West Africa: the Former French States

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Publisher : Englewood Cliffs, N. J. : Prentice-Hall
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 200 pages
Book Rating : 4.F/5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis West Africa: the Former French States by : John D. Hargreaves

Download or read book West Africa: the Former French States written by John D. Hargreaves and published by Englewood Cliffs, N. J. : Prentice-Hall. This book was released on 1967 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Surveys the common political, social and ethnic forces and historical trends in nine French-speaking African states, newly independent between 1958-1961.

Slavery and Colonial Rule in French West Africa

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780521596787
Total Pages : 388 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (967 download)

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Book Synopsis Slavery and Colonial Rule in French West Africa by : Martin A. Klein

Download or read book Slavery and Colonial Rule in French West Africa written by Martin A. Klein and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1998-07-28 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A history of slavery during the 19th and 20th centuries in three former French colonies.

Africa's Last Colonial Currency

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Author :
Publisher : Pluto Press (UK)
ISBN 13 : 9780745341798
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (417 download)

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Book Synopsis Africa's Last Colonial Currency by : Fanny Pigeaud

Download or read book Africa's Last Colonial Currency written by Fanny Pigeaud and published by Pluto Press (UK). This book was released on 2021 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How the CFA Franc enabled France to continue its colonies in Africa.

Britain, France and the Decolonization of Africa

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Publisher : UCL Press
ISBN 13 : 1911307746
Total Pages : 257 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (113 download)

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Book Synopsis Britain, France and the Decolonization of Africa by : Andrew W.M. Smith

Download or read book Britain, France and the Decolonization of Africa written by Andrew W.M. Smith and published by UCL Press. This book was released on 2017-03-01 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Looking at decolonization in the conditional tense, this volume teases out the complex and uncertain ends of British and French empire in Africa during the period of ‘late colonial shift’ after 1945. Rather than view decolonization as an inevitable process, the contributors together explore the crucial historical moments in which change was negotiated, compromises were made, and debates were staged. Three core themes guide the analysis: development, contingency and entanglement. The chapters consider the ways in which decolonization was governed and moderated by concerns about development and profit. A complementary focus on contingency allows deeper consideration of how colonial powers planned for ‘colonial futures’, and how divergent voices greeted the end of empire. Thinking about entanglements likewise stresses both the connections that existed between the British and French empires in Africa, and those that endured beyond the formal transfer of power.

The French Imperial Nation-State

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Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226897680
Total Pages : 417 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (268 download)

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Book Synopsis The French Imperial Nation-State by : Gary Wilder

Download or read book The French Imperial Nation-State written by Gary Wilder and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2005-12 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: France experienced a period of crisis following World War I when the relationship between the nation and its colonies became a subject of public debate. The French Imperial Nation-State focuses on two intersecting movements that redefined imperial politics—colonial humanism led by administrative reformers in West Africa and the Paris-based Negritude project, comprising African and Caribbean elites. Gary Wilder develops a sophisticated account of the contradictory character of colonial government and examines the cultural nationalism of Negritude as a multifaceted movement rooted in an alternative black public sphere. He argues that interwar France must be understood as an imperial nation-state—an integrated sociopolitical system that linked a parliamentary republic to an administrative empire. An interdisciplinary study of colonial modernity combining French history, colonial studies, and social theory, The French Imperial Nation-State will compel readers to revise conventional assumptions about the distinctions between republicanism and racism, metropolitan and colonial societies, and national and transnational processes.

Living Beyond Boundaries

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 338 pages
Book Rating : 4.:/5 (858 download)

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Book Synopsis Living Beyond Boundaries by : Sarah Jean Zimmerman

Download or read book Living Beyond Boundaries written by Sarah Jean Zimmerman and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Living Beyond Boundaries: West African Servicemen in French Colonial Conflicts, 1908-1962, is a history of French West African colonial soldiers who served in French Empire. Known by the misnomer tirailleurs sénégalais, these servicemen contributed to the expansion, maintenance, and defense of France's presence on several continents. The complex identity and shifting purpose of this institution were directly linked to French colonialism, but determined by numerous actors and settings. The men in the ranks of the tirailleurs sénégalais came from France's colonial federations in sub-Saharan Africa--French West Africa and French Equatorial Africa. During the twentieth century, tirailleurs sénégalais' deployed to North Africa, the Levant, Indochina, and Madagascar, where their exploits brought them into contact with other imperial populations. Tirailleurs sénégalais played crucial roles in assembling and disassembling French empire. The tirailleurs sénégalais provide a unique West African perspective of France's colonial empire that challenges national and French colonial readings of this colonial military institution. Tirailleurs sénégalais were colonial soldiers and intermediaries who experienced French colonialism unlike other colonized peoples. As employees of the colonial state, West African soldiers were often among the first populations to experience novel colonial policy. As soldiers, they implemented those policies in foreign colonial populations. However, these men were not simply the conveyors of colonialism. Their imperial assignments in colonial wars evidenced the importance of lateral exchanges of knowledge and experience between colonial populations linked together by France's presence. The tirailleurs sénégalais demonstrate that the core-periphery model of historicizing colonialism, where information and historical causality flow unidirectionally from the French metropole into its colonies, is limited in portraying how people experienced colonialism. The roles of women and wives in the tirailleurs sénégalais' history attest to the significance of cross-colonial exchange in the French colonial world. West African women followed their soldier/husbands to North Africa and Madagascar. Repatriating soldiers brought foreign wives home to French West Africa from Syria, Lebanon, and Indochina. Regardless of their origin or the setting of their interactions with soldiers, women affected the decisions that West African men made regarding their military service. By accounting for the importance of wives and marriage, this project also illustrates how women and soldiers challenged a secular colonial state to redefine marriage. Soldiers and wives convinced the colonial state to allot family allowances to polygynous Muslim West African soldiers. By emphasizing the importance of foreign women and cross-colonial exchange in the history of the tirailleurs sénégalais, this project problematizes histories of federal colonial institutions that are circumscribed by the boundaries of modern nation-states. Due to its composition and the range of its deployments, the tirailleurs sénégalais was an international enterprise. When shoehorned into the national history of a contemporary West African country, the tirailleurs sénégalais become a tool for interrogating French colonialism in that West African. These histories overemphasize the hand of France in the histories of West Africans and neglect the global influences on men who made French empire. When viewed through the lens of empire, the tirailleurs sénégalais also challenge the periodization of the colonial period. West Africans fought in the French-Algerian conflict after their home colonies were sovereign nations. The veterans of the tirailleurs sénégalais continue to rely on this historical relationship through the collection of their pensions. This project is informed by archival, published, and oral sources. They sources provide a nuanced understanding of the various worlds that tirailleurs sénégalais traipsed through in the twentieth century. The first half of this dissertation relies on French archival materials and published memoirs. These written sources were penned predominantly by French men, but the voices and agency of West African troops emerge in critical moments. These sources also portray French biases towards the tirailleurs sénégalais, as well as the ways in West African intermediaries contributed to French knowledge regarding their recruits. Roughly one hundred interviews conducted with veterans and their families inform the second half of this dissertation. Memory and oral history added complexity to the history presented by archival military documents. A source fraught with its own biases and omissions, veterans' memory of the past enriched this dissertation with anecdotal evidence. Their memories also illustrated how the fifty years since independence have influenced how they give importance particular events in their personal histories as soldiers and veterans. Living Beyond Boundaries chronologically, and geographically follows tirailleurs sénégalais' imperial engagements in Morocco, Syria-Lebanon, Indochina, Madagascar, and Algeria. The West Africans in this dissertation were soldiers in the employment of France and large-scale conflicts act as the chronological framing device of this dissertation. Each chapter takes place in different imperial locations, but each analyzes recurring themes that illustrate how West Africans experienced the French colonial military and how they maintained empire. Chapter One introduces tirailleurs sénégalais and situates them within several genres of historical literature and accounts for the institution's nineteenth-century history. Chapter Two analyzes their deployment in the Moroccan "pacification" campaign, between 1908 and 1914. Tirailleurs sénégalais' deployment in North Africa was an experiment that served as the springboard for subsequent deployments in French empire. The Moroccan campaign tested the adaptability of West African servicemen to military life in temperate climates, as well as challenged the French assumptions about their sub-Saharan African troops. The outbreak of the Great War brought the tirailleurs sénégalais to France. Chapter Three deals with pivotal legislation that reshaped the tirailleurs sénégalais. The Blaise Diagne Laws of 1915 and 1916 passed as result of the crises of the Great War. These laws secured citizenship for a minority of West Africans, who became obligated to service in the French military. The renegotiation of citizenship for military service led to the bifurcation of West African soldiers in the French Armed Forces--West African citizens served in the French metropolitan army and West African subjects in the tirailleurs sénégalais. Their experiences as soldiers diverged after the ratification of this legislation. After the armistice in 1918, tirailleurs sénégalais were diverted from France to serve in recently acquired French mandate territories--Syria and Lebanon. Chapter Four takes place in the interwar period, when the tirailleurs sénégalais' role in empire was redefined as they fought in small-scale conflicts in the Levant and Morocco. The financial crisis of the 1920s and 1930s negatively impacted the colonial military's effort to improve and professionalize the tirailleurs sénégalais. The "hollow years" witnessed important processes in thetirailleurs sénégalais. The French military's attempt to professionalize the tirailleurs sénégalais was also thwarted by their paradoxical move to reestablish racial hierarchy in empire. The outbreak of World War II brought schizophrenia, paranoia and fratricide to the tirailleurs sénégalais. Chapter Five studies the division of empire into factions aligned with Free France and Vichy France. The tirailleurs sénégalais existed on both sides of this divide and found themselves facing one another on the battlefields of Syria when Allied forces attacked Vichy forces there. French Indochina fell under the authority of neighboring Japan and West African soldiers relied on romantic relationships with Indochinese women to survive the war. The reversals of World War II encouraged postwar challenges to France's authority in several of its colonies. Tirailleurs sénégalais' participated in these events as colonizers and colonized peoples. The conclusion of hostilities in France were eclipsed by the Vietnamese Declaration of Independence. Chapter Six addresses the nine-year guerilla war in Indochina, where tirailleurs sénégalais found themselves overwhelmed by the intimacy and violence of close fighting quarters. This chapter is informed by veterans and their widows' memories, which illuminated the personal and psychological characteristics of this conflict. This was the first large-scale anti-colonial war where evidence suggests that tirailleurs sénégalais questioned their role in French colonialism. Deserters abandoned the French army for political reasons and for love. The romantic relationships between soldiers and Indochinese women led to the international migrations of inter-racial families to West Africa. West African communities dealt with the aftermath of the French-Indochinese Ware as their sons' families integrated into their households. After the conclusion of the Indochinese conflict in 1954, some tirailleurs sénégalais were redeployed immediately to the battlefields of Algeria. Chapter Seven uses the French-Algerian war as a backdrop for troops' demobilization and West Africa's decolonization. The French Constitutional Referendum in ...

Contesting French West Africa

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Author :
Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 1496202325
Total Pages : 436 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (962 download)

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Book Synopsis Contesting French West Africa by : Harry Gamble

Download or read book Contesting French West Africa written by Harry Gamble and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2017-09 with total page 436 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: After the turn of the twentieth century, schools played a pivotal role in the construction of French West Africa. But as this dynamic, deeply researched study reveals, the expanding school system also became the site of escalating conflicts. As French authorities worked to develop truncated schools for colonial "subjects," many African students and young elites framed educational projects of their own. Weaving together a complex narrative and rich variety of voices, Harry Gamble explores the high stakes of colonial education. With the disruptions of World War II, contests soon took on new configurations. Seeking to forestall postwar challenges to colonial rule, French authorities showed a new willingness to envision broad reforms, in education as in other areas. Exploiting the new context of the Fourth Republic and the extension of citizenship, African politicians demanded an end to separate and inferior schools. Contesting French West Africa critically examines the move toward educational integration that took shape during the immediate postwar period. Growing linkages to the metropolitan school system ultimately had powerful impacts on the course of decolonization and the making of postcolonial Africa.

The End of Empire in French West Africa

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Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1845206304
Total Pages : 285 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (452 download)

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Book Synopsis The End of Empire in French West Africa by : Tony Chafer

Download or read book The End of Empire in French West Africa written by Tony Chafer and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2002-06-01 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In an effort to restore its world-power status after the humiliation of defeat and occupation, France was eager to maintain its overseas empire at the end of the Second World War. Yet just fifteen years later France had decolonized, and by 1960 only a few small island territories remained under French control.The process of decolonization in Indochina and Algeria has been widely studied, but much less has been written about decolonization in France's largest colony, French West Africa. Here, the French approach was regarded as exemplary -- that is, a smooth transition successfully managed by well intentioned French politicians and enlightened African leaders. Overturning this received wisdom, Chafer argues that the rapid unfurling of events after the Second World War was a complex , piecemeal and unpredictable process, resulting in a 'successful decolonization' that was achieved largely by accident. At independence, the winners assumed the reins of political power, while the losers were often repressed, imprisoned or silenced.This important book challenges the traditional dichotomy between 'imperial' and 'colonial' history and will be of interest to students of imperial and French history, politics and international relations, development and post-colonial studies.

French West Africa

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 650 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (91 download)

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Book Synopsis French West Africa by : Virginia Thompson

Download or read book French West Africa written by Virginia Thompson and published by . This book was released on 1969 with total page 650 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Political Directions in Former French (West) African Colonies

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 13 pages
Book Rating : 4.:/5 (475 download)

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Book Synopsis Political Directions in Former French (West) African Colonies by : Jeremy W. Johnson

Download or read book Political Directions in Former French (West) African Colonies written by Jeremy W. Johnson and published by . This book was released on 1978 with total page 13 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recent events in Africa include wars on the Horn of Africa, Zaire and Angola. Cuban troops have been involved in the fighting and are stationed in other African states. The USSR and China have been competing for influence in Africa for some time. However, the formerly French West African states have not been the scene of these more dramatic events. This paper examines in some depth the development of this area. As a model, two former French colonies are examined in depth (Senegal and the Ivory Coast). (Author).

Colonial Suspects

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Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 1496206185
Total Pages : 368 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (962 download)

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Book Synopsis Colonial Suspects by : Kathleen Keller

Download or read book Colonial Suspects written by Kathleen Keller and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2018-04-01 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Vietnamese cook, a German journalist, and a Senegalese student--what did they have in common? They were all suspicious persons kept under surveillance by French colonial authorities in West Africa in the 1920s and 1930s. Colonial Suspects looks at the web of surveillance set up by the French government during the twentieth century as France's empire slipped into crisis. As French West Africa and the French Empire more generally underwent fundamental transformations during the interwar years, French colonial authorities pivoted from a stated policy of "assimilation" to that of "association." Surveillance of both colonial subjects and visitors traveling through the colonies increased in scope. The effect of this change in policy was profound: a "culture of suspicion" became deeply ingrained in French West African society. Kathleen Keller notes that the surveillance techniques developed over time by the French included "shadowing, postal control, port police, informants, denunciations, home searches, and gossip." This ad hoc approach to colonial surveillance mostly proved ineffectual, however, and French colonies became transitory spaces where a global cast of characters intermixed and French power remained precarious. Increasingly, French officials--in the colonies and at home--reacted in short-sighted ways as both perceived and real backlash occurred with respect to communism, pan-Africanism, anticolonialism, black radicalism, and pan-Islamism. Focusing primarily on the port city of Dakar (Senegal), Keller unravels the threads of intrigue, rumor, and misdirection that informed this chaotic period of French colonial history.

West African Transformations

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 308 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (91 download)

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Book Synopsis West African Transformations by : A. I. Asiwaju

Download or read book West African Transformations written by A. I. Asiwaju and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study arises from the need for comparative historical perspectives on the different styles of French and British colonialism, and the localised impacts of the regimes in West Africa. The work is broadly divided as: an overview, including a summary of new trends in African historiography; an examination of colonial methods; a study of socio-economic impact and the impact on indigenous political institutions and culture. A considerable part of the study addresses the question: How did the colonial styles of governance determine the post-colonial states? The author identifies a major point of divergence to be French centralising and assimilationist tendencies in education and the economy, as opposed to a British laissez-faire approach. This explains, in part, the uniformity in currency, language and culture which makes francophone Africa a distinctive cultural zone. Common concerns - which stem from the pre-colonial era - were mainly trade and trans-border co-operation. Pursuance of common goals, the author stipulates, paved the way for institutions of economic integration - e.g. ECOWAS.

The Acquisition of Africa (1870-1914)

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Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004321195
Total Pages : 364 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (43 download)

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Book Synopsis The Acquisition of Africa (1870-1914) by : Mieke van der Linden

Download or read book The Acquisition of Africa (1870-1914) written by Mieke van der Linden and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2016-10-05 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over recent decades, the responsibility for the past actions of the European colonial powers in relation to their former colonies has been subject to a lively debate. In this book, the question of the responsibility under international law of former colonial States is addressed. Such a legal responsibility would presuppose the violation of the international law that was applicable at the time of colonization. In the ‘Scramble for Africa’ during the Age of New Imperialism (1870-1914), European States and non-State actors mainly used cession and protectorate treaties to acquire territorial sovereignty (imperium) and property rights over land (dominium). The question is raised whether Europeans did or did not on a systematic scale breach these treaties in the context of the acquisition of territory and the expansion of empire, mainly through extending sovereignty rights and, subsequently, intervening in the internal affairs of African political entities.

Children of the French Empire

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Publisher : Clarendon Press
ISBN 13 : 0191589896
Total Pages : 218 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (915 download)

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Book Synopsis Children of the French Empire by : Owen White

Download or read book Children of the French Empire written by Owen White and published by Clarendon Press. This book was released on 1999-11-25 with total page 218 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book vividly recreates the lives of the children born of relationships between French men and African women from the time France colonized much of West Africa towards the end of the nineteenth century, until independence in 1960. Set within the context of the history of miscegenation in colonial French West Africa, the study focuses upon the lives and identities of the resulting mixed-race or métis population, and their struggle to overcome the handicaps they faced in a racially divided society. Owen White has drawn a valuable evaluation of the impact and importance of French racial theories, and offers a critical discussion of colonial policies in such areas as citizenship and education, providing original insights into problems of identity in colonial society.

The French Army and Its African Soldiers

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Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 0803253397
Total Pages : 280 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (32 download)

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Book Synopsis The French Army and Its African Soldiers by : Ruth Ginio

Download or read book The French Army and Its African Soldiers written by Ruth Ginio and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2017-01-01 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 7 Adjusting to a New Reality: The Army and the Imminent Independence -- Conclusion -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index

Citizenship between Empire and Nation

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Author :
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 1400850282
Total Pages : 513 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (8 download)

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Book Synopsis Citizenship between Empire and Nation by : Frederick Cooper

Download or read book Citizenship between Empire and Nation written by Frederick Cooper and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2014-07-21 with total page 513 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A groundbreaking history of the last days of the French empire in Africa As the French public debates its present diversity and its colonial past, few remember that between 1946 and 1960 the inhabitants of French colonies possessed the rights of French citizens. Moreover, they did not have to conform to the French civil code that regulated marriage and inheritance. One could, in principle, be a citizen and different too. Citizenship between Empire and Nation examines momentous changes in notions of citizenship, sovereignty, nation, state, and empire in a time of acute uncertainty about the future of a world that had earlier been divided into colonial empires. Frederick Cooper explains how African political leaders at the end of World War II strove to abolish the entrenched distinction between colonial "subject" and "citizen." They then used their new status to claim social, economic, and political equality with other French citizens, in the face of resistance from defenders of a colonial order. Africans balanced their quest for equality with a desire to express an African political personality. They hoped to combine a degree of autonomy with participation in a larger, Franco-African ensemble. French leaders, trying to hold on to a large French polity, debated how much autonomy and how much equality they could concede. Both sides looked to versions of federalism as alternatives to empire and the nation-state. The French government had to confront the high costs of an empire of citizens, while Africans could not agree with French leaders or among themselves on how to balance their contradictory imperatives. Cooper shows how both France and its former colonies backed into more "national" conceptions of the state than either had sought.

West Africa Under Colonial Rule

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Author :
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
ISBN 13 : 1000958116
Total Pages : 463 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (9 download)

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Book Synopsis West Africa Under Colonial Rule by : Michael Crowder

Download or read book West Africa Under Colonial Rule written by Michael Crowder and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2023-07-07 with total page 463 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originally published in 1968, this book became the standard work on the colonial period in the vast and varied areas of the coast and hinterland of West Africa. It is a comprehensive survey of the domination of West Africa by the British and the French, which challenges the accepted view of the colonialists that their rule was generally beneficial. Penetrating descriptions of the colonial economic system are given, and the quality of colonial administration is analysed, as well as the impact of two World Wars.