LE PLAY, FRÉDÉRIC. - Engineer and professor, precursor of the Catholic social movement, but on a plane of pure observation, b. at La-Rivière-St-Sauveur on 11 April 1806, d. at Paris on 5 April 1882.
From the revolution of 1830 he understood the gravity of the social travail and thereupon devoted himself to the study of the progress of working-class life and especially of the family, conducting an inquiry into 300 model families, from 1829 to 1853 (Les ouvriers européens, 1855). From 1860 onward, above all, he broadened his horizon, entering fully into reformist action. The ideas contained in the Réforme sociale en France (1867), in the Organisation du travail (1879), in La méthode sociale (1879) and in many other works were applied by the "Union de la paix sociale" and propagated after 1881 by the journal La réforme sociale. His plan was above all moral: he reproached the Revolution with three great errors: that of the original perfection of man, of individual infallibility, of absolute equality. The remedy he proposed consisted in restoring respect under three forms: respect for God and for religion; respect for the father and obedience; respect for woman, or moral chastity. Le P. is little favorable to associations: he awaits the reform of authority, which leads him to paternalism.
His work was continued by two schools: the reformist work by the "Ecole de la paix sociale" and the positive work of observation and research by the "Ecole de la science sociale", founded in 1885 by M. Demolins and by the abbé de Tourville.
Bibliography3 works
Pietro Palazzini