T H E T A B L E l ' February 11th, 1950

THE TABLET A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER AND REVIEW

PRO ECCLESIA DEI, PRO REGE ET PATRIA

VOL. 195, No. 5725

FOUNDED IN 1840

LONDON, FEBRUARY 11th, 1950

SIXPENCE

PUBLI1H1D AS A NEWSPAPIR

THE NEW PROTECTIONISM

Very Old Politics in Fresh Forms CHURCH AND STATE IN ARGENTINA II. Catholics and the Peron Regime. By John Murray, S .J .

INSIDE TIBET

IV . The Reincarnation of the Panchen Lama. By Père Matthias Hermanns HOLY YEAR DIFFICULTIES UNIVERSITIES IN AUSTRIA

from a Rome Correspondent from a Vienna Correspondent preparation which the Communists can quite easily build upon.

So far in the British general election very little, and th a t o f a ra th e r perfunctory nature, is being said about the rest o f the world, although w hat is happening outside these shores is really very much more im portan t for our future. The French Socialists Withdraw

TOWARDS EUROPEAN SOLVENCY T HE second annual report o f O.E.E.C., the Organization for European Economic Co-operation, gives its reasons for fairly optim istic view o f the chance o f Europe’s trad e with the dollar area being balanced, bu t only if Europe cuts imports by a th ousand million dollars. The cuts to come half in food a n d half in machinery, and if Europe earns a thousand dollars more th an in 1948, for the to ta l gap is over two thousand million dollars. The overseas te rrito ries which supply tropical raw materials must earn more. There can be more trad e with th ird countries, th rough whom Europe can earn dollars ; and the Americans must invest more in Europe o r European dependencies. All these things can be done. The report records a general increase o f industrial production by 30 per cent through the Marshall Aid countries as a whole. But what is even more im portant, prices in Europe have been stable and with the removal o f controls the confidence o f European peoples in their national currencies has been greatly fortified. The pattern o f future policy fo r each constituent country emerges as very much the same : all must seek to increase production still more, to export more to the dollar area and to keep internal financial stability. They must pursue these policies co-operatively, as people who are all in the same boat together and n o t competitively, each only thinking about its own balance o f payments. These are policies which have been accepted by the coalitions, in which Christian Democrat parties are the leading elements, th roughou t the continent. Little is said o f nationalization in Europe now. The Italian Christian Democrats and the French M.R.P. a re pursuing today policies th a t are more liberal in the old sense, in th a t they are giving much more play to private individuals than used to be envisaged in the p ro grammes which they drew up in the later stages o f the war. There is no doubt that what they are doing is the most sensible thing they could do, for their nations can only recover by tapping the great source o f potential wealth, the energies and resourcefulness th a t exist inside hum an beings, but can so very easily be discouraged and devitalized by the wrong sort o f Government. Most o f human history, especially in Asia, is the sorry story o f such discouragem ent.

The refusal o f their term s fo r the cost o f living bonus was given as the immediate reason for the decision o f the F rench Socialists to quit M. Bidault’s Government. I t is believed, however, th a t there was inside the coalition as well as inside the French Socialist Party, ano th e r ou tb u rs t o f the o ld disagreement which wrecked M. Queuille’s cabinet last October and was never settled. The Socialists, once a large workers' Party, have grown increasingly ill a t ease in a Government which has swung steadily to the right since 1947 when the Third Force coalition was form ed.

The Socialists, on one hand, would like to maintain this coalition and their behaviour during last week’s crisis has clearly shown th a t they share their partn e r ’s wish n o t to hold early elections which, they believe, might strengthen the position o f G eneral de Gaulle, w ithout sufficiently weakening the Communists. On the o th e r hand, as the elections draw nearer, they are getting increasingly nervous because o f Communist competition, in the present dispute the Socialists feel th a t the Communists have been making political p ro paganda—and n o t unsuccessfully— by urging the workers to stand out for more pay and by blaming the Socialists for sitting in a Government which does n o t pay p roper respect to the T rade Unions. Thus, M . Blum’s a t tem p t to solve the Socialists’ dilemma by draw ing the Party Ministers ou t o f the Bidault Government, while the Party Members o f Parliament give M. Bidault a vote o f confidence sounded paradoxical, and the party has w ithheld its vote.

British statesmen who look a t Europe and European political parties only in economic term s will continue to be mystified a t the weakness o f the Socialists there. One great reason why these parties have failed to gain a majority where British Socialism succeeded is quite clearly to be found in the anti-C hristian character w ith which continental Socialism has from the beginning invested itself. It is th a t which has compelled the Catholics to form their own parties, whose basis o f association is something p ro founder than any mere economic programme, and it is th a t which has left continental Socialism so weak in the face o f the Communists. Continental Socialism, whose own foundations are in Marxism, when it prepares its young neophytes, gives them an intellectual

M. Bidault’s task o f reconstructing his Governm ent was not easy : the Socialist Ministers had a good adm inistrative record, especially M. Moch, the able and energetic Minister o f Interior. The Radicals, who held this Ministry fo r nearly four decades during the Third French Republic and now hope th a t they will re tu rn to their o ld tenure, have p u t in M. Queuille. I t was no t easy, this tim e, to agree on an M .R .P . minister, M. Bacon, for the much disputed Ministry o f Labour. However, M. B idault succeeded in overcoming these difficulties by gaining the full support o f M. Queuille and by including in his reconstructed Government M. Charles Brune, a Radical Senator, who will help him to conciliate a potential opposition o f the U pper House. On Tuesday night, when he presented his Governm ent to the Chamber, he did not obtain a very clear majority ; but the speeches and the voting showed clearly enough th a t the three form er coalition partners are still determ ined to fight both the Communist left and the Gaullist right.