The Pro-European and Federalist Positions of the French Resistance and the Foundation of the UEF

Abstract

This article is for a large part a summary of a lecture at a symposium held at the Universities of Assisi and Perugia in 2013. This research followed a previous publication for a symposium at the University of Pavia on an almost unknown aspect of the French Resistance, the clandestine founding in occupied Lyons of the French Committee for the European Federation (CFFE), and it will be followed by a more specific research connected with the Gaullist “Free France” related press or other French publications published in exile or out of the metropolitan territory during WWII. What are the conditions or the reasons for the beginning of the French Resistance and the progressive affirmation of a clandestine press? Why is the Resistance far from spontaneous movement after the lightning victory of Germany in June 1940 and why does it appear first in the North where the Nazi occupation induces a first form of “patriotic” opposition while it is rather late coming in the South-zone where the army of occupation is less present and where the majority of the population seems to be satisfied, until the autumn of 1941 with the apparent autonomy of the Maréchal Petain’s regime?