Pierre Renaudel

Renaudel, Pierre 

Born Dec. 19, 1871, in Morgny, in Seine-Maritime; died Apr. 2, 1935, in Palma, on Mallorca. Prominent figure in the French workers’ movement.

Renaudel’s activity in the socialist movement began in 1899. From 1906 to 1915 he was editor and from 1915 to 1918 director of the newspaper L’Humanité. He was a member of the Chamber of Deputies in the years 1914–19 and 1924–35. During World War I he was a Social Chauvinist, and in 1919 and 1920 he opposed joining the French Section of the Second International (SFIO) to the Comintern. A leading figure in the right wing of the SFIO, Renaudel adopted a hostile attitude toward communism and the Soviet Union and advocated socialist participation in bourgeois governments. In 1933, having been expelled from the SFIO along with other “neosocialist” leaders, he helped found the League of Jean Jaurès (Socialist party of France).