Suzanne Labin: socialist, anti-communist and ‘Globalist’

This article follows the transnational career of Suzanne Labin, a French socialist and anti-communist professional, in order to analyse the roles and agencies of individuals while the global connectivity of anti-communist actors was growing during the ‘long 1960s’ (approximately 1955–1980). Retrospective analysis, as well as accounts from contemporaries, describes this period as a time of multi-polarisation and globalisation. I will chart Labin’s path from anti-Stalinist circles in France to conservative circles in the US, to finally becoming the first and only female permanent member of the global anti-communist umbrella organisation, the World Anti-Communist League (WACL), chairing its French chapter in 1972. An analysis of Labin’s seemingly ambiguous alliances as a socialist with anti-communist and right-wing organisations will shed light on the particularities of international anti-communism during the ‘long 1960s’ on three levels. First, it will show the dynamics between anti-communist networks and actors on national, transatlantic and global levels, especially their contact points. Second, it will underline the diversity of anti-communism and its capacity to integrate several (even contradictory) ideologemes. Third, by following Labin’s global anti-communist engagement within the WACL and her cosmopolitan lifestyle, this article will argue that anti-communist actors were actively involved in the process of globalisation during the ‘long 1960s’.