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REMMM 105-106, 201-219 Geoffrey D. Schad* Colonial Corporatism in the French Ma

REMMM 105-106, 201-219 Geoffrey D. Schad* Colonial Corporatism in the French Mandated States: Labor, Capital, the Mandatory Power, and the 1935 Syrian Law of Associations Résumé. Corporatisme colonial dans les États sous mandat français : travail, capital, pouvoir mandataire et loi syrienne de 1935 sur les associations. La “question sociale” en Syrie à l’époque du mandat français (1920-1946) était pour l’essentiel soumise à la “question nationale”. Pourtant, une catégorie de la société syrienne, celle des ouvriers et artisans, luttait pour la reconnaissance de ses droits. Artisans et ouvriers d’usine commencèrent à s’organiser et à se mobiliser pour l’amélioration de leur situation. Le mili- tantisme ouvrier connut un sommet au début des années 1930 avec une série de grèves qui coincidèrent avec une crise politique et économique de grande ampleur dans les États du Levant, et menaçèrent l’ordre social et le maintien de l’autorité française. La puissance mandataire s’efforça alors de canaliser les griefs de la classe ouvrière/artisanale à travers des “associations professionnelles” sous son contrôle. Les efforts du Mandataire ne connurent qu’un succès limité. Bien que les élites syriennes aient largement accepté le compromis corporatiste proposé par les Français, artisans et ouvriers poursuivirent leur quête d’autonomie. En analysant les motivations, l’impact, et l’héritage de la législation mandataire, cet article propose le modèle du “corporatisme colonial” comme grille de lecture susceptible d’aider à comprendre cette situation ou d’autres situations comparables. Abstract. The “social question” in Syria during the French Mandate (1920-1946) was by and large subordinated to the “national question”. However, one stratum of Syrian society, the artisanal-laboring segment, did press for recognition of its rights during the 1920s and 1930s. Artisans and factory workers began to organize themselves and to agitate for amelioration of their situation. Labor militancy peaked in the early 1930s with a series of strikes, coinciding * Historien, Villanova University, Pennsylvania (États-Unis). 202 / Geoffrey D. Schad with a major political and economic crisis in the Levant states that threatened to disrupt social order and challenged the maintenance of French authority. In consequence the Mandatory Power attempted to channel artisanal/working class grievances through officially controlled “professional associations”. The Mandatory’s efforts were only a partial success. Although Syrian elites largely accepted the corporatist bargain offered by the French, artisans and wor- kers continued their quest for autonomy. In analyzing the motivations, impact, and legacy of Mandatory social legislation, it is suggested that a model of “colonial corporatism” is a useful way to approach this and similar situations. The “social question” in Syria during the French Mandate (1920-1946) was by and large subordinated to the “national question”. That is, for most politically active Syrians, especially the pro-independence politicians consolidated in the National Bloc after 1928, problems connected to the social order were to be deferred until the achievement of formal political independence. Although this strategy did tend to promote national solidarity, it was also self-serving, in that the Bloc leadership was composed very largely of landlord-bureaucrat “nota- bles” whose social, economic, and political dominance would be challenged by attempts to address inequality in Syrian society, especially in rural areas. Nevertheless, one stratum of Syrian society, the artisanal-laboring segment, did press for recognition of its rights during the 1920s and 1930s. Artisans and factory workers, although they often shared the elites’ nationalist outlook, began to organize themselves and to agitate for higher wages, better working conditions, and the right to strike. This militancy, often abetted by nationalist and communist organizers, reached a peak in the early 1930s with a series of strikes. These strikes coincided with a major political and economic crisis in the Levant states, a crisis that threatened to disrupt social order and challenged the maintenance of French authority. In consequence the Mandatory Power, acting through the subordinate Syrian government and drawing on Ottoman precedent, attempted to channel artisanal/working class grievances through offi- cially controlled “professional associations”. The corporatist character of these associations and the generally corporatist outlook of Mandatory social policy are underscored by the contemporaneous effort to reorganize the institutions representing capital’s interests – the chambers of commerce, industry, and agri- culture – also along corporatist lines. The Mandatory’s efforts were only a partial success. Although economic elites by and large accepted the terms of the corporatist bargain, by which they agreed to close government supervision of their organizations in return for access to power and a representational monopoly, artisans and workers continued their quest for autonomy, ultimately gaining a generous labor law at independence. However, the shape of Syrian associational life continued to be a corporatist one, as the mechanisms of social mobilization used by the later Bacth regimes demonstrate (Heydemann, 1999 ; Sadowski, 1984 ; Wedeen, 1999). In this Colonial Corporatism in the French Mandated States… / 203 REMMM 105-106, 201-219 regard the Mandatory phase of Syrian history represents a bridge between the Ottoman and post-independence periods, emphasizing the continuities in Syrian institutions across time and under differing regime types. This paper analyses the legal reform of artisans’ and workers’ organizations in Syria during the Mandate. It will first examine the patterns of interest represen- tation under the later Ottoman system. The development of the labor movement and French attitudes toward it in early Mandatory Syria are treated next. A close analysis of the legislation enacted under High Commissioner Damien de Martel then follows, with a particular emphasis on the terms of the 1935 law of occupational associations (Legislative Decree 152 of 18 September 1935). The contemporaneous reform of the chambers of commerce, industry, and agriculture is also discussed as a counterexample of a set of elite institutions which more readily accepted the Mandatory’s corporatist agenda. Suggested interpretations of these policies, notably an emphasis on tactical political motives (Shambrook, 1998) and the concept of a “colonial welfare state” (Thompson, 2000), are reviewed, and a line of interpretation applying the concepts of corporatism is suggested as a tentative alternative. Interest Representation in the Late Ottoman Period As Syria was an Ottoman successor state the Mandatory was obliged to retain Ottoman law as much as possible, and so the legal status of representative organizations was an important consideration. The Mandatory Power closely examined Ottoman precedent in considering changes in Syrian law. Moreover, France inherited not just formal legal structures in 1920, but also structures in Syrian society as they were articulated at the end of Ottoman times, so that the bodies with which the French dealt were also products of the late Ottoman period. These bodies in turn reflected the changing character of their members. For our purposes the most important transformational force had been the ope- ning up of the Syrian market to the products of an industrializing Europe on terms largely favorable to Europeans during the 19th century. Among the conse- quences of this “infitâÌ” were an erosion of the position of handicraft industry, a concomitant acceleration of the decline of the artisanal guilds, changes in the composition and interests of the urban commercial bourgeoisie, a reorientation of agriculture toward commercial crops, and the expanding prevalence of capi- talist labor relations throughout the economy. Of necessity these consequences were reflected in the outlook and organizational methods of the laboring and business segments. The institutions representing the interests of the artisanry had an ambiguous official status in the late Ottoman period. Like the class of petty producers and retailers that they represented, their organizations, analogous in some respects to medieval European guilds, were in disarray. Known by different names (e.g. Ìirfa / Ìiraf, Òinf / aÒnâf, mihna / mihan) and operating under a variety of laws 204 / Geoffrey D. Schad and internal regulations, these bodies (Fr. corporations) had evolved over centu- ries, regulating admission to the trade, product quality, professional advancement and, depending on the exact locale and time, acting as tax-farmers. These old corporations, with their elaborate initiation rituals and apprentice-journeyman- master advancement system (Qoudsî, 1885; Qâsimî, 1960), lost much influence in the 19th century as a result of the competition of cheap European machine- made goods with local handicrafts and the gradual supersession of guild masters by non-guild merchants as employers in many crafts, especially weaving (Vatter, 1993, 1994). Barriers to advancement and the new capitalist relations between merchant-manufacturer employers and craft workers sapped the corporations’ internal cohesion. By the Young Turk period (1908-18) political elites viewed the organizations as anachronisms inconsistent with their own modernizing ethos. In several laws, significantly the law on « the directives of the guilds (taclîmât al-niqâbât) » of 24 April 1912 (text in Rama∂ân, 1929, 2: 433-38) the new Otto- man leadership sought to supplant the old guilds by formally constituted, legally recognized organizations, termed niqâbât al-aÒnâf. Among other obligations the niqâbât al-aÒnâf had to have written statutes approved by the government. These were not labor unions in the Western sense, being combinations of owners and workers. Just how effective this law was is an open question. It is probable that it was largely unenforceable due to the almost continuous state of war that the empire was engaged in until its demise (Longuenesse, 1977: 42). It uploads/Politique/ schad-201-219.pdf