With ironic optimism, Benoît Malon, an early prophet of socialist unity on the basis of doctrinal eclecticism, observed in 1882 that “Without a doubt, the Parti Ouvrier is still not over its crisis of formation that has caused three successive schisms; but the most difficult path has been crossed and the definitive organization is on the right road.” Not only would Malon himself be estranged from the party by 1884, but the pattern of morcellement – fragmentation – of French socialism had been clearly established by the defection of the Marxist followers of Jules Guesde from the party's congress of 1882. The departure of the Guesdists to form a competing socialist party, the Parti Ouvrier Français, was merely the climax to a number of internal disputes that had previously led to the defection of nonrevolutionary trade unionists in 1879 and then the anarchists in 1880. Hopes of socialist unity had been dashed on the rocks of internal dissension. Socialist unity would not be achieved until 1905.

Prior chapters have adduced some of the general conditions that promoted the schismatic tendencies of the French labor movement. Chapter 2 argued that open communal groups (fellowships) will attempt to maintain organizational commitment through a process of communal closure that entails a sharpened dualism of us versus them, hierarchicalization, strong classification, condensed symbolism, ideological closure, and depersonalization. Countermobilization against attempts at communal closure will produce schism.