Although not altered beyond recognition, the SFIO which re-emerged after the liberation of France differed in many ways from its pre-war counterpart. Having been badly divided over questions of foreign policy between September 1938 and May 1939, it had remained on the margins of the French political scene during the first nine months of the Second World War and had virtually ceased to exist as a political force by the summer of 1940. Then, having re-established itself as an underground organization during the years of the German occupation and the Vichy regime, it had re-entered politics in 1944 as a more centralized party, determined to impose strict standards of discipline on its membership. The changes which had taken place over this period form the background to that phase of internal conflict which cast its shadow over the party between June 1945 and August 1946 and led to the appointment of Guy Mollet as General Secretary, and it is to them that we must now turn our attention.

The conflict between Blumistes and Fauristes, September 1938–May 1939

The Czech crisis of September 1938, which developed with frightening rapidity, forced political observers in the western democracies to face the fact that their efforts to restrain Germany might well involve them in a European war.