarian Organisation" (''"Organisation communiste libertaire"''. OCL) but then, in the words of one source, "with the growth of a widespread social apathy in the years following 1974", was dissolved in 1976. In 1979 he joined the

Union of Libertarian Communist Workers The Union of Libertarian Communist Workers (french: Union des travailleurs communistes libertaires, UTCL) was a political organization established in France and created in 1978 after splitting from the Revolutionary Anarchist Organization two year ...

(french: Union des travailleurs communistes libertaires, UTCL). Georges Fontenis remained a member of the successor organisation, "

Alternative libertaire ''Alternative libertaire'' (''AL'', "Libertarian Alternative") was a French anarchist organization formed in 1991 which publishes a monthly magazine, actively participates in a variety of social movements, and is a participant in the Anarkismo.ne ...

", but in his later years he wrote less and less. He died at his home in Reignac-sur-Indre (a little to the south-east of

) on 9 August 2010. In 1990 he issued his memoirs under the title "L'Autre communisme, histoire subversive du mouvement libertaire" (''"The other communism: a subversive history of the Libertarian Movement"''). An expanded and re-edited version appeared in 2000, something that happened again in 2008. The title changed, too, becoming "Changer le monde, histoire du mouvement communiste libertaire (1945-1997)" (''"Changing the world: A history of the Communist Libertarian Movement (1945-1997)"'')

Works (selection)

* ''Manifeste du communisme libertaire'', Problèmes essentiels, 1953, Éditions L, 1985. * ''L'autre communisme : histoire subversive du mouvement libertaire'', Éditions Acratie, 1990. * ''Changer le monde : histoire du mouvement communiste libertaire, 1945-1997'', Éditions Le Coquelicot/Alternative libertaire, 2000. * with Gilbert Estève, ''Non-conforme'', Édition Bénévent, 2002. * with

André Marty André Marty (6 November 1886 – 23 November 1956) was a leading figure in the French Communist Party (PCF) for nearly thirty years. He was also a member of the National Assembly, with some interruptions, from 1924 to 1955; Secretary of Comintern ...

Claude Bourdet Claude Bourdet (28 October 1909 – 20 March 1996) was a writer, journalist, polemist, and militant French politician. Peronal life Bourdet was a son of the dramatic author Édouard Bourdet and the poet Catherine Pozzi, was born and died in Pari ...

Daniel Guérin Daniel Guérin (; 19 May 1904, in Paris – 14 April 1988, in Suresnes) was a French libertarian-communist author, best known for his work '' Anarchism: From Theory to Practice'', as well as his collection ''No Gods No Masters: An Anthology of ...

, Jacques Danos, ''Un homme, une cause, Pierre Morain un prisonnier d’État'', 1956.

References

External links

* Daniel Goude, Guillaume Lenormant, ''Une résistance oublié. Des libertaires dans la guerre d'Algérie (1954-1957)'', 32 min, 2001, view online
/small>. * Franck Wolff, ''Parcours libertaire'', 45 min, 2008, view online
/small>. {{DEFAULTSORT:Fontenis, Georges French anarchists Anarcho-communists Anarcho-syndicalists Members of the General Confederation of Labour (France) Politicians from Tours, France Members of the French Anarchist Federation 1920 births 2010 deaths French schoolteachers