The Republican Socialist Party ( French : Parti socialiste républicain , abbreviated PSR ) was a political party in Belgium . The party was founded on August 15, 1887, by Alfred Defuissaux, a miners' leader from Borinage . Defuissaux had been expelled from the Belgian Labour Party in February 1887, as the party tried to distance itself from militant strikes such as those of 1886 . The new party was mainly based in the Wallonia - Hainaut areas. The party, whose followers were generally miners, argued in favour of a grève noire ('black strike', i.e. , a complete general strike ) as a means to obtain universal suffrage or, possibly, integration with republican France . The year it was founded, the PSR led a wave of local strikes.
9-527: The first PSR party congress was held on December 25, 1887, in Châtelet . The congress adopted a party programme and statues. In December 1888 several leading figures of the PSR were arrested, a blow that the party would not recuperate from. Through the legal proceedings that followed in 1889, information emerged that most of the PSR leadership were in fact agent provocateurs on the government's payroll. The influence of
18-438: A total population of 36,101. The total area of the municipality is 27.03 km which gives a population density of 1,336 inhabitants per km . The municipality consists of the following districts: Bouffioulx , Châtelet, and Châtelineau . Châtelet was a long established independent city prior to its fusion with the other entities. The first settlers of the site of Châtelet, dating from paleolithic times, were attracted by
27-551: The Belgian Labour Party. The PSR, albeit short-lived, represented the sole effort to build a structured republican political organization in Belgium. Ch%C3%A2telet, Belgium Châtelet ( French pronunciation: [ʃatlɛ] ; Walloon : Tcheslet ) is a city and municipality of Wallonia located in the province of Hainaut , Belgium . It lies on the river Sambre . As of January 1, 2018, Châtelet had
36-437: The current city streets can be dated from that period. Cultural activities and artistic talent flourished as well. Chatelet, and, in particular, Bouffioux, became well known for the production of its potteries . Originally formed in coal-fired kilns, the works from the region became internationally sought after. Three major producers still exist in the region and continue to produce artistic, as well as useful, pottery, but on
45-450: The day (Spain, France, Austria) fought for supremacy in this region. By the end of the century, the main economic drivers of the whole Sambre valley had become coal and heavy industry. The prosperity that came with the industrial revolution accounts for much of the population growth of the 1800s: Châtelet grew by a factor 5 in less than a century; Châtelineau grew by a factor 20 between 1811 and 1950 to more than 18,000 inhabitants. Many of
54-505: The ford on the river, the nearby wooded areas and flint-rich highlands. This region was continuously populated, first by Celtic , then Gallo-Roman peoples, until the Germanic invasions of the 4th and 5th century. In the 9th century, the land was likely part of emperor Louis the Pious ’s estate. The first occurrence of the name Châtelet appears in a text dating from the time when its territory
63-549: The party waned as a result of these revelations. The scandal became known as le Grand Complot (the Great Complot). The events of le Grand Complot were reenacted in a 1990 theatre play by the same name by Jean Louvet. The party began publishing La Bataille in 1889, its publication continued until 1891 (as a Republican Socialist weekly). At the time of the centenary of the French Revolution of 1789 , PSR merged back into
72-417: The prince-bishopric in 1655. While Châtelet's economy was dominated by artisanal guilds and trade, that of its neighbours, including Châtelineau and Bouffioulx, remained mostly agricultural. The 18th century first witnessed the gradual shift of the regional economic power from Châtelet to the newly founded neighbouring city of Charleroi . This was also a time of political instability as the various powers of
81-527: Was given to the chapter of the Liège cathedral in the 12th century. Châtelet obtained its charter of rights in 1220, symbolized by the perron . The protection later afforded by the Prince-Bishopric of Liège made the city into an important administrative, cultural, and economic centre, which could boast four annual trade fairs and a weekly cattle market. It became one of the 23 bonne villes (main cities) of
#551448