ABSTRACT
1929 was the year of the onset of what is still generally called 'the great depression'. Banks and other creditors were unable to recover loans. The Kredit-Anstalt in Vienna failed. Britain and France responded to the onset of the economic crisis in different ways. The French franc was kept on the gold standard, and for some time Paris, as the centre of the Gold Bloc, was in a stronger monetary position than either London or New York. But it was impossible for France to escape all the consequences of the depression, or of the steps taken by others to deal with it. The strength of the franc and British devaluation meant that British exports to France became cheaper, which France countered by the introduction of quotas on British goods. J. B. Duroselle described Herriot and Paul-Boncour in 1932 as 'men of the Left, patriotic but under the spell of collective security and disarmament' and they were characteristic of a type.
