Bernadette Cattanéo ( Le Loarer; February 25, 1899 – September 22, 1963) was a French trade unionist and communist activist, as well as a newspaper editor and magazine co-founder. She is remembered as the secretary general of the

World Committee Against War and Fascism The World Committee Against War and Fascism was an international organization sponsored by the Communist International, that was active in the struggle against Fascism in the 1930s. During this period Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany, Italy ...

. Cattanéo also held various roles of importance within the

Confédération générale du travail unitaire The Confédération générale du travail unitaire, or CGTU (), was a trade union confederation in France that at first included anarcho-syndicalists and soon became aligned with the French Communist Party. It was founded in 1922 as a confederat ...

(CGTU) and the

French Communist Party The French Communist Party (, , PCF) is a Communism, communist list of political parties in France, party in France. The PCF is a member of the Party of the European Left, and its Member of the European Parliament, MEPs sit with The Left in the ...

(PCF).

Early life

Bernadette Le Loarer was born in Brélévenez,

Côtes-d'Armor The Côtes-d'Armor ( , ; ; , ), formerly known as Côtes-du-Nord until 1990 (, ), is a department in the north of Brittany, in northwestern France. In 2019, it had a population of 600,582. Her parents were Jean Marie Le Loarer, a railwayman, and Marie Ollivier, an illiterate peasant. Her family was Breton-speaking and Catholic but it was a teacher who awakened Cattaneo to socialist ideas. She trained as a seamstress before going to Paris in 1919 to do several odd jobs. There, she met Jean-Baptiste Cattanéo who, like her, was a pharmacy employee. They married on October 10, 1922 and had two children.

Career

MNelken-BCattaneo-LLangevin-WLandy-MRabate

At the end of 1923, Cattanéo joined the French Communist Party, with an interest in issues affecting women. She was fired from her job in a pharmacy for having organized a strike with her husband and found employment as editor of the newspaper ''

La Nouvelle Vie Ouvrière (;''The New Worker's Life'') ou ''NVO'' is a French trade union magazine first published in 1909 under the name . It is the main newspaper of the General Confederation of Labour. History 1909-1914 Alphonse Merrheim, a revolutionary syndical ...

'' in April 1925. After a reorganization of the PCF, she directed its 35th department and was a member of the party's women's commission. At the same time, she joined the women's commission of the CGTU, of which she was appointed secretary in 1929, and joined the confederal office in November 1931. During this time, she was on the editorial board of ''L'Ouvrière''. She traveled in France and Europe between 1925 and 1936 to follow the strikes organized by the CGTU. Cattanéo was also active internationally since she took part in the fourth congress of

Profintern The Red International of Labor Unions (, RILU), commonly known as the Profintern (), was an international body established by the Communist International (Comintern) with the aim of coordinating communist activities within trade unions. Formally ...

on April 5, 1928 in the USSR where she met

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili; 5 March 1953) was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin, his death in 1953. He held power as General Secret ...

. She traveled there eleven times.

Georgi Dimitrov Georgi Dimitrov Mihaylov (; ) also known as Georgiy Mihaylovich Dimitrov (; 18 June 1882 – 2 July 1949), was a Bulgarian communist politician who served as General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party from 1933 t ...

made her responsible for setting up the World Committee of Women Against War and Fascism in 1934. In this coordinated development, she was secretary of the International Women's Organizations' Joint Coordination Committee, where she represented the PCF and the CGTU and associated with Gabrielle Duchêne and Maria Rabaté, herself a communist leader. The magazine (Women in Global Action) was created in this connection and was managed by these three women. When

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

broke out, she opposed the

Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, officially the Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and also known as the Hitler–Stalin Pact and the Nazi–Soviet Pact, was a non-aggression pact between Nazi Ge ...

, left the PCF and in late 1941 moved to

Moissac Moissac () is a Commune of France, commune in the Tarn-et-Garonne Departments of France, department in the Occitania (administrative region), Occitanie Regions of France, region in southern France. The town is situated at the confluence of the riv ...

in France's

Zone libre The ''zone libre'' (, ''free zone'') was a partition of the French metropolitan territory during World War II, established at the Second Armistice at Compiègne on 22 June 1940. It lay to the south of the demarcation line and was administered b ...

, where she coordinated a number of resistance initiatives. She returned to Paris in June 1944 and discontinued all her political activities. She nevertheless maintained contact with former communist figures such as and

Angelo Tasca Angelo Tasca (19 November 1892 – 3 March 1960) was an Italian politician, writer and historian. Born in Moretta, in the Piedmont region of Italy, he was a founding member of the Communist Party of Italy but was expelled in 1929 for his oppos ...

Death and legacy

Bernadette Cattanéo died in

La Penne-sur-Huveaune La Penne-sur-Huveaune (, literally ''La Penne on Huveaune''; Provençal: ''La Pena d’Evèuna'') is a commune east of Marseille and west of Aubagne along the A50 autoroute in the department of Bouches-du-Rhône in the Provence-Alpes-Côt ...

Bouches-du-Rhône Bouches-du-Rhône ( ; , ; ; "the Mouths of the Rhône") is a Departments of France, department in southern France. It borders Vaucluse to the north, Gard to the west and Var (department), Var to the east. The Mediterranean Sea lies to the sout ...

, September 22, 1963. Her papers are held by the Humathèque, on the

Condorcet Campus The Condorcet Paris-Aubervilliers Campus, known as Condorcet Campus, is an inter-university campus of the universities of Paris, located between '' Porte de la Chapelle'' in Paris and '' La Plaine Saint-Denis'' in Aubervilliers and inaugurated in ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cattaneo, Bernadette 1899 births 1963 deaths People from Côtes-d'Armor French trade unionists French Communist Party members French women trade unionists French anti-fascists French newspaper editors French women newspaper editors French magazine founders French pacifists