La Lutte (newspaper)

La Lutte ('The Struggle') was a French-language newspaper published in Saigon, Vietnam, during the French colonial period.[1] It was launched ahead of the April-May 1933 Saigon municipal council election as a joint organ of the Indochinese Communist Party and a grouping of Trotskyists (which became known as Nhom Tran Dau, the 'Struggle Group', after La Lutte), who were running a joint slate of candidates for the polls.[2][3][4] This kind of cooperation between Trotskyists and Comintern-linked communists was a phenomenon unique to Vietnam.[5] The editorial line of La Lutte fluctuated between Trotskyist and Communist Party positions.[6] The supporters of La Lutte were known as lutteurs.[7]

1933 election

La Lutte opposed both colonial rule and the Constitutionalist Party.[8] The first issue of La Lutte was published on April 24, 1933. In the election the La Lutte grouping called its slate of candidates the 'Workers' List'. Two of the candidates of the Workers' List, Nguyen Van Tao and Tran Van Thach, were elected (there were six elected seats in total), but their election was invalidated in August 1933. Publication of La Lutte was discontinued after the election.[3][4]

Revival

However, Nguyen An Ninh (an independent Marxist) sought to revive experience of leftist cooperation. An agreement between the Communist Party and the Trotskyists was reached. As a result, La Lutte was revived on October 4, 1934. The editorial board consisted of Nguyen An Ninh, Le Van Thu, Tran Van Thach (left-wing nationalists), Nguyen Van Tao, Duong Bach Mai, Nguyen Van Nguyen, Nguyen Thi Luu (Communist Party), Ta Thu Thau, Phan Van Huu, Ho Huu Tuong, Phan Van Chang and Huynh Van Phuong (Trotskyists). Edgar Ganofsky was the manager of the newspaper.[3] The united front formed around La Lutte ran various campaigns and participated in elections. In the March 1935 Cochinchina assembly election, albeit with restricted suffrage and government interference, leftist candidates obtained 17% of the votes. There was a joint La Lutte candidate slate for the May 1935 municipal election, and Tran Van Thach, Nguyen Van Tao, Ta Thu Thau and Doung Bach Mai were elected. The election of the latter three was, however, invalidated.[3] Moreover, the election was preceded by a controversy within the La Lutte alliance regarding the candidature of Doung Bach Mai, a Communist Party leader. He was labelled 'reformist' by Trotskyists, but defended by Ta Thu Thau.[6] In late 1936 and 1937 the grouping organized various strikes.[3]

Struggle for amnesty

La Lutte gave a large amount of attention to political prisoners held by the French colonial regime and campaigned for an amnesty for political prisoners.[3] Prisoners' protests were frequently reported in the pages of La Lutte.[9]

However, the Communist Party and the Trotskyists diverged on whether to support the Popular Front that governed France.[10] Moreover, under the Popular Front line the Communist Party adopted a more conciliatory tone towards moderate Vietnamese nationalists.[11] By 1937 the Trotskyists had become the dominant force in La Lutte.[12] In May 1937 the Communist Party launched a new newspaper of its own, L'Avant Garde ('The Vanguard'), in which the Trotskyists were attacked. The split in La Lutte was finalized on June 14, 1937, when the Communist Party refused to support a motion of Ta Thu Thau against the Popular Front government.[13]

Latter period

The Trotskyists publicly blamed the French Communist Party for the break-up of the La Lutte alliance.[14] Ta Thu Thau emerged as the main leader of the Trotskyist La Lutte group. During the 1939 campaign for the Cochinchina assembly election, a Vietnamese-language sister newspaper was launched, Tranh Dau ('The Struggle').[15] La Lutte was published until 1939.[16]

References

  1. ↑ Steinberg, David Joel. In Search of Southeast Asia; A Modern History. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1971. p. 322
  2. ↑ Bousquet, Gisèle L. Behind the Bamboo Hedge: The Impact of Homeland Politics in the Parisian Vietnamese Community. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1991. pp. 34-35
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Alexander, Robert J. International Trotskyism, 1929-1985: A Documented Analysis of the Movement. Durham: Duke University Press, 1991. pp. 961-962
  4. 1 2 Trager, Frank N (ed.). Marxism in Southeast Asia; A Study of Four Countries. Stanford, Calif: Stanford University Press, 1959. p. 134
  5. ↑ McConnell, Scott. Leftward Journey: The Education of Vietnamese Students in France, 1919-1939. New Brunswick, U.S.A.: Transaction Publishers, 1989. p. 145
  6. 1 2 Trager, Frank N (ed.). Marxism in Southeast Asia; A Study of Four Countries. Stanford, Calif: Stanford University Press, 1959. p. 139
  7. ↑ McHale, Shawn Frederick. Print and Power: Confuciansim, Communism, and Buddhism in the Making of Modern Vietnam. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2004. p. 126
  8. ↑ Quinn-Judge, Sophie. Ho Chi Minh: The Missing Years ; 1919 - 1941. Berkeley [u.a.]: University of California Press, 2002. p. 200
  9. ↑ Zinoman, Peter. The Colonial Bastille: A History of Imprisonment in Vietnam, 1862 - 1940. Berkeley [u.a.]: University of California Press, 2001. p. 231
  10. ↑ Alexander, Robert J. International Trotskyism, 1929-1985: A Documented Analysis of the Movement. Durham: Duke University Press, 1991. p. 964
  11. ↑ Trager, Frank N (ed.). Marxism in Southeast Asia; A Study of Four Countries. Stanford, Calif: Stanford University Press, 1959. p. 140
  12. ↑ Dunn, Peter M. The First Vietnam War. London: C. Hurst, 1985. p. 7
  13. ↑ Trager, Frank N (ed.). Marxism in Southeast Asia; A Study of Four Countries. Stanford, Calif: Stanford University Press, 1959. p. 142
  14. ↑ Quinn-Judge, Sophie. Ho Chi Minh: The Missing Years ; 1919 - 1941. Berkeley [u.a.]: University of California Press, 2002. p. 227
  15. ↑ Patti, Archimedes L.A. Why Viet Nam?: Prelude to America's Albatross. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980. p. 522
  16. ↑ Hobson, Christopher Z., and Ronald D. Tabor. Trotskyism and the Dilemma of Socialism. Contributions in political science, no. 215. New York: Greenwood Press, 1988. p. 95
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