French Development Aid and
Co-operation under de Gaulle
G É R A R D B O S S U A T
French aid was part of the general process of decolonisation by France and other
powers in the 1950s. It was during the particularly eventful period of Charles
de Gaulle’s presidency that the process was completed, with the creation of the
Communauté Franco-Africaine in 1959 and the granting of independence to former
French colonies in sub-Saharan Africa from 1960 onwards, while Algeria gained
its independence in July 1962. The new relationships to be created by mutual
consent between France and the newly independent states required some form of
‘voluntary’ financial aid, to be funded by the French government and managed
using tried and tested financial instruments left over from colonial times, equipped
with new names, and with French staff being progressively replaced by Africans.
The administration of technical assistance passed from the old Ministry for Overseas
Territories to the new Department of Co-operation, but aid was also contributed by
other ministries, including Education, the Interior, Post and Telecommunications,
and Defence. Almost all of this aid was directed towards sub-Saharan Africa and the
French-speaking countries. The European Economic Community (EEC) treaty of
25 March 1957 also envisaged giving aid from the European Overseas Development
Fund. A good deal of this was dispensed by the French financial authorities which
also handled the French aid. As Raymond Aron noted, decolonisation ought to
have provided France with a good opportunity to reassess the aid being granted to
its former colonies. This aid was not reduced.1 Why it was not is an intriguing
question. In this article I shall examine the functioning of French overseas aid and its
geographical context,2 and attempt to explain the impact of this foreign aid on both
donor and recipients: did aid really foster economic and social development?
What is aid?
All of the available sources stress the extreme difficulty of identifying what kind of
foreign aid was granted, and in what amounts. Government loans were channelled
1
Raymond Aron, ‘Dégagement et Communauté’, Le Figaro (22 Sept. 1961).
Sources: Archives de la Documentation Française, 29–31 quai Voltaire, Paris 7. These sources
comprise journal and newspaper articles from France, Africa and elsewhere, filed under FAC 1959–76
and CCCE.
2
C 2003 Cambridge University Press
Contemporary European History, 12, 4 (2003), pp. 431–456 DOI: 10.1017/S096077730300136X Printed in the United Kingdom
432
Contemporary European History
into a number of different departmental budgets,3 which means that it was – and
has remained ever since – hard to discern how much money was actually allocated.4
Accounting is also a problem. Should development aid be taken to include funds
allocated to the French Overseas Departments (Départements Français d’OutreMer – DOM)? That would scarcely be logical, given that these departments are part
of the territory of the French Republic, and yet Algeria prior to 1962 comprised a
number of French departments, but public investment was channelled through the
extraordinary development aid budget.
The Development Assistance Committee (DAC) of the Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) lumps together all government
aid, whether multilateral or bilateral, all private aid and even, until recently, loans to
DOMs and TOMs (Territoires Françaises d’Outre-Mer) as ‘development aid’.5 DAC
figures include government credits to promote growth (personal loans, subsidies,
direct loans) and finance from public authorities (as the Caisse Centrale de Coopération Économique – CCCE), civil and war pensions paid in Africa, and the
costs of the French presence abroad (embassies, upkeep of French military bases).6
They include all net private capital flows (loans and investments) and private
export credits backed by insurance/export credits from COFACE (Compagnie
Française d’Assurance pour le Commerce Extérieur – French Foreign Trade
Insurance Company).7 But in reality development aid has little in common with
budget stabilisation subsidies or military aid. And although private investment is
as development aid, nobody would think that French private investment in the
3
Henry Didier, ‘Aide accordée en 1959 par la France au développement des autres Etats de la
Communauté, des TOM et DOM’, Communautés et Continents, 7 ( July–Sept. 1960).
4
The French development aid programme remains singularly opaque, and the true figures are
a mystery. The Observatoire permanent de la coopération française (OPCF) noted: ‘All in all, the
government has virtual carte blanche to dole out public money’. See ‘Le mystère des chiffres ou l’opacité
du système français d’aide au développement’, OPCF, Rapport 1995 (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1995).
5
Both DOMs and TOMs are legally part of the French Republic.
6
Two remarks: French francs issued before 1 Jan. 1960 are named ‘old francs’; after that date they
were replaced by ‘new franc’ (FF), whose value equals 100 old francs (external value: 180 milligrammes
fine gold for a new franc). The official currency of the independent African countries was the CFA
franc (CFA – Communauté Financière Africaine/African Financial Community); $1 = 245 CFA francs.
One CFA franc was equivalent to 0.02 French francs from 1960 until 11 Jan. 1994, when the CFA franc
was devalued to 0.01 French francs. Most amounts given in this article are in current French francs, but I
occasionally cite amounts in dollars. The value of the French franc in dollars is as follows: 1944 – $1 = 50
old francs; 1958 – $1 = 420 old francs; 1960 – $1 = FF 4.2; 1968 – $1 = FF 4.9; 1969 – $1 = FF 5.2.
The purchasing power of the French franc can be estimated, according to INSEE (Institut national de la
Statistiques et des études économiques), as follows:
Year
1959
1960
1961
1962
1963
1964
7
Value of FF1 in euros (2002)
Year
Value of FF1 in euros (2002)
0.01358
1965
1.08922
1.31029
1966
1.06065
1.26838
1967
1.03251
1.21014
1968
0.98792
1.15477
1969
0.92804
1.11638
1970
0.88204
Simone Malet-Buisson, ‘La politique française de coopération’, L’Economie, 979 (22 Oct. 1965), 13.
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
433
United States or Germany should come into that category. Should aid granted
as a contribution to expenditure by newly independent states on the exercise of
sovereignty, with the aim of demonstrating national unity, be counted as development
aid? In principle it should not, but it has to be put under this heading because it is
a prerequisite for the subsequent success of investment in the national infrastructure
(transport, communication, energy, management of natural resources, etc.) and in
human resources and activities, and in productive investment in growth.
The colonial inheritance
Bilateral government aid ensured that action that had been begun at the time of
the Union Française continued, but in a different spirit. ‘France [is changing] from
the outdated colonial system to a system of fruitful and friendly co-operation’, said
General de Gaulle on 20 December 1960. He had the originality to accept the
consequences of independence and develop a policy of co-operation on the basis
of equality. In 1964 the then Prime Minister, Georges Pompidou, declared that
‘the policy of co-operation follows on from the expansionist policies of nineteenthcentury Europe, when vast colonial empires were created or extended and Europe
made its economic and political influence felt over an enormous area’.8 There were
also references to ‘aid’; the term ‘assistance’ is not commonly used in French.9 ‘Cooperation’ denoted a new approach in foreign policy, and as such attracted sustained
attention at the highest government levels. It became part of the President’s own
particular purview under the watchful guardianship of a devoted Gaullist, Jacques
Foccart.10 For as long as it lasted, this approach precluded any public debate on
co-operation. Until 1975 all co-operation budgets were simply rubber-stamped by
the National Assembly.
The policy of co-operation, particularly in Africa, was based on hand-outs
which caused serious distortions: dependency, clientelism, irresponsibility. In part
this is the result of history. Hand-outs were a sine qua non of effective decolonisation.11
8
‘Débats à l’Assemblée Nationale’, Journal Officiel (11 Jun. 1964).
Discussion in ‘Technical and cultural co-operation’, Confluent, Vol. 1: ‘Etudes’, nos. 29–31 (March–
May 1963), 226–318.
10
Jacques Foccart’s familiarity with Africa began in 1937. In 1952 he became an advisor to the assembly
of the Union Française, and in 1958 a technical advisor to the general secretariat of the President’s office.
In 1961 he was appointed general secretary to the presidency of the Communauté franco-africaine and
secretary for African and Madagascan affairs. He remained in office under Pompidou but was pensioned
off by Giscard. His published works include Tous les soirs avec de Gaulle, Vol. 1 (Paris: Fayard/Jeune
Afrique, 1997) and Foccart parle, entretiens avec Philippe Gaillard (Paris: Fayard/Jeune Afrique, 1997). He
died in March 1997. On the recent vagaries of French foreign policy in Africa, see the hard-hitting book
by François-Xavier Verschave, La Francafrique, le plus long scandale de la République (Paris: Stock, 1999).
11
See the report by Alain Barrau, filed at the Assemblée Nationale by the Commission des Finances,
de l’économie générale et du Plan sur la réforme de la Co-opération on 26 Sept. 2001.
9
434
Contemporary European History
Muddled ministries
When the Communauté Franco-Africaine replaced the Union Française on 1 January
1959, the Overseas Ministry (Ministère de la France d’Outre-Mer) was replaced by
an Interministerial Council for Aid and Co-operation between the Republic and
the other States of the Community, reporting to the prime minister. The latter
was responsible for supervising ‘economic, financial, cultural and social aid and cooperation’ vis-à-vis the African ex-colonies.12 But a spate of colonies gained their
independence in 1960 and a Ministry for Co-operation was set up on 10 June 1961. It
assumed responsibility for aid and co-operation missions in sub-Saharan Africa13 and
for the Aid and Co-operation Fund (Fonds d’Aide et de Co-opération – FAC) which
was to foster development in the new countries through investment subsidies. It was
seen as the ‘aid ministry’ for the fourteen sub-Saharan African countries that had
emerged from the former French empire. At times this ministry was independent,
at others (1966–74, 1981–6) it was subordinated to the Quai d’Orsay. In the early
years (1959–66) co-operation was directed successively by Robert Lecourt,14 Georges
Gorse15 and Raymond Triboulet.16 In 1966 the Prime Minister, Georges Pompidou,
reorganised aid administration so that overall responsibility passed to the Foreign
Minister, Maurice Couve de Murville, supported by Jean de Broglie as secretary
of state for sub-Saharan Africa and Jean Charbonnel as secretary of state for cooperation. This put de Murville in charge of Algerian affairs. The change is taken
to mark the end of the post-colonial period, since by now all foreign relations had
been taken over by the Foreign Office.17 However, each department retained its own
budget although overall policy was directed by the ministry. The Finance Ministry
was still the first port of call for the big international development agencies, the
International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. The Quai d’Orsay, the
Ministry for Co-operation and the Finance Ministry jointly controlled the CCCE.18
The ministries of education and of the interior, the prime minister’s department and
the ministries of public works and transport (the air transport safety agency), post and
telecommunications, and defence all contributed to the financing of aid. This makes
it difficult to put an exact overall figure on French development aid.
12
Decree of 27 March 1959.
Decree of 25 July 1959.
14
Robert Lecourt was a lawyer.
15
Georges Gorse taught in Egypt before becoming under-secretary of state for Islamic affairs in the
Léon Blum government (end-1946–early 1947) and for France Overseas in Georges Bidault’s government
in 1949. He was an advisor to the Union Française from 1952 to 1958 and French ambassador to Tunisia
from 1957 to 1959.
16
Raymond Triboulet was an agriculturalist and was Minister for War Veterans in the Fourth and
Fifth Republics. His knowledge of Africa was slight.
17
Europe-France-Outre-Mer, Jan. 1966.
18
See no. 46, Sénat: Session ordinaire de 2001–2002. Annexe au procès-verbal de la séance du
30 October 2001. ‘Rapport d’information fait au nom de la commission des Affaires étrangères, de la
défense et des forces armées sur la réforme de la coopération’, by the senators Guy Penne, Paulette
Brisepierre and André Dulait.
13
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
435
Figure 1. The delivery of French aid to developing countries
Note: Based on Simone Malet-Buisson, ‘La politique française de coopération’, l’Economie, 979 (22 Oct. 1965).
Publicly funded development aid: original instruments
The Investment Fund for the Social and Economic Development of the Overseas
Territories (Fonds d’Investissement pour le Développement Economique et Social
des Territoires d’Outre-mer – FIDES) and the Investment Fund for the Overseas
Departments (Fonds d’Investissements des Départements d’Outre-mer – FIDOM),
set up in 1946, were the intervention funds of the Union Française, supplemented
from the budgets of various French ministries. When the Union Française was
abolished in 1959, the funds were passed on to the French DOMs and TOMs (usually
lumped together as the DOM TOM). Between 1946 and 1959 France spent a total of
937 billion old francs, including 222 billion in development loans.19 Of this total, the
FIDES poured over 600 billion old francs into basic social and economic infrastructure
in sub-Saharan Africa.20 The FIDOM spent 70 billion. Sub-Saharan Africa accounted
for 95 per cent of all the FIDES funds. On 1 January 1959, FIDES was replaced by
the FAC.
The France Overseas Central Fund for Co-operation (Caisse Centrale de Coopération de la France d’Outre-Mer, CCFOM), created on 2 February 1944, was
designated in 1946 as the development bank for the TOMs, Cameroon and Togo. It
19
Communautés et Continents, 7 (July–Sept. 1960).
Equivalent to 6 billion new (1960) francs. Owing to the rise in the value of the franc, it was
calculated in 1958 that these 600 billion francs now had the purchasing power of 750 billion.
20
436
Contemporary European History
Table 1. Cumulative investments by CCFOM since 19461
1946–1960
FF million
Loans to African finance companies
Loans from African finance companies
Loans from property investment companies aided by CCFOM in Africa
Loans to electricity companies set up with aid of CCFOM in Africa
CCFOM loans to local communities (long-term African loans at 2.5 per cent)
Loans to African companies
Direct and indirect financial aid to TOMs
Direct and indirect financial aid to DOMs (the ‘old colonies’)
172.6
683.6
139.6
360.0
470.0
725.6
145.0
393.2
Source: L’Economie 785 (20 Jul. 1961); Bulletin de l’Afrique Noire (BAN ), 839 (15 Oct. 1975).
1 This overestimates the amount of aid provided by CCFOM, because it includes local savings, which do
not count as credit transfers from metropolitan France.
conducted financial operations on behalf of FIDES, FIDOM and the development
fund for the countries of former Indochina. It could also use its own funds.
The new financial instruments
Subsequent to the co-operation agreements between France, the African
countries and Madagascar, France conveyed its aid by way of new financial instruments.
The FAC distributed the available budget aid credits (from the budget of the
Ministry for Co-operation) among the countries of the Communauté FrancoAfricaine and to the new countries which succeeded them. The first meeting of
the FAC took place on 28 August 1959. Its investment programme was decided
by France and the assisted countries. The ministries prepared investment plans with
the support of twelve specialist agencies.21 FAC financed development aid, cultural
co-operation and personnel offering technical assistance. Its aid was tied to purchases
in the franc zone.22
Recipients of funds included applied research instruments such as the Office
de recherche scientifique et technique de l’Outre-mer (ORSTOM),23 the Mining
21
Including the Agricultural Development Bureau, the Geological and Mining Research Bureau, the
Central Research Bureau for Overseas Infrastructure, The Central Overseas Railway Office, the Overseas
Post and Telecommunications Research Bureau, etc.
22
Bulletin de l’Afrique noire (BAN), 526 (30 Oct. 1968).
23
The FAC funded a number of public and private research institutes including the Research Institute
for Oils and Oil-Bearing Plants (IRHO), the Fruits and Citrus Research Institute (IRFA) and the
Rubber Research Institute (IRCA), all set up in 1942, and also the Tropical Countries Stockbreeding
and Veterinary Medicine Institute (IEMVT, 1948), the Technical Centre for Tropical Forestry (CTFT,
created officially at the beginning of 1950), the Cotton and Exotic Textiles Research Institutes (IRCT),
the French Institute for Coffee, Cocoa and Other Stimulant Plants (IFCC, beginning of 1958), the
Institute for Research into Tropical Agronomics and Glasshouse Cultivation (IRAT, 1960) and the
Centre for Research and Experiment in Tropical Agricultural Machinery (CEEMAT). In 1984 all these
institutes were brought under the umbrella of the Centre for International Co-operation in Agronomic
Development Research (CIRAD), based in Montpellier.
1960
1961
1962
1963
1964
1965
1966
142.62
435.55
2.50
290.00
26.82
122.06
1019.55
FF million
FAC band IIIa
FAC band IVb
FAC band Vc
FAC band VId
ORSTOM
Aid to national armed forces
Total FAC
a Research
41.00
410.00
5.50
541.00
40.30
460.00
3.50
547.00
130.30
497.00
6.00
446.00
147.00
567.00
6.00
379.00
160.50
556.80
5.00
315.00
164.00
502.55
3.00
200.00
0
997.50
0
1050.80
0
1079.30
0
1099.00
0
1037.30
79.01
948.56
institutes, AT, grants and courses, cultural action.
assistance and budget subsidies to governments.
c French investments: cultural centres, permanent aid and co-operation missions (MPACs).
d Government investments, payment credits.
∗ Approximation.
Source: Simone Malet-Buisson, ‘La politique française de coopération’, L’Economie 979 (22 Oct. 1965), 13.
b Technical
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
Table 2. Distribution of FAC credits, 1960–1966
437
438
Contemporary European History
Figure 2. Use of FAC funds, 1960−1964
Source: Simone Malet-Buisson, ‘La politique française de coopération’, L’Economie, 979 (22 Oct. 1965), and
Bulletin de l’Afrique noire (BAN), 389 (20 Oct. 1965).
Office of France Overseas, the Niger Office and the budgets of the new countries.24
FAC funded development projects in agriculture, sanitation, highway maintenance,
universities and schools, ports, roads and aerodromes.
FAC credits (band VI) were paid at government level. These tended to diminish,
but those from the European Development Fund (EDF), which had the same purpose,
seem to have increased correspondingly. From 1970 onwards, France’s policy of
austerity put a curb on FAC credits, a change deplored by Jeune Afrique because of
the great value of its contribution to the new countries.25
The main function of the CCCE, which succeeded CCFOM on 12 January 1960,
was to bankroll the FAC. It also managed the national fund for the regularisation of
prices for overseas products and the support fund for overseas textiles. It granted loans
for development projects out of its own funds or borrowed them from the Caisse des
Dépôts et Consignation. In 1964, its loans totalled 147.9 million francs.
The EDF and the European Investment Bank (EIB) had been contributing to
publicly funded aid since 1958.26 The EDF was set up by the six member states of
the European Economic Community (EEC), on French insistence, as a pay-off for
the opening of Union Française markets to other EEC member states.
24
Republic of Central Africa, Republic of Congo, Republic of Gabon, Republic of Madagascar,
Republic of Senegal, Republic of Chad, Republic of Upper Volta, Islamic Republic of Mauritania,
Republic of Mali, Republic of Togo, Republic of Ivory Coast, Republic of Cameroon and Republic of
Benin (the Republic of Guinea declined to join the Co-operation).
25
Jeune Afrique (22–28 Oct. 1969).
26
Interafrique Presse, 346 (15 Feb. 1966).
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
439
Figure 3. The use of loans from the second EDF in 1966
Source: Bulletin de l’Afrique noire (BAN), 526 (30 Oct. 1968), report of the Commission des finances, co-operation
budget for 1969 presented by A. G. Voisin.
The former French overseas territories did exceedingly well out of the EDF loans.
The EDF had lent the African countries 610 million francs by 1961.27 Another source
shows that 384 projects were financed out of the first EDF for only $370 million
(FF 1,850 million). The second EDF was opened subsequent to the signature of
partnership agreements between the newly independent African countries, former
overseas territories of the EEC countries, at Yaoundé on 20 July 1963.
The sources show that French undertakings received 80 per cent of the EDF
contracts on the African deals. Competition ensued between French and EDF
finance, with the result that, for example, two deep-water ports were built very
close together, at Cotonou and Lomé, and similarly two competing cement works
at Malbaza in Niger and Sokoto in Nigeria. The EDF effectively financed state-ofthe-art projects which flattered the vanity of the European donors. The FAC was to
finance agricultural development, the EDF industrialisation and communications. In
response to this, the rapporteur on the 1969 aid law called on France to draw attention
to its efforts by ‘marking the country of origin very prominently on all equipment’.28
The rapporteur approved of the renewal of the Yaoundé agreements, while pointing
out certain difficulties such as punitive EEC taxation on African chocolate products
by reason of their milk content. He called loudly for the EEC to reintroduce price
support in the next EDF.29
Having explained the means by which the aid was conveyed, we can now draw
some preliminary conclusions as to the effectiveness of the transfers. First, the figures
tell us nothing about how far officials from the assisted countries participated in the
mechanisms of the FAC, CCCE or EDF. There was certainly some co-operation,
but the agencies controlling the aid were those of the former colonial power and the
27
According to ‘French expenditure in Africa’, Les Echos (30 Oct. 1961).
BAN, 526 (30 Oct. 1968), report by finance commission, co-operation budget for 1969, introduction
by A. Voisin.
29
Ibid.
28
Contemporary European History
440
Table 3. Total aid as a percentage of GNP
1956
1959
1960
1961
1962
1963
1964
1967
1969
1970
1.56
1.16
1.22
1.34
per cent GNP
Total French aid
2.03
2.33
2.15
2.16
1.86
1.47
Note: These figures are not, of course, derived by averaging out the figures in the sources, but by comparing
them. Figures that appear consistently in all the sources have been retained. Sources: Industries et Travaux d’Outremer (March 1972), La Correspondance Economique (7 Nov. 1963), Le Monde (6–7 March 1966); BAN, 678 (9 Feb.
1972); a series of comments on GNP/Aid ratios in the Jeanneney report, La politique de co-opération avec les pays
en voie de développement, La Documentation Française Illustrée, 201 (special number, Nov. 1964), 82.
Table 4. French aid to underdeveloped countries, 1960–70 (value)
1960
1961
1962
1963
1964
1966
1967
1968
1969
1970
3.829
0.246
4.075
2.546
6.621
3.975
0.238
∗
4.213
4.179
8.392
4.442
0.495
∗
4.937
3.893
8.83
4.713
0.572
∗
5.285
4.607
9.892
FF billion
Government aid
Bilateral
Multilateral
Total
Total private aid
Total aid†
3.868
0.322
4.190
2.146
6.336
4.295
0.362
4.657
2.260
6.917
4.340
0.571
4.911
2.010
6.921
4.055
0.137
4.192
1.927
6.119
4.0790
0.0818
4.1608
2.5700
6.7308
3.535
0.134
3.669
2.836
6.505
Sources: Le Monde (6–7 March 1966, 14 July 1963); Industries et Travaux d’Outre-mer (Oct. 1963); Industries et
Travaux d’Outre-Mer (March 1972); BAN 678 (9 Feb. 1972).
∗ These figure are given as 4.314 (1968), 4.956 (1969) and 5.285 (1970) respectively by G. Mathieu, ‘Prêts,
investissements, crédits privés à l’exportation garantis par l’Etat’, Le Monde (14 Jul. 1963); see also Industries et
Travaux d’Outre-mer (Oct. 1963); BAN 678 (9 Feb. 1972).
† The ‘Total aid’ row represents the arithmetical total of the figures in each column. But the sources –
Le Monde (14 Jul. 1963); G. Mathieu in Le Monde (10–11 May 1963); Le Monde (6–7 Mar. 1966); BAN 678,
(9 Feb. 1972) – give the following slightly different figures:
1960
1961
1962
1963
1964
1965
1966
1967
1968
1969
1970
6.507
6.621
8.493
8.849
10.047
FF billion
Total aid
6.34
6.941
6.887
6.132
6.714
6.415
Western banking system. The investment plans were analysed using French methods.
The administration of multilateral aid was quite different. But was which better, in
other words more productive in terms of growth and human development? To find
the answer to this question, let us now look at the volume of transfers to find out
who benefited from them.
Forms of French aid
One straightforward way to gauge the amount of aid is to relate it to gross national
product (GNP). The general trend in aid as a proportion of GNP shows that France
devoted less of its national wealth to aid at the end of this period than in the years
immediately following decolonisation.
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
441
Private aid =
Bilateral government aid +
Multilateral government aid =
Total government aid +
FF Billion
Total aid
Figure 4. French aid to underdeveloped countries, 1960–1970
The French aid effort 1959–70
Between 1960 and 1970 French aid increased in terms of current French francs and
in terms of purchasing power, but not as fast as GNP. After a period of stagnation
from 1963 to 1967, total aid began to grow again in 1968 (by 28.3 per cent), helped
by private contributions. The aid included bilateral government aid (both civil and
military), multilateral government aid and private aid. Of these, the first was always
by far the largest proportion, representing 92.3 per cent of government aid in 1960
and 89.9 per cent in 1970. As the senator Marcel Pellenc explained in May 1964,
90 per cent of this French bilateral government aid took the form of outright gifts,
as compared to 60.9 per cent of British, 50 per cent of West German and 45 per cent
of US aid. Newspaper reports generally exaggerated the proportion of GNP devoted
to aid, presumably to make a political point – either to complain of the exorbitant
cost or in self-congratulation on France’s meritorious efforts.30
The bulk of French aid was from public funds. In 1969, the UN Conference on
Trade and Development (UNCTAD) asked the developed countries to contribute a
total of 1 per cent of GNP, including government aid of 0.7 per cent. France reached,
or surpassed, this figure, but government aid started to diminish towards the end of
the period.
30
On 23 June 1962, the Moniteur Africain proclaimed a proportion of 2–3 per cent; in 1964 Raymond
Aron, in ‘L’aide compromet-elle le développement français?’, Le Figaro (20 March 1964), put the figure at
between 2 and 2.5 per cent of GNP – an exaggeration according to the available figures, which indicate
1.56 per cent. In the same year René Payot, in an editorial for the Journal de Genève, mentioned a figure
of 3 per cent of GNP.
Contemporary European History
442
Table 5. Government aid as a percentage of GNP
1959 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1968 1969 1970 1997 2002
per cent of GNP
French government aid 1.54
1.41
1.45
1.34
1.09
0.90
0.69
0.69
0.65
0.45
0.36
Cross-checked from the following daily and weekly reviews: Croissance des Jeunes Nations, 40 ( Jan. 1965),
from 1963 government accounts; BAN, 678 (9 Feb. 1972); Industries et Travaux d’Outre-mer (March 1972). Levels
of development aid as percentage of GNP are forecasts.
Types of aid
Private aid
Private aid grew faster than government aid. But we should not be misled into
thinking that it did so for humanitarian motives, or that the intention was to foster
social development or infrastructure. Private aid consisted of investment flows or
loan guarantees to assisted countries from undertakings in the competitive sector.
If local lifestyles improved, this was a trickle-down effect in terms of salaries, job
creation, and the payment of local taxes and charges and of national taxes. Private
aid reflected a changed attitude to the assisted countries. Figures for investments and
customer loans grew steadily from 1960 to peak at 2.8 billion francs in 1966. This has
been seen by economists as the beginning of the economic take-off in some of the
assisted countries. Another form of private aid were loans from French vendors to
customers in the developing countries, guaranteed by COFACE. It is worth noting
that from 1969 gifts from humanitarian aid organisations began to be reckoned as
private contributions (the much more accurate term which has now replaced ‘private
aid’). These charities contributed 13.6 million francs in 1969 and a similar amount in
1970.
Multilateral aid
Multilateral aid consisted essentially of European aid from the EDF and inflows
from the UN (from the International Development Association (IDA), and the
International Bank for Research and Development (IBRD)). They were not
substantial. Africans complained that the bulk of aid from the IBRD and the IDA
went to Pakistan, India and countries in Asia. This meant that French aid was
fundamentally important, corresponding to the UK and US perception that France
ought to assume responsibility for the development of its former colonies. For that
reason, French bilateral government aid was continued.
Government aid
A study of the total government aid package in 1961 exposes the complex system
of payments, from traditional bilateral aid to French contributions to international
organisations.
While it is difficult to assess the effectiveness of aid from a single statistic, comments
in various articles confirm the remark by a specialist, Gilbert Mathieu, writing in
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
443
Table 6. French government budget aid, 1963–1971
1963
1964
1965
1966
1967
1968
1969
1970
1971
FF billion
Sub-Saharan Africa
and Madagascar
Algeria
Morocco
Tunisia
Total AFN
Countries of former
Indochina
Other countries
Total government
budget aid
(arithmetical total)
Total government
budget aid (official)
1.310
1.307
1.117
1.173
1.326
1.321
1.403
1.399
1.308
1.254
0.099
0.057
1.410
0.071
1.087
0.113
0.070
1.270
0.082
0.777
0.114
0.057
0.948
0.093
0.524
0.116
0.061
0.701
0.096
0.454
0.087
0.046
0.587
0.116
0.328
0.102
0.048
0.478
0.095
0.359
0.096
0.057
0.512
0.080
0.266
0.105
0.063
0.434
0.082
0.232
0.096
0.061
0.389
0.048
0.280
3.071
0.135
2.794
0.215
2.373
0.298
2.268
0.419
2.448
0.445
2.339
0.562
2.557
0.619
2.534
0.690
2.435
3.073
2.796
2.377
2.377
2.411
2.320
2.465
2.404
2.438
Sources: Le Monde (6–7 March 1966); Le Monde (14 July 1963); Industries et travaux d’outre-mer, Oct. 1963 and
March 1972; BAN, 678 (9 Feb. 1972).
Table 7. Distribution between bilateral and multilateral government aid,1960–1970
1960
1961
1962
1963
1964
1966
1967
1968
1969
1970
per cent
Bilateral
government aid
Multilateral
government aid
Total government
aid
92.3
92.2
88.3
96.7
98.0
96.3
94.0
94.3
90.0
89.1
7.7
7.8
11.7
3.3
2.0
3.7
6.0
5.7
10.0
10.9
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
Sources: Le Monde (6–7 March 1966 and 14 July 1963); Industries et travaux d’outre-mer, Oct. 1963 and March
1972; BAN, 678 (9 Feb. 1972).
Table 8. Breakdown of government aid budget, 1961
FF million
Bilateral aid, AT, FAC, research institutes
Of which
Equipment loans and budget subsidies to African governments
Oil prospecting by BRP
Export credit insurance, government allocations
Regularisation of tropical product markets and contribution to EDF
Government aid to Algeria
French contribution to IBRD
Contribution to IDA
Special UN agencies
Total
3,000.0
307.0
120.0
270.0
225.0
1,000.0
170.5
51.5
23.0
4,740.0
Source: After G. Mathieu, ‘Rapport du gouvernement français au CAD’, Le Monde (6–7 March 1966); idem,
‘L’aide de la France aux pays sous développés a baissé d’un sixième en 63’, Le Monde (10 and 11 March 1963);
BAN, 678 (9 Feb. 1972).
Contemporary European History
444
1 Sub - Saharan Africa and Madagascar
3 Algeria
5 Morocco
2 Tunisia
4 Former Indochina
6 Other countries
FF Billion
6
4
2
5
3
1
Figure 5. Bilateral budget aid by area of intervention, 1963–1971
Le Monde in 1963: ‘Over the last few years, French aid to African countries has
represented between 6 and 15 per cent of their GNP, about equal to the income from
taxes or customs duties.’31 But how much of this aid really helped in the development
of famine-stricken countries? It is more useful to talk in terms of net aid rather than
gross aid. From gross aid we must strip the income from capital repatriated to France
by French investors, and the ‘aid’ which never left France in the first place: a third
of the salaries of technical aid workers and a tenth of equipment credits. We should
also deduct expenditure on maintaining French forces in the assisted countries and
on aid administration.
The geography of French aid
Figure 5 and Table 9 clearly show a downward trend in budget aid, but aid to
sub-Saharan Africa was stabilised. Naturally, aid to Algeria, which in 1963 equalled
that to sub-Saharan Africa, fell off as France began a disengagement from Algeria,
symptomatic of the strained relations between the two countries. Aid to other
countries (28.3 per cent in 1971 compared with 9.1 per cent in 1963) reveals a
determination on the part of French governments, and of de Gaulle, to keep the
level of government aid on a par with France’s ambitions on the global political stage.
The geographical distribution of French budget aid mirrors the traditional axes
of French diplomacy: north Africa, sub-Saharan Africa and Madagascar, former
Indochina and then the rest of the world (Latin America, Europe, Middle East).
The distribution of French aid reflects the history of the French presence in the
world. Some links, such as those with sub-Saharan Africa, Morocco and Tunisia,
endured, while others weakened, particularly that with Algeria; this, and the forging
31
See Mathieu in Le Monde (14–15 Jul. 1963).
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
1400
1200
1310 1308
1173
445
1254
1000
FF
million
800
690
600
524
400
280 298
232
200
99
116 96
57
61
61
71
96
48
0
Sub-Saharan Africa
Algeria
Morocco
1963
Tunisia
1966
Ex-Indochina
Other
1971
Figure 6. Geographical distribution of French budget aid in 1963, 1966 and 1971
Sources: BAN, 480 (18 Oct. 1967), 678 (9 Feb. 1972); and see sources for Tables 6 and 7.
of new relationships, clearly shows the connection between aid, colonisation and the
subsequent voluntarist policies of de Gaulle, and the toing and froing of bilateral
relationships and international events.
Before independence in 1962, Algeria received substantial development credits
as a French department. In 1958, the Constantine Plan, a too late but important
social and economic development plan, anticipated an investment of twenty billion
francs. The Algerian Equipment and Development Fund (Caisse d’Equipement et
de Développement de l’Algérie, CEDA) was set up in March 1959 and doled out
4.94 billion francs in four years. Thanks to this funding, in the three years up to
1962 the number of Algerian children in primary education had increased by 77 per
cent and of those in secondary education by 82 per cent; over the same period the
equipment programme created 160,000 jobs.32 After Algerian independence French
aid to the CEDA continued at least up to 1964, focusing chiefly on education
and technical training (there were 12,000 technical aid workers in Algeria in 1965,
including 8,000 teachers in eight high schools and 600 classes). In 1964 there
were 7,000 Algerian students in the Algerian École Nationale d’Administration,
in training for jobs with the ministries or bodies responsible for Algerian railways,
rural engineering, telecommunications, air transport safety, the Sahara authority, the
police and health services. This aid was effectively used to tide over the transition
from colony to independent state, but de Gaulle would have liked to make the aid
to Algeria the cornerstone of his new policy set up by the Evian agreements (of 18
March 1962, which led to the independence of Algeria). ‘The policy of co-operation
with Algeria has an element of patience and indulgence that is much less conspicuous
in other countries of the Maghreb’, as a contemporary writer explained.33 France
was anxious for Algeria not to fall into the Soviet camp and begin systematically to
32
33
Ibid.
Valérie-Barbara Rosoux, ‘Le ǵenerale de Gaulle et la francophonie’, Politique et Societé, 16, 1 (1997).
446
Contemporary European History
oppose French influence in Africa. De Gaulle wanted to ‘hold on to the Saharan sites
for testing France’s nuclear strike capability and to keep an eye on the exploitation
of Sahara oil discovered and financed by French companies. He also wanted to
maintain French cultural influence in Africa through co-operation in the field of
education. Algeria became the showcase for French decolonisation. Similarly, in
Asia, Sihanouk’s independent Cambodia was a model of successful French aid at a
time when the United States was preparing for war in Vietnam. The reduction in
French aid to Algeria by 1971 sealed the failure of co-operation with that country.
Co-operation with other under-developed areas began in 1966. On his world
travels, de Gaulle promised a total of more than four billion francs to Mexico, Spain,
Iran, Greece, Ethiopia, Turkey and Pakistan.34 The (very relative) ‘globalisation’ of
French aid to the developing countries was also fostered by the expansion of French
trade with those countries. At the end of this period, the franc zone accounted for
31 per cent of French aid (formerly 39 per cent) and for 29 per cent of its exports
(formerly 41 per cent).
Was the aid indispensable?
In 1971, aid to sub-Saharan Africa represented 53.7 per cent of budget aid to the
developing countries, which was proportionately more than in 1963, but a dramatic
drop in comparison with France’s total budget. The co-operation budget, the main
one where sub-Saharan Africa was concerned, represented 1.4 per cent of the national
budget in 1963, but only 0.7 per cent in 1970.35 Had Africa been forgotten? Certainly
France was defending its interests in a part of the world where decolonisation had
generally proceeded without major upheavals. It kept indigent governments at arm’s
length and responded to requests from local African elites, many of whom had served
their apprenticeship in French political parties. French public opinion was critical of
the way in which aid was squandered by corrupt or undemocratic political elites,
but continued to support its distribution for a mixture of good and bad reasons:
friendship and co-operation between peoples, France’s historical responsibilities, the
struggle against world hunger, the development of French trade, pride in the French
cultural community, the preservation of Western values in Africa during the Cold
War.
Aid to sub-Saharan Africa helped to keep the African countries going from day
to day. Aid loans after 1959 were not destined only for economic development (FAC
loans), but simply to ensure that French and African administrators would continue
to be paid. The relevant French ministries continued to maintain and equip sectors
including civil aviation, oil prospecting, public health, education and investments of
the Organisation commune des régions sahariennes (OCRS) in sub-Saharan Africa.
Over and above the aid budget, France assumed responsibility for regulating the
prices of raw materials and for EDF listings.
34
Thus Mathieu in ‘French government report to CAD’, Le Monde (6–7 Mar. 1966); see also Mathieu
in Le Monde (10–11 May 1963): ‘French aid to the underdeveloped countries fell by one-sixth in 1963’.
35
Jeune Afrique (22–28 Oct. 1969).
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
447
Table 9. Numbers of French experts and teachers working overseas, 1960–1971
1960
1963
1964
1965
1966
1967
1968
1969
1970
1971
Total number 45,000 46,121 44,003 39,803 37,998 37,338 37,528 38,566 32,076 31,899
Of which
31,410 25,000 28,878
20,954 21,230
20,366
teachers
Sources: Croissances des jeunes nations, 1, 40 (1965); E. Bonnefous, Les milliardsqui s’envolent (Paris, Fayard,
1963); ‘Le procès de l’aide française au développement’, Droit et Vie, May 1969; Malet-Buisson, ‘La politique
française’; G. Mathieu, Le Monde, 14 July 1963.
The originality of French aid: experts and teachers
Finance apart, the shock troops of co-operation were technical experts, aid volunteers,
administrators, and primary, secondary and university teachers. Some were civilians,
some were members of the armed forces (Active National Service Volunteers –
VSNAs) working on civilian projects for their military service. French co-operation
encouraged young Frenchmen and their families to spend several years in an assisted
country. This immersion in a strange, new, but for the most part French-speaking
world created personal contacts which far outlasted the period of co-operation.
The VSNAs worked overseas. The civilian aid volunteers were young people
from rural France, chosen after rigorous selection to work in rural areas. In 1965
there were over four hundred young men and women working in sub-Saharan
Africa, in agriculture, stock-rearing, community medicine, practical teaching, cultural
activities, handicrafts and building.36 Teachers might work in the high schools,
middle schools or universities of the host country, or in French overseas schools
attended by the children of European and well-off local families. It was French
policy to replace French teachers in the local schools of newly independent countries
with local French speakers. Efforts were also made to increase access to French
culture, both by creating French cultural centres overseas and by setting up elite
lycées and offering scholarships. France maintained in the under-developed countries
(mainly in Africa) sixteen instituts français out of forty-three and eigthy-three cultural
centres out of one hundred. Overseas students studying in France and technical
missions abroad turned out trained administrators who were then expected to
return to their own countries. For example, the Association for the Organisation
of Courses for Technicians in France (Association pour l’Organisation des Stages
de Techniciens en France – ASTEF) sent 2,495 students to France in 1964, and
in the same year the Association for the Organisation of Technical Co-operation
Missions (Association pour l’Organisation des Missions de Co-opération Technique –
ASMIC) sent out 319 experts to fourty-nine countries, liaising with eleven private
companies and two French ministries. But the numbers of experts and teachers started
to dwindle at the end of this period.
36
BAN, 526 (30 Oct. 1968).
448
Contemporary European History
Justification of French aid
Why did France contribute so substantially to the running and development of
certain under-developed countries in the 1960s? France’s approach is even more
interesting when compared with that of other donor countries. The United States,
the leading donor in absolute terms, was trying to consolidate political and personal
freedom in the newly independent countries by promoting economic and social
development. Events in the Belgian Congo from 1960 to 1963 drew the attention
of the United States to sub-Saharan Africa, owing to the disquieting presence in
Leopoldville of Russian, Czech and Polish aid missions. The US government had
two precise aims: first, to dispose of US agricultural surpluses, and second, to open
up these new countries to US investment and so usher them into the international
capitalist system.37 America used long-term loans (forty years at 0.75 per cent) in
preference to outright gifts,38 working through the 10,000 agents of the US Agency
for International Development (USAID).39
Development of the policy of co-operation
France’s aid and co-operation policy developed both as more and more colonies
became independent and in response to international events and the foreign policy
of General de Gaulle.
Successful decolonisation
France had first to adapt her policy to the ‘Community’ invented by de Gaulle
in 1959; from 1960 it had to be adapted to the newly independent colonies. This
new aid policy had to be a worthy successor to the development policies of the
Union Française.40 The heads of government of the newly independent countries
were not slow to express their opinions. Félix Houphouët-Boigny, of the Ivory
Coast, wanted an end to ‘the policy of donations so exasperating to both giver and
receiver’. Hamani Diori, of Niger, wanted to see the FAC turn into the Community’s
solidarity fund with contributions from all members; this did in fact happen.41 Cooperation meant creating relationships of equality and trust between France and the
developing countries. The French government laid down three broad lines of action:
technical assistance, investment aid and guarantees to the new countries for balancing
their budgets. ‘Technical assistance’ meant that French personnel would remain in
the new countries to ensure the smooth running of public services; they would be
replaced by Africans in due course. The FAC continued to administer investment
37
Francis Charbonnière in Communauté France-Eurafrique (May 1962).
Le Moniteur Africain (3 Aug. 1963).
39
Jeune Afrique (28 Jan.–3 Feb. 1963).
40
See Gérard Bossuat, La France, l’aide américaine et la construction européenne 1944–1954, 2 vols. (Paris:
CHEFF, revised edn, 1997).
41
Agence France-Presse (AFP) 4001 (7 Nov. 1959), conference on aid and co-operation.
38
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
449
aid. The FAC’s investment credits, associated with European credits, would be spent
on infrastructure so as to avert hardship and famine, an enterprise which would be
profitable only indirectly and in the long term, whereas private investment would
aim at short-term profitability. The plan’s supervisory committee prioritised the
financing of authentically productive and regionalised development projects. They
saw two roads to success – training and industrialisation.42 French financial aid was not
confined to development and humanitarian assistance: it offered deficiency subsidies
to balance – temporarily at least – the new countries’ working budgets. This was
the favourite theme of pronouncements by Raymond Triboulet, the Minister for
Co-operation, in 1963. He was determined to maintain deficiency subsidies, and
called on aid volunteers to maintain effective technical co-operation even in the back
of beyond.43 As René Payot commented in an editorial for the Journal de Genève, the
aim was successful decolonisation.44
1964: redeployment
It was not long before these principles of co-operation ran out of steam. The report
prepared under the aegis of ex-minister Jean-Marcel Jeanneney in November 1964
recommended that France should redeploy its aid and seek new markets outside the
franc zone. It included five propositions: government aid should be maintained at
the 1961 level of 1.5 per cent of GNP; the range of beneficiaries should be widened;
aid should focus on technical and cultural co-operation; bilateral aid should be
maintained; and the administration and politics of co-operation should be reformed.
The report was acted upon. More aid found its way beyond the franc zone – 28 per
cent was going to ‘other countries’ by 1970. Deficiency subsidies were drastically
reduced.
This redeployment revealed the other motives for aid. It had to support French
overseas trade. But at the same time aid was shrinking in proportion to the growth
in national wealth. This, Teresa Hayter suggests, was because the development of the
French economy was integrated into that of the Common Market and the world
economy, which meant that its interests were shifting away from the franc zone.45 But
if, as Hayter argues, French aid was motivated solely by access to African markets, why
did France not abandon sub-Saharan Africa as soon as its redeployment in Europe
was successfully completed?
There was, of course, an economic motive behind aid: oil prospecting in Gabon,
transport companies, new agricultural opportunities, rare raw materials. But political
and cultural motives were equally important. Politically, France had an eye to the
international influence it could acquire through its aid to Third World countries
in Africa. From the cultural viewpoint, aid was also a response to the concern for
the worldwide standing of the French language and the universalist values of French
42
43
44
45
Commissariat Général du Plan, Bulletin d’Information 19 (Oct. 1962): proposed donations in 1963.
AFP 5240 (4 Dec. 1963), lecture at NATO college.
‘La France et les pays sous-développés’, Le Journal de Genève (12 Jun. 1964).
‘French Aid to Africa – Its Scope and Achievements’, International Affairs (Apr. 1965), 236ff.
Contemporary European History
450
35000
32629
30000
25000
20000
15000
10399
10000
5000
302
0
North Africa
African States Rest of Africa
and Madagascar
1215
452
463
Asia/Oceania
Near East
Latin America
Figure 7. Geographical distribution of French technical assistants, 1963
Sources: Croissance des jeunes nations, 40 (1/1965); G. Mathieu, Le Monde (14 July 1963); BAN, 526 (30 Oct.
1968).
culture, as transmitted by 30,000 voluntary teachers in the Third World. If some
aid was redeployed outside the franc zone it was in support of de Gaulle’s policy of
acquiring influence in Asia, south America and Quebec. Arguably the ultimate aim
of the decision-makers was to use cultural and technical co-operation to reconstruct
a French-speaking civilisation that had foundered with decolonisation.
Adapting co-operation
By the mid-1960s aid had come under a cloud. In 1966, the secretary of state for cooperation, Jean Charbonnel,46 warned of budget cut-backs but called for governments
to work together in the deployment of aid. Aid could, he said, be used as a controlled
instrument of mass education.47 In 1968 his successor, Yvon Bourges, explained that
the policy of co-operation would need to be flexible and agreed with the African
countries themselves.48 He lauded the achievements of French multilateral aid, citing
as examples the building of the port of San Pedro, the trans-Cameroon highway, and
the development of palm groves of South Dahomey in co-operation with EDF and
IDA.
Gloomy prognostications were countered by the sending out of aid volunteers,
who were expected to be better suited to local conditions, and the development of
technical assistance thanks to the military element among them (the VSNAs). French
deputies in the Assembly suggested that the administration of the new countries
should be Africanised as quickly as possible; applied research should be stimulated
through grants to large organisations such as ORSTOM. In the later 1960s France’s aid
and co-operation policy concentrated on the transfer of skills by technical experts and
teachers, and the training of local administrators, rather than lavish cash hand-outs.
46
Charbonnel was a judge in the Cour des Comptes, a Gaullist deputy representing the Corrèze
region and mayor of Brive.
47
As reported by AFP (20 Oct. 1966).
48
Jeune Afrique (4–10 Nov. 1968).
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
451
However, the African office in the Elysée exercised a good deal of influence under
Jacques Foccart. France’s doors were never shut in the faces of its African friends, nor
had it given up the idea of supporting them through military intervention – in fact,
quite the reverse was the case.
Aid policy: a social debate
Although the aid and co-operation policy was a hotly debated topic in France, the
actual amount of cash involved was seldom realised. At the time of the Union Française
some parliamentary deputies had thought the amount excessive, but said nothing so as
not to nourish anti-colonialist feelings. This was why they approved the Constantine
Plan.49 In 1956, the journalist Raymond Cartier wrote a series of articles for ParisMatch on the exorbitant cost of maintaining the colonies, claiming that the Dutch
withdrawal from Indonesia had stimulated growth at home in the Netherlands. His
view, soon dubbed ‘Cartierism’, was broadened with the gaining of independence by
the sub-Saharan African countries, and particularly with the loss of Algeria in 1962.
The issue came to a head in 1965, when a presidential election was held in
France. Public opinion was, on the whole, critical. ‘Cartierism’ was widespread.50
Jean Lecanuet, the candidate for the Democratic Centre Party, pointed out that
development aid was swallowing 10 per cent of French investment requirements.
While not overtly opposed to its continuation, he called for more multilateral aid
(through the EDF) and an end to de Gaulle’s discrimination against certain countries.
The Assembly suggested that France should confine itself to offering development
loans and sending technical assistants, while putting an end to outright gifts and
deficiency subsidies.51 This of course meant that the EDF would be expected to bear
the burden of major infrastructure projects.52
Cutbacks
Why should France continue to pour aid into countries which seemed anxious to
shake off its influence? This was the argument used by the extreme right and by the
poujadistes,53 as well as by ‘Cartierist’ isolationists. In 1965, Cartier argued that France
could not afford both a nuclear strike force and a co-operation policy. He wanted
49
Pierre Viansson-Ponté in Le Monde (12 Jun. 1964).
That is support for Cartier’s opinion, first expressed in Paris-Match in 1956 and repeated in March
1964, that aid was a burden on France: ‘Warning! France is wasting her money’, he wrote in 1964. This led
to the ‘War of the Two Raymonds’, the second being Raymond Triboulet, Minister for Co-operation,
who was of Breton origin, with the slogan ‘Brittany before Dahomey’. This ‘war’ continued under his
successor, Charbonnel, with the familiar slogan ‘La Corrèze avant le Zambèze’ – ‘Corrèze before the
Zambezi’.
51
BAN, 436 (26 Oct. 1966), special report by the Commission des Finances et de l’Economie
Générale, written by André Voisin, UNR deputy for the department of Indre et Loire.
52
A. Voisin, ‘Modalités et résultats de la politique de co-operation’, report by the Commission de la
Production et des Echanges on the co-operation budget for 1966, in BAN, 389 (20 Oct. 1965).
53
This was a trend in right-wing French politics which emerged in the parliamentary election of
December 1965. The poujadistes called for a revolt against bureaucracy and taxation and assumed an
ultra-nationalist and colonialist colouring.
50
452
Contemporary European History
more investment in ‘housekeeping’ at home: France should give no more to the
Third World than other countries did. Global solutions should be sought for global
poverty. Within the Atlantic alliance, Europe and the United States should adopt a
common policy on under-development, seeing that aid was expensive – 4 per cent
of France’s budget in 1961,54 or 5 per cent of government spending, according to
an estimate in Le Monde that included military expenditure but excluded Algeria.55
Neither side disputed these figures, but the advocates of aid retorted that the Algerian
war had cost fifty billion francs over six years.56 Opponents of aid were astounded
to find that post-colonial assistance was costing more than the Union Française had
done. They were outraged that some of the recipients of French aid were refusing to
support France in the United Nations – meaning Bourguiba’s Tunisia. (They forgot
the loyalty of Houphouët-Boigny.) Aid budgets and the costs of decolonisation
were compared with the costs of providing housing at home, leading to the easy
and triumphant conclusion that ‘aid has now reached double the amount spent on
state-subsidised housing or agriculture in France, and three times the outlay on
public health’. This argument did not make sense, because there was no way to
be sure that if the money had not been spent on aid it would have been spent
on housing. Its author, the senator Marcel Pellenc, grumbled about cash handouts,
‘a custom sometimes described by ungrateful recipients as neo-colonialism’, and
about the weakness of French multilateral aid.57 Others resented the fact that 50,000
French government employees were working overseas while France itself was short of
teachers, or complained that exports to the franc zone had dropped from 36 per cent
to 20 per cent of French exports by 1963. They failed to realise how the Common
Market had changed the parameters of French trade.58
Towards cultural co-operation
A highly influential senator, Edouard Bonnefous, stressed the reasons why French
aid needed to be reformed: it was commercially unprofitable, it sapped growth and
contributed nothing to the expansion of French capitalism. The Jeanneney report,
which Bonnefous used as evidence to back up his arguments, warned of the dangers of
increasing taxation to pay for aid. Bonnefous thought that the aid burden had already
become intolerable. Liberal as he was, he thought that the aim of creating a privileged
economic zone was ‘outdated and neo-colonialist’. He denied that aid was a moral
obligation. Meanwhile, Raymond Aron argued that aid came out of uninvested
capital and not current production, which would have had less serious consequences
for growth.59 So should aid be discontinued? Aron’s answer was ambiguous, so that his
arguments could be exploited by the ‘Cartierists’. But Bonnefous distanced himself
54
55
56
57
58
59
Les Echos (30 Oct. 1961).
Gilbert Mathieu in Le Monde (26–27 Feb. 1961).
Rejoinder by François Charbonnière in Communauté France-Eurafrique (Feb. 1962).
In a speech made in the Senate on 27 May 1964.
After ‘Le procès de l’aide française au développement’, Droit et Vie (May 1964).
Raymond Aron, ‘L’aide compromet-elle le développement français?’, Le Figaro (20 Mar. 1964).
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
453
from the latter because he was prepared to support a broad political and educational
programme. ‘By spreading French technology and culture through a great mass of
native people, the 10,000 French experts and 28,000 teachers working overseas are
accomplishing a work of lasting value, worthy of our best traditions.’60 The critics,
in fact, were not speaking with a united voice.
Opposition to bilateral and neo-colonial aid
Co-operation was also criticised by those opposed to the government and to liberal
economics. François Mitterrand, a left-wing opponent of de Gaulle, complained that
aid was doled out according to the fitful fancies of that quasi-monarchic head of state.
Others threw doubt on a policy which included the maintenance of private hunting
preserves in Africa in the name of French grandeur. It would be much grander, opined
Pierre Abelin of the Democratic Centre Party, for France to support the European
aid effort. Pro-Third World opinion called for an end to neo-colonialist aid. Gérard
Jaquet, director of the European Movement and founder of the European Left,61
thought that solidarity was much better expressed through multilateral action. Aid
was ill-directed, costly and often ineffective, but, as Pierre Viansson-Ponté remarked,
the critics were ‘hammering on an open door’. Both government and opposition
accepted the idea of co-operation based on the figures in the Jeanneney report.
Justification of French aid
The Gaullist administrations combated the criticisms of de Gaulle’s policy with bald
refutations: aid was self-justifying because, as a deputy of the Gaullist Union pour la
Nouvelle République (UNR), Aymar Achille-Fould, put it, it made no more sense
to abandon co-operation than to jump off a speeding train. The Gaullist leaders could
claim that public opinion was behind them. Jacques Baumel, secretary-general of the
UNR, pointed out that all France’s political, religious and trade union leaders were
in favour of co-operation.62
Government and pro-aid apologists did, of course, call on other, more sophisticated
arguments. Co-operation could give a new lease of life to the French language,
and offered France a vast field of influence. As one author put it: ‘The value
of our technicians is universally recognised, our experience unchallenged, and in
international organisations French is scarcely less spoken than English, and much
more than any other language.’63 French co-operative aid workers were three times
as numerous as US experts. By helping the Third World France was helping the
free world. Aid had to be continued because it benefited the recipient peoples, as
60
In ‘Dépolitiser, internationaliser l’aide aux pays sous-développés’, La Vie Française (27 Mar. 1964).
Bonnefous’s book Les milliards qui s’envolent (‘The billions of francs that get away’) is also sharply critical.
See also Agence d’Information pour la Zone Franc et l’Outre-Mer, ‘Le Tiers-monde et nous’ (2 Sep.
1964).
61
Communautés et Continents, 24 (Oct.–Dec. 1964): debate on Cartierism and co-operation.
62
Ibid.
63
Simone Malet-Buisson, ‘La politique française de coopération’, l’Economie, 979 (22 Oct. 1965).
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was frequently asserted in French and African government circles. Between 1947 and
1959, France invested about 11.4 billion new francs, which was ‘a fitting rejoinder
to the accusations of colonialism too readily hurled at [it]’.64 But the Gaullists were
asking African governments to exercise a little more caution in their development
projects.65 The aid effort was justified for both moral and political reasons, wrote
André François-Poncet.66 Solidarity was the watchword. ‘The same solidarity that
exists among the inhabitants of a single country must now be shown among nations’,
proclaimed the Journal de Genève,67 this solidarity, watered by billions of francs worth
of aid, had put down deep roots in Asia and Africa.68 Friendships must be cultivated
and peoples must be helped to organise a free society, even if Ben Bella, president
of Algeria from 1963 to 1965, had thrown in his lot with the USSR. This idea
was supported by the Banque Centrale des États de l’Afrique de l’Ouest, which
considered that the expenditure was not so very high in proportion to the political
and cultural benefits, and moral satisfaction, which France derived from its aid.69
The argument from history also had weight. It was not possible to abandon countries
that had once been attached to France – it had to live up to its past greatness, but
also make up for the upheavals of colonisation. Those in power in France refused to
countenance any alternatives to co-operation such as outright withdrawal, allowing
countries to choose their own type of development, prioritising multilateral aid,
promoting socialism or, alternatively, unfettered mercantilism. Georges Pompidou
declared that ‘the prosperity, influence and future of France undoubtedly depend
in large measure on co-operation’. De Gaulle said more or less the same thing in
December 1959: ‘But I say to the heads of state gathered here around me, as the
pilgrims on the road to Emmaus said to their fellow traveller, ‘abide with us, for it is
toward evening, and the day is far spent’.’70
Thus the arguments advanced by supporters of co-operation, who were
unchallenged in the Assembly until 1975, could be commonsensical (risk of chaos
in doing otherwise), pragmatic (do as other countries do), humanistic or moral
(historical responsibility; righting wrongs; solidarity), self-interested (promoting
French language and culture; trade), or an invocation of high politics – the future,
the happiness of all partners in the grand scheme of Co-operation.
Conclusion
Was co-operation a footnote to colonisation or a manifestation of France’s new
foreign policy? The concept of co-operation sprang from decolonisation. General de
Gaulle made it one of the main planks of his policy vis-à-vis the sub-Saharan African
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
Communautés et Continents, 7 ( Jul.–Sep. 1960).
Le Monde (23 Jan. 1963), on the co-operation budget.
Le Figaro (2 June 1964).
Journal de Genève (12 June 1964).
Communautés et Continents, 24 (Oct.–Dec. 1964), debate on Cartierism and co-operation.
Banque Centrale des États de l’Afrique de l’Ouest, Bulletin, 79 (Feb. 1962).
Charles de Gaulle, Mémoires d’espoir, Le renouveau, 1958–1962 (Paris: Plon, 1970), 71.
French Development Aid and Co-operation under de Gaulle
455
countries and independent Algeria. Flows of cash from North to South were nothing
new: from 1947 onwards France had been transferring more and more of its wealth
to the territories of the Union Française (11.14 billion old francs by 1959). This flow
increased between 1960 and 1964. The novelty of co-operation was that it involved
a systematic transfer of expertise via technical aid experts and teachers living in the
assisted countries. Unlike colonisation, co-operation worked towards its own demise,
since the ultimate intention was to replace French administrators by African ones.
What did France get out of this? The aid and co-operation policy reflected
the universalist aims of human solidarity.71 These aims were to be achieved within
a community of values borne on the back of French language and civilisation
in contradistinction to the liberal English-speaking world, and in opposition
to communism. The construction of this French-speaking human and cultural
community would ensure that the dominant state, France herself, regained the international influence she had lost owing to decolonisation and the curbing of commercial
and economic opportunities with the introduction of the common market.72
Co-operation could be seen as the ultimate adaptation of a European country, anxious
to capitalise on its past, to the new international scene. In other words, it was another
manifestation of France’s traditional role as a world power – the pursuit of power
politics by other means.
This policy was supported by the vast majority of public opinion and of French
political circles. They rejected multilateral aid because this would have meant
abandoning France’s former territories and bringing the new countries straight into
a market economy. The first solution seemed utopian, the second suicidal. Bilateral
aid seemed to be a good way to keep the newly independent states from aligning
themselves with the Eastern bloc, which – according to the French public opinion –
would have been pure treachery. The EDF could never replace French aid because
France’s European partners did not want to develop it.
Did French aid and co-operation really assist the development of under-developed
countries? Could they not be seen as an excuse for keeping in power usurping
potentates? Evidently the historian must take account of this judgement on cooperation, frequently expressed by Africans and students of the Third World. But
was it possible to set up democracies? Indeed, French aid policy has some darker
corners, as illustrated by the secret actions of Jacques Foccard, counsellor to the
president, called ‘M. Africa of Elysée’, who was devoted to each African head of state
as long as they were able to support the French policy. But that is no reason to forget
the best aspects of French aid: the FAC investments and the sending of technical aid
experts and teachers who came into direct contact with local people. France’s decision
to give the assisted countries the chance to profit from the long-term presence of
experts and aid workers was a unique aspect of French aid to the Third World,
71
The Jeanneney report explains why France should espouse a co-operation policy, giving exactly the
same reasons as those in the sources consulted: (i) human solidarity is a duty; and (ii) France needs to
extend its influence (pp. 61 and 62); see also André Postel-Vinay, Réflexion sur l’aide française (Paris, 1972).
72
The Jeanneney report does not accept this as a reason for the co-operation policy (see pp. 52ff.).
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with no equivalent in other bilateral or multilateral aid programmes. Young people
from France helped African administrators to construct an African society that was
open and modern. De Gaulle ensured that France would not pull out of the new
African francophone countries. He tried to create a global axis of universal values
grounded in French humanism and based on bilateral agreements with each of the
newly independent African states: an axis which would make its influence felt in
international relations. These reasons totally justified a policy of active aid and cooperation in the francophone African countries (including Congo-Kinshasa, Rwanda
and Burundi); they were less convincing with regard to the Maghreb, but even there
they were much more convincing than with regard to the Third World as a whole. The
co-operation policy highlighted the idea that the industrialised North and the underdeveloped South need not be divided by an irremediable hostility. France wanted
to avert a clash of civilisations. And yet it can hardly be said that former French
sub-Saharan Africa held the trump cards when it came to promoting economic and
social development.73
73
The famous essay by René Dumont, L’Afrique noire est mal partie (Paris: Seuil, 1962), develops an
opposing argument.