International audienceThis is an exercise in contemporary history that aims to give a comprehensive background and analysis to the current (2012) political crisis in Mali, generated by the start of a new Tuareg nationalist uprising against the state, complemented by a coordinated attack on the state by both international (AQIM) and local Jihadi–Salafi movements, leading to a coup d’état against the incumbent President Touré, and finallly a political stalemate of great concern to the international community. By pooling sources and analysis, a group of eight scholars tries to give a comprehensive overall picture
What was theindigénat? This article approaches this question via three arguments. First, a study of theindigénat(the regime of administrative sanctions applied to colonial subjects) challenges the idea that French West Africa formed part of an ‘empire of law’. Second, a dynamic spectrum of political statuses developed around theindigénatuntil its abolition in 1946. This spectrum is no less significant than one of its poles alone, that of colonial citizens. Third, theindigénat, its narrative of reform, and its relationship to law, bureaucracy, and authority illuminate the tensions between imperial rhetoric and colonial governance.
In the summer of 1996, when French policemen stormed Paris' Eglise Saint-Bernard, evicting dozens of African immigrants and activists who had taken refuge in the church, people in both France and West Africa surged with anger. Many of those immigrants had lived in France for years, often with an ambiguous legal and bureaucratic status (hence their moniker sans-papiers, those without papers), and they had occupied the church in order to demand the regularization of their status. 1 West African, French, and international protests of the high-handed and violent government action called on both universal and particular arguments to support the rights of the sans-papiers. Editorialists lambasted the French government for disregarding the "Rights of Man" and for forgetting the sacrifices of West African soldiers-the tirailleurs Sénégalais-in the defense of France. 2 While the discourse on "rights" made a universal claim, the second line of rhetorical attack was a particular one. The sans-papiers and their partisans have repeatedly invoked a language of patron/clientage and mutual obligation which emerged across the decades from an uneven dialogue between French military officers, colonial critics and administrators, and West African military veterans and political elites. Calling on the tirailleurs is almost always an act of historical memory, since none of the immigrants were themselves soldiers in the colonial army. Nevertheless, while the reference is usually abstract, on occasion it can be made in a very concrete fashion. Few commentators can speak with quite the same power as the former tirailleur Samba Fofana, who was forced into the army when his name was chosen from the tax-rolls of the colonial government: "For me, it's unforgettable because my children have no papers in France . . . they live there with great difficulty (péniblement) in Paris." 3 The presence in France of immigrants from the former African colonies is 362 0010-4175/03/362-385 $9.50
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.