End Game South of the Sahara? France’s African Policy

Abstract

Paris has never stopped considering its African policy as simply an instrument within its power policy. From the imperial dream of the end of the nineteenth century to the orderly withdrawal of decolonization and, to the conservatory administration of cooperation, the continuity has been obvious. At least in the last two phases of this continuum, France has exercised its supremacy south of the Sahara as part of its effort to spread its interests on a world scale. The diplomatic clientele which Africa has provided — and more precisely, the set of votes that it brought her within the United Nations — had the advantage of guaranteeing its seat as a permanent member of the Security Council, of increasing the hearing of resolutions which it intended to have passed on world affairs and of protecting it from very massive attacks against nuclear tests or its pending problems of decolonization in the Pacific and Indian Ocean. More generally, the existence of a continental atmosphere of French predominance (as witnessed by the nebulae of French-speaking communities, the franc area and the Franco-African Summits) has for a long time increased the influence of the Elysée diplomacy, including diplomacy within the European field.

This chapter is taken, for the most part, from an article published in the journal Politique Internationale (56, Summer 1992) under the title: ‘France—Afrique: aider moins pour aider mieux’.