Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-7cvxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T05:11:08.342Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Historical, Economic, and Political Bases of France's African Policy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 November 2008

Guy Martin
Guy Martin
Affiliation:
Visiting Lecturer, Diplomacy Training Programme, University of Nairobi.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

A Quarter of a century has elapsed since France granted independence to her former colonies in West and Central Africa. Yet to this day, France continues to wield considerable power and influence in these countries politically, economically, socially, and culturally, thanks to a tightly-knit network of formal and informal relations. France's African policy has been remarkably constant and stable through the various successive governments of the Fifth Republic. How can this persistent situation of dominance/dependency and this continuity in foreign policy be accounted for? More specifically, the present study tries to analyse the main characteristics and essential mechanisms of France/s post-colonial policy in Africa, all too often shrouded under a veil of secrecy, albeit premised on a number of historical factors for its ideological foundation. On this basis, a variety of economic and political interests have been developed which constitute the main elements of this policy and its principal explanatory variables. Eventually, it is concluded that a neo-colonial strategy has been adopted in order to preserve a status quo that is clearly favourable to the conservative interests of the western world in general, and to France in particular.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Modern African Studies , Volume 23 , Issue 2 , June 1985 , pp. 189 - 208
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1985

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Cohen, William B., The French Encounter with Africans: white response to blacks, 1530–1880 (Bloomington, 1980).Google Scholar

2 Memmi, Albert, Portrait du colonisé, précedé portrait du colonisateur (Paris, 1966), pp. 107–111 – translated by the author, as elsewhere in this article.Google Scholar

3 Lévy, Bernard-Henri, L'Idéologie française (Paris, 1981).Google Scholar

1 ‘All-African People's Conference, Cairo, March 23–31, 1961: Resolution on Neo-Colonialism’, in Legum, Colin, Pan-Africanism: a short political guide (London, 1962), p. 254.Google Scholar

2 Nkrumah, Kwame, Neo-Colonialism: the last stage of imperialism (London, 1965), p. xiii.Google Scholar

3 On this process, see Foltz, William J., From French West Africa to the Mali Federation (New Haven, 1964);Google Scholarde Benoist, Joseph-Roger, La Balkanisation de l'Afrique occidentale française (Paris, 1979);Google Scholar and N'diaye, Guédel, L'Échec de la fédération du Mali (Paris, 1980).Google Scholar

4 Bourgi, Albert, La Politique française de coopération en Afrique: le cas du Sénégal (Paris and Dakar, 1979), pp. 3 and 7.Google Scholar

1 Ibid. pp. 76–88.

1 Diop, Cheikh Anta, L'Unité culturelle de l'Afrique noire (Paris, 1960),Google Scholar and Les Fondements économiques et culturels d'un état fédéral d'Afrique noire (Paris, 1974, 2nd edn.).Google Scholar

3 Memmi, op. cit. p. 112.

1 For a fairly typical illustration of French public opinion and the media's idea of Africa, see Favilla, in Les Échos (Paris), 21 01 1983: ‘Africa is quite different from France… Democracy does not and cannot have the same persuasion there as in the European countries with an ancient humanist tradition… under these inhospitable climes where civilisation has hardly penetrated, the daily exercise of power does not allow for any weakness.’Google Scholar Quoted by Bayart, Jean-François, La Politique africaine de François Mitterand (Paris, 1984), p. 124.Google Scholar

In much the same vein Pierre Messmer, the former Minister of the Armed Forces, declared in May 1982: ‘To criticise the “personalisation” of political relations between France and Africa is to demonstrate one's ignorance of the African psychology’. Quoted in ibid. p. 120.

2 Lévy, op. cit.

3 Thus, there is some evidence that external interventions in the coups d'état which led to the murder of Sylvanus Olympio in Togo in 1963 and to the overthrow of Léon M'Ba in Gabon in 1964 were primarily motivated by French fears of the possible prevailing influences of the West Germans (Togo) and Americans (Togo and Gabon). See Bénot, Yves, ‘Vingt ans de “politique africaine”’, in La France contre l'Afrique/Tricontinental I (Paris, 1981), pp. 58–60;Google Scholar and Péan, Pierre, Affaires africaines (Paris, 1983), pp. 46–50.Google Scholar

4 Televised interview of Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, as reported in Le Monde (Paris), 29 January 1981.

1 Admiral Antoine Sanguinetti, ‘Les Interventions militaires françaises’, in La France contre l'Afrique, p. 96.

2 This seems to be the case of the military coups d'état which led to the overthrow (or elimination) of Presidents Modibo Kéïta in Mali (19 November 1968), Hamani Diori in Niger (15 April 1974), Marien Ngouabi in Congo (18 March 1977), Ali Soilih in Comoros (13 May 1978), Moktar Ould Daddah in Mauritania (10 July 1978), and ‘Emperor’ Jean-Bedel Bokassa in the Central African Republic (21 September 1979). The same applies to the ‘quasi-coup d'état’ which resulted in the temporary neutralisation of Captain Thomas Sankara in Burkina Faso on the very day that Guy Penne (France's main presidential adviser on African affairs) arrived for an official visit to that country (17 May 1983).

3 Le Monde, 29 January 1981.

1 Masquet, Brigitte, ‘France-Afrique: dépasser les contradictions’, in Afrique contemporaine (Paris), 119, 01 1982, p. 16.Google Scholar

2 Antoine Bouillon, ‘Du Bon usage de l'apartheid’, in La France contre l'Afrique, pp. 206–7.

3 Thus, it is the French firm FRAMATOME which provided the equipment and technology necessary for the construction of phase I of the Koeberg nuclear power plant in South Africa. Phase II is now under way after the Mitterand Government gave its tacit approval. On this point, as on franco-South African relations in general, see Whiteman, Kaye, ‘President Mitterand and Africa’, in African Affairs (London), 82, 328, 07 1983, pp. 331–2.Google Scholar

4 Bouillon, loc.cit. p. 208.

5 Statement by Lionel Jospin, Secretary-General of the Socialist Party, 20 May 1981, quoted in Bayart, op.cit. pp. 24–5.

6 Press conference given by President François Mitterand in Yaoundé on 21 June 1983, while on a state visit to Cameroun (20–21 June 1983). This statement is obviously in contradiction with the recent government-authorised Koeberg II deal which, indeed, relates to a particularly ‘suspicious’ matter!

1 Much the same argument is made by Bayart, op. cit. p. 52, who goes as far as to assert that it was, in fact, Mitterand himself who initiated a ‘new deal’ for Africa when he became Minister for Overseas French Territories in 1954: ‘The real continuity actually starts with M Mitterand and is passed on to General de Gaulle and to his successors’. See also Whiteman, loc. cit.

2 de Guiringaud, Louis, ‘La Politique africaine de la France’, in Politique étrangère (Paris), 2 06 1982, p. 443.Google Scholar

3 Le Monde, 29 January 1981.

4 Diagne, Pathé, ‘Mitterand, la gauche, l'Afrique et le tiers-monde’, in Peuples noirs/peuples africains (Paris), 27, 05 1982, p. 6.Google Scholar

1 ‘L'Afrique: un partenaire indispensable’, in Actuel développement (Paris), 36, 05 1980, pp. 39–40.Google Scholar

2 Figures taken from Owen, A. D., ‘The World Uranium Industry’, in Raw Materials Report (Stockholm), 2, 4, 1984, pp. 6–23;Google Scholar Libération-Afrique, ‘Les Particules de Giscard: l'uranium africain’, in La France contre l'Afrique, pp. 144–6; and ‘La France et l'Afrique’, in Marchés tropicaux et méditerranées (Paris), 2041, 21 12 1984, p. 3169.Google Scholar

1 Péan, op. cit. pp. 42–3. The other main source for this information is Bourgi, op. cit. p. 99.

2 ‘La France et l'Afrique’, p. 3168.

1 Ibid. pp. 3169 and 3175.

2 Ibid. p. 3179. Development Co-operation: 1984 Review (Paris, 1984), p. 210. These figures, according to the newly-adopted computation system, exclude overseas districts and territories.Google Scholar

4 Messine, Philippe, ‘Nord-Sud: la gauche an I’, in Coopération et dépendances/Critiques de l'économie politique (Paris), 20, 07 1982, p. 25.Google Scholar

5 Joseph, Richard, ‘The Gaullist Legacy: patterns of French neo-colonialism’, in Review of African Political Economy (Sheffield), 6, 05 1976, p. 9.Google Scholar

6 Berthelot, Yves and de Bandt, Jacques, Impact des relations avec le tiers-monde sur l'économie française (Paris, 1982), p. 43. The ‘rate of return’ is a measure of the percentage of FF100 of aid which actually ‘returns’ to France in the form of purchases of goods and services from that country.Google Scholar

7 Development Co-operation: 1984 Review, pp. 219–20.

1 Geographical Distribution of Financial Flows to Developing Countries, 1980/1983 (Paris, 1984), various tables.Google Scholar

2 Hugon, Philippe, ‘L'Afrique noire francophone: l'enjeu économique pour la France’, in Politique africaine (Paris), 5, 02 1982, p. 88.Google Scholar

3 Edmond Jouve, ‘L'Afrique, enjeu mondial: le rôle de la France’, in La France contre l'Afrique, p. 82.

4 On this point, see Patrick, and Guillaumont, Sylviane, Zone franc et développement africain (Paris, 1984);Google ScholarMartin, Guy, ‘The Franc Zone: underdevelopment and dependency in francophone Africa’, 13th World Congress of the International Political Science Association,Paris,15–20 July 1985;Google Scholar and Yansané, Aguibou Y., ‘Some Problems of Monetary Dependency in French-Speaking West African States’, in Journal of African Studies (Los Angeles), 5, 4, Winter 1978–1979, pp. 444–70.Google Scholar

1 These and other problems raised by the functioning of the franc-zone system for the African member-states are examined in some detail in Martin, loc. cit. 1985.

2 It is interesting to note that Penne's deputy is none other than Jean-Christophe Mitterand, the President's son. As is often said in France, African affairs are truly ‘family affairs’!

1 Cf. Bayart, op. cit. p. 48, for an unequivocal statement by Mitterand during his state visit to Gabon in January 1983: ‘It is I who determine France's foreign policy, not my Ministers… The Ministers are allowed to think or to have an opinion… It is unthinkable that a policy could be implemented without my agreement, let alone my initiative’. This state of affairs has been confirmed by a recent report in Africa Confidential (London), 26, 2, 16 01 1985, p. 8: ‘Rarely during the Fifth Republic has decision-making in African affairs been so concentrated in the hands of the Elysée. Indeed President François Mitterand has now taken personal charge of the Chad dossier. The foreign ministry and the ministry of cooperation are virtually bystanders.Google Scholar Mitterand consults a small group of advisers and takes all the main decisions.’ On the principle of the ‘reserved competence’ of the Presidency in African affairs, see Nouaille-Degorce, Brigitte, La Politique française de coopération avec les états africain et malgache au sud du Sahara, 1958–1978 (Bordeaux, 1982), pp. 104–55.Google Scholar

2 Péan, op. cit.

3 On this episode, see Bayart, op. cit. pp. 37–48; also Cot, Jean-Pierre, A l'Épreuve de pouvoir: le tiers-mondisme, pour quoi faire? (Paris, 1984).Google Scholar

4 Messine, loc. cit. p. 15. On this point, see also Whiteman, loc. cit. pp. 335–6.

5 The 10th Conference of the French and African Heads of State and Government was held in Vittel, France, 2–4 October 1983, with 39 participants. The 11th summit, held in Bujumbura, Burundi, 11–12 December 1984, brought together 35 participants.

1 Thus, there have been 32 state visits to Africa by French Heads of State between 1960 and 1978 (9 by President Mitterand since May 1981), and 280 meetings between the latter and their African counterparts during the same period. In addition, during the period 1959 to 1978, the number of visits of all kinds (official or private) by certain African Heads of State is impressive: 47 for Félix Houphouët-Boigny (Ivory Coast), 32 for Léopold Sédar Senghor (Senegal), and 16 for Moktar Ould Daddah (Mauritania), to mention just a few. Nouaille-Degorce, op. cit. pp. 463–5.

2 On this point, see Touré, Abdou, La Civilisation quotidienne en Côte d'Ivoire: procès d'occidentalisation (Paris, 1981).Google Scholar

3 Bourgi, op. cit. pp. 205–6 and 224–6. Thus in the Ivory Coast to this day, the Principal Secretary to the Presidency, the Government's Secretary-General, and the Head of State's Personal Secretary, are all French; see Libération Afrique-Caraïbe-Pacifique (Paris), 18, 10 1983, p. 28.Google Scholar

1 Thus, the Malagasy journalist Sennen Andriamirado recently declared with conviction: ‘The futility of debating African affairs among Africans has now become clear. In order to prevent intra-African conflicts, the Africans must necessarily call on France’. ‘Comment éviter les guerres?’, in Jeune Afrique (Paris), 12 10 1983, p. 49.Google Scholar

2 On this issue, the most authoritative sources are: Chaigneau, Pascal, La Politique militaire de la France en Afrique (Paris, 1984);Google ScholarLuckham, Robin, ‘French Militarism in Africa’, in Review of African Political Economy, 24, 05 1982, pp. 55–84; and Sanguinetti, loc. cit. pp. 94–104.Google Scholar

3 As of 1 January 1984, France had concluded defence agreements with five countries (Cameroun, Central African Republic, Gabon, the Ivory Coast, and Senegal) and military technical assistance agreements with 17 others (the same as above, plus Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Chad, Congo, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Rwanda, Togo, and Zaïre). Chaigneau, op. cit. annexes 7 and 8, pp. 113–14.

4 Chaigneau, ibid. p. 114. It should be noted that an additional 3,000 French troops were stationed in Chad during the period August 1983 to September 1984, following operation ‘Manta’. Some sources estimate that about one-third of this force may have been based at Bouar in the Central African Republic, from where they could be sent back to Chad at short notice, should the need arise. Coleman, Fred, ‘Mitterand's Chad Strategy’, in Newsweek (New York), 24 12 1984, p. 9.Google Scholar

1 The list of these interventions is as follows: Gabon (1964); Chad (1968, 1975, 1978, 1980, 1983); Djibouti (1967, 1974, 1976, 1977); Mayotte (1977, 1978); Mauritania (1956–63, 1977, 1978, 1980); Central African Republic (1979); and Zaïre (1977, 1978). Chaigneau, op. cit. pp. 93–100.

2 Televised interview with Giscard d'Estaing, reported in Le Monde, 29 January 1981.

3 Letter from François Mitterand to Libération Afrique, dated April 1981, quoted in Libération Afrique-Caraïbe-Pacifique, 14, September 1982, p. 28.

4 Quoted in Messine, loc. cit. p. 24.

5 As Luckham cogently remarks, loc. cit. p. 56, ‘The presence of French troops and military advisers, the consolidation and reproduction of national military structures through external support and the transmission through military training of metropolitan skills, tastes and ideologies constitute a permanent intervention’.

1 Ibid. pp. 68–71.

2 Televised interview of Giscard d'Estaing after the French military intervention in Kolwesi (Zaïre), quoted in Thomas Jallaud, ‘La Coopération militaire, outil de contrôle’, in La France contre l'Afrique, p. 105.

3 Guiringaud, loc. cit. p. 443. It is interesting to note in this regard that the French socialists have a similar view on this issue. Thus, according to Cot, op. cit. p. 38, ‘[Africa]… constitutes a territory matching our resources and which we have a duty to develop’.

4 Luckham, loc.cit. p. 77.

1 Ibid, p. 78.

2 Leguébe, Jacques, L'Afrique du sud contemporaine (Paris, 1978), p. 205.Google Scholar

3 It is such motivations which explain the French secret destabilisation actions against the M.P.L.A. in Angola during 1975–6, as well as successive interventions in Zaïre in 1977 and 1978. Luckham loc. cit., Table II, p. 61.

1 Golan, Tamar, ‘A Certain Mystery: how can France do everything that it does in Africa - and get away with it?’, in African Affairs, 80, 318, 01 1981, pp. 3–11.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Engels, Friedrich, ‘The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State’, in Feuer, L. S. (ed.), Marx and Engels: basic writings on politics and philosophy (New York, 1959), p. 394.Google Scholar