On Rulers of Empire

This is a pretty standard bureaucratic history, which exclusively studies the Corps of Colonial Administrators within the Ministry of Colonies, at the expense of all of the rest of France’s colonial bureaucracy. The bulk of the Corps of Colonial Administrators spent their time in French West Africa, with some in French Equatorial Africa, and a few scattered through Madagascar and the rest of the world (excluding Algeria, the French protectorates in North Africa, and the French mandates in the Eastern Mediterranean).

I was surprised to see the amount of latitude given to the Ecole Nationale de la France d’Outre-Mer (ENFOM) during World War II, which was in Occupied Paris but subject to the Vichy regime. As a result, neither Vichy nor Germany had full control over the school. Although the leader of the school was technically supposed to surveil students and send reports to Pétain, he didn’t, and a number of students were more sympathetic to De Gaulle. It’s also interesting to see here the alignment of France’s two sub-Saharan federations during the Second World War. In French West Africa, about 10% of the administrators were Gaullists and were purged from the administration; while in French Equatorial Africa, about 10% of the administrators were Vichyites and also purged from the administration. This falls quickly into “great man” history, as both subsets followed the chain of command closely—ultimately listening to their superiors (Pierre Boisson and Félix Eboué, respectively).

I wish there was some material on the North African colonies outside of the Ministry of Interior here (Morocco and Tunisia) to see how much latitude they had, falling under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs rather than the Ministry of Colonies, but Cohen does a decent job with what he has and, given the field of imperial history was currently in the process of imploding, it’s a pretty good job.