The Tours Congress was the 18th National Congress of the French Section of the Workers' International, or SFIO, which took place in Tours on 25–30 December 1920. During the Congress, the majority voted to join the Third International and create the French Section of the Communist International, which became the French Communist Party in 1921.
The SFIO divided itself in three factions during the Congress:
Hence the SFIO split in two: the SFIC (3,208 votes) and the SFIO (1,022 votes). The next year, the CGT trade-union also split, with the creation of the Communist Confédération générale du travail unitaire (CGTU), which itself merged again with the CGT at the 1936 Toulouse Congress during the Popular Front.
A young Ho Chi Minh, then known as Nguyen Ai Quoc, was present at the congress and made a speech decrying the exploitation of the French colonies, and supporting the proposal to join the Third International. [2]
The General Confederation of Labour is a national trade union center, founded in 1895 in the city of Limoges. It is the first of the five major French confederations of trade unions.
The Popular Front was an alliance of French left-wing movements, including the communist French Communist Party (PCF), the socialist French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO) and the progressive Radical-Socialist Republican Party, during the interwar period. Three months after the victory of the Spanish Popular Front, the Popular Front won the May 1936 legislative election, leading to the formation of a government first headed by SFIO leader Léon Blum and exclusively composed of republican and SFIO ministers.
The Twenty-one Conditions, officially the Conditions of Admission to the Communist International, refer to the conditions, most of which were suggested by Vladimir Lenin, to the adhesion of the socialist parties to the Third International (Comintern) created in 1919. The conditions were formally adopted by the Second Congress of the Comintern in 1920.
Marceau Pivert was a French schoolteacher, trade unionist, socialist militant, and journalist. He was an alumnus of the École normale supérieure de Saint-Cloud.
Ludovic-Oscar Frossard, also known as L.-O. Frossard or Oscar Frossard, was a French socialist and communist politician. He was a founding member in 1905 and Secretary-General of the French Socialist Party (SFIO) from 1918 to 1920, as well as a founding member and Secretary-General of the French Communist Party (PCF) from 1920 to 1922.
Boris Souvarine, also known as Varine, was a French Marxist, communist activist, essayist and journalist.
Legislative elections were held in France on 26 April and 3 May 1936, the last elections before World War II. The number of candidates set a record, with 4,807 running for election to the Chamber of Deputies. In the Seine Department alone, there were 1,402 candidates.
The Union of Communist Students is a French student political organization, part of the Mouvement Jeunes Communistes de France. It was founded in 1939 but dissolved after World War II. The UEC was re-created in 1956, along with the MJCF. It is independent from the French Communist Party (PCF) although it remains close to it. It maintains exchange contacts with the PCF, in particular on student issues. The UEC is organized in sectors, by university, and is led by a national collective elected during the congress of the MJCF and renewed during the National Assemblies of the facilitators, every year. A national coordination runs the organization.
The Left in France was represented at the beginning of the 20th century by two main political parties, namely the Republican, Radical and Radical-Socialist Party and the French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO), created in 1905 as a merger of various Marxist parties.
Louis Bouët was a French teacher and anarcho-syndicalist. He played a leading role in the National Federation of Teachers' Unions and in the socialist party. He was briefly a member of the steering committee of the French Communist Party. For many years he edited the pedagogical review L'Ecole Emancipée, which he had founded.

Alphonse Adolphe Merrheim was a French copper smith and trade union leader.

Alexandre Marius Henri Blanc was a French schoolteacher, socialist and national deputy. He belonged to the left wing of the socialist party, and during World War I was pacifist. After the war he was one of the founders of the French Communist Party.

Pierre Brizon was a French teacher, national deputy, internationalist and pacifist. He was subject to violent attacks in the press and parliament for speaking out against the fighting during World War I.

Jean Pierre Raffin-Dugens was a French politician. He was a socialist, internationalist and pacifist. During World War I (1914–1918) he was one of the few national deputies to remain true to the principle that the workers of the world should not support wars between their countries arranged by political and military leaders. After attending an international pacifist conference in Switzerland in 1916 he was subject to a storm of criticism. He was not reelected after the war.

Fernand Loriot was a French teacher who was active in forming the teachers' union. He took a pacifist stance during World War I. He was one of the founders of the French Communist Party.
Louise Saumoneau was a French feminist who later renounced feminism as being irrelevant to the class struggle. She became a union leader and a prominent socialist. During World War I she was active in the internationalist pacifist movement. In a change of stance, after the war she remained with the right of the socialist party after the majority split off to form the French Communist Party.
Albert Henri Bourderon was a French cooper and syndicalist who became a leading socialist. During World War I he supported a pacifist position in line with internationalist principles.
The French Communist Party has been a part of the political scene in France since 1920, peaking in strength around the end of World War II. It originated when a majority of members resigned from the socialist French Section of the Workers' International (SFIO) party to set up the French Section of the Communist International (SFIC). The SFIO had been divided over support for French participation in World War I and over whether to join the Communist International (Comintern). The new SFIC defined itself as revolutionary and democratic centralist. Ludovic-Oscar Frossard was its first secretary-general, and Ho Chi Minh was also among the founders. Frossard himself resigned in 1923, and the 1920s saw a number of splits within the party over relations with other left-wing parties and over adherence to the Communist International's dictates. The party gained representation in the French parliament in successive elections, but also promoted strike action and opposed colonialism. Pierre Semard, leader from 1924 to 1928, sought party unity and alliances with other parties; but leaders including Maurice Thorez imposed a Stalinist line from the late 1920s, leading to loss of membership through splits and expulsions, and reduced electoral success. With the rise of Fascism this policy shifted after 1934, and the PCF supported the Popular Front, which came to power under Léon Blum in 1936. The party helped to secure French support for the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War and opposed the 1938 Munich Agreement with Hitler. During this period the PCF adopted a more patriotic image, and favoured an equal but distinct role for women in the communist movement.

Raymond Péricat was a militant French trade unionist and communist. During World War I (1914–18) he took an internationalist and pacifist position. After the war he tried to establish a radical Communist party that blended Bolshevism with anarchist concepts.
The French Section of the Workers' International was a political party in France that was founded in 1905 and succeeded in 1969 by the modern-day Socialist Party. The SFIO was founded during the 1905 Globe Congress in Paris as a merger between the French Socialist Party and the Socialist Party of France in order to create the French section of the Second International, designated as the party of the workers' movement.