Jaurès

Jaurès is a surname. The most prominent bearer is Jean Jaurès (1859–1914), a French socialist leader, journalist, and pacifist.

Jean Jaurès was born in Castres in the Tarn department. He studied philosophy and began a career as a teacher before turning to journalism and politics. In the 1880s he emerged as a leading figure in the French socialist movement, advocating reformist socialist policies, universal suffrage, secular public education, and workers’ rights. He helped found and edit L'Humanité, a daily newspaper established in 1904 to promote socialist ideas in France.

Jaurès was influential in unifying socialist currents in France and played a key role in the formation of the SFIO, the French Section of the International Workers' Association, in 1905. He stressed internationalism and opposed militarism, arguing for peaceful arbitration and international cooperation as the best path to social progress.

On 31 July 1914, with World War I looming, he was assassinated in Paris by Raoul Villain. His death removed a major voice in the anti-war movement and his writings continued to shape socialist and pacifist currents in France and beyond. His legacy is commemorated in streets, schools, and institutions named in his honor, and L'Humanité remained an important socialist daily.