The Council for Maintaining the Occupations (French: Conseil pour le Maintien des Occupations), or CMDO, was a revolutionary committee formed during the May 1968 events in France originating in the Sorbonne

University of Paris

The University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...

. The council favored the continuation of wildcat general strike

General strike

A general strike is a strike action by a critical mass of the labour force in a city, region, or country. While a general strike can be for political goals, economic goals, or both, it tends to gain its momentum from the ideological or class sympathies of the participants...

s and factory occupations across France, maintaining them through directly democratic

Direct democracy

Direct democracy is a form of government in which people vote on policy initiatives directly, as opposed to a representative democracy in which people vote for representatives who then vote on policy initiatives. Direct democracy is classically termed "pure democracy"...

 workers' councils. Within the revolutionary movement, it opposed the influence of major trade unions and the French Communist Party

French Communist Party

The French Communist Party is a political party in France which advocates the principles of communism.Although its electoral support has declined in recent decades, the PCF retains a large membership, behind only that of the Union for a Popular Movement , and considerable influence in French...

 who intended to contain the revolt and compromise with General Charles de Gaulle

Charles de Gaulle

Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle was a French general and statesman who led the Free French Forces during World War II. He later founded the French Fifth Republic in 1958 and served as its first President from 1959 to 1969....

.

The council implemented a policy of equal representation for its participants. It was described by Situationist René Viénet

René Viénet

René Viénet is a French sinologist who is famous as a situationist writer and filmmaker. Viénet used the situationist technique of détournement — the diversion of already existing cultural elements to new subversive purposes.- Career :...

 as "essentially an uninterrupted general assembly, deliberating day and night. No faction or private meetings ever existed outside the common debate." It was formed on the evening of May 17, by supporters of the Sorbonne Occupation Committee

Occupation Committee of the Sorbonne

The Occupation Committee of the Sorbonne was a radical student group that occupied the Sorbonne during the May 1968 social unrest in France....

.

See also

• Sorbonne Occupation Committee
  Occupation Committee of the Sorbonne
  The Occupation Committee of the Sorbonne was a radical student group that occupied the Sorbonne during the May 1968 social unrest in France....
  
  
• On the Poverty of Student Life
  On the Poverty of Student Life
  On the Poverty of Student Life: A Consideration of Its Economic, Political, Sexual, Psychological and Notably Intellectual Aspects and of a Few Ways to Cure it is a pamphlet first published by students of the University of Strasbourg and the Situationist International in 1966...
  
  
• May 1968 in France
• Situationist International