THE MRP AND FRENCH FOREIGN POLICY.

By Russell B. Capelle '36. NewYork: Praeger, 1963. 196 pp. $5.50.

It is always a pleasure to be able to review favorably a book by a former student. Professor Capelle of Norwich University has produced a very scholarly work on the Mouvement Republicain Populaire (MRP), the great Catholic political party of the Fourth French Republic, whose two outstanding leaders, Robert Schuman and Georges Bidault, were foreign ministers for the entire decade 1944-1954. In this period the MRP inaugurated the movement towards European integration and union and succeeded in establishing in 1952 the European Coal and Steel Community, later absorbed in the more ambitious Common Market.

Although Professor Capelle gives due recognition to the exalted vision and highminded leadership of Schuman and Bidault, he is quite critical of the parliamentary tactics of the MRP and its relation to public opinion. In contrast to its idealism on European integration, the MRP was rather backward looking and inflexible towards North Africa and Indochina. Professor Capelle indicts the party for yielding too readily to pressure groups on colonial issues. All too often there were inconsistencies and contradictions between the party's ultimate objectives and some of its policies in practice.

In his Foreword, Professor Capelle graciously acknowledges some financial aid from Dartmouth which enabled him to collect much of the material for this book in Paris, where he also interviewed personally many of the MRP leaders. Consequently his bibliography and documentation are most impressive.

Since he is a Professor of Government, the book is naturally organized analytically rather than chronologically. At times the analysis is so technical in its use of the terms of political science that it becomes rather difficult for the general reader to follow. Professor Capelle's short epilogue makes one hope that he will continue his studies of European integration since 1954, particularly President De Gaulle's impact upon the movement.

Professor of History Emeritus