Confédération générale du travail

(CGT)

   The Confédération générale du travail (CGT) is a French labor union that was formed at Limoges in 1895. In 1902, it brought together various other French labor movements. Despite its Charter of Amiens (1905), affirming the independence of the labor union movement from party politics, the CGT was divided into factions with different tendencies and, until World War I, was dominated by revolutionaries and anarchosyndicalists. In 1920, the failure of the general strike considerably reduced its membership. The anarchosyndicalist and the Socialist majority (who had joined the Communists at the Congress of Tours, 1920), separated from the CGT after their setback at the Congress of Lille (1921) and formed the CGTU (Confédération générale du travail unitaire, 1922), which adhered to the policies of the Internationale syndicale rouge (1932). Reunited at the Congress of Toulouse (1936), CGT and CGTU supported the program of the Front populaire and with the Confédération générale du patronat français signed the Matignon Accords (June 1936), which granted the 40-hour workweek and paid vacations. Dissolved by the vichy government (1940), the CGT has been controlled, since the end of World War II,by members with communist views. The CGT joined the Fédération syndicate mondiale, which provoked new dissensions within the labor union movement resulting in the formation of the anarcho-syndicalist Confédération nationale du travail (CNT, 1946) and the confédération générale du travail-force ouvrière (1948), a reformist union. The CGT, which is the most important main French labor union, has approximately 700,000 members (see léon jouhaux).