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The Transforming Impact of Collective Action: Belgium, 1886*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 February 2009

Gita Deneckere
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Summary

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This article illuminates the transforming impact of collective action in the light of the industrial jacquerie of 1886 in Belgium. This important episode of popular struggle fuelled a dialectical process of change which was marked by a fundamental shift in both social policy and in repertoires of collective action. In 1886 workers still drew on an old repertoire of collective action. Their struggle had such a disruptive force that it forced the state to intervene in labour conflicts. The conservative political élite responded with conciliatory gestures that foreshadowed a legislative programme of social reform. In the changed political climate the position of progressive wings in the two conservative parties was enhanced as the growing strength of the labour movement became more apparent. The industrial jacquerie functioned as a catalyst in the transition from old to new repertoires of collective action. In the aftermath of the revolt, mass collective action quickly, and extensively, came under the control of the Parti Ouvrier Belge (POB).

Type
Research Article
Information
International Review of Social History , Volume 38 , Issue 3 , December 1993 , pp. 345 - 367
Copyright
Copyright © Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis 1993

References

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9 The Royal Attorney asked among other things, whether the strike had broken out “spontaneously” in their municipality. An example: “A Damprémy se sont mis en grève forcément dans tous les établissements, verreries, tréfilleries, charbonnages (les 4 fosses) attendu que les bandes de grévistes étrangers ont venu envahir les établissements, le 26 Mars de une heure de relevée à 6 heures du soir. Mais les houilleurs surtout s'y attendaient, car à la remonte des ouvriers à 3 heures [ … on a entendu dire: … ] Ah, on y est; bonne affaire si cela réussit.” Archives Générales du Royaume à Bruxelles, Parquet-Général de Bruxelles, 238–239.

10 Annales Parlementaires, 1886–1887, p. 290.

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13 Clearly, the smaller patrons within the glass industry, who could not afford to innovate, were equally threatened by an entrepreneur like Baudoux. It has been said that they paid the rioters to steal industrial secrets.

14 A detailed account of this can be found in Verhaeghe, Jan, “De ordehandhaving bij de sociale onlusten in maart-april 1886 in Luik en Henegouwen”, Belgisch tijdschrift voor militaire geschiedenis – Revue belge d'histoire militaire, 25 (1984), pp. 687–724Google Scholar; 26 (1985) pp. 17–40; 27 (1986), pp. 435–464; 28 (1989), pp. 269–298.

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16 See, for instance, the only synthesis on popular action in Belgium up to the present: Kalken, Frans Van, Commotions populaires en Belgique 1834–1902 (Brussels, 1936) p. 97Google Scholar. Van Kalken writes: “Rien ne prouve peut-être mieux que le mouvement de 1886 fut “un sursaut de fureur collective, sans plan préconçu, sans direction, sans but précis” [the quote is from H. Pirenne] que ce fait: huit jours s'écoulèrent avant le pays de Charleroi se prit à imiter le mouvement né dans le pays de Liége.”

17 Tilly, The Contentious French, p. 394.

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22 For this and other ideas on the relationship between struggle, reform and the state, see Tarrow, Struggle, Politics and Reform, pp. 91–103.

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30 Annales Parlementaires, 1886–1887, p. 10.

31 The report of the Commission d'Enquête du Travail, was published in four volumes between 1887 and 1888.

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41 Archives Générales du Royaume à Bruxelles, Parquet-Général, 224.

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44 Frank, “L'insurrection belge de 1886”, pp. 169–174. See also Puissant, “1886, la contreréforme sociale?”

45 See Polasky, Janet L., “A Revolution for Socialist Reforms: the Belgian General Strike for Universal Suffrage”, Journal of Contemporary History, 27 (1992), pp. 449–466CrossRefGoogle Scholar.