WI/AHC: France integrates all colonies into France proper?

I was rather bored in school earlier today and was thinking about history. I remembered Algeria was divided into departments and could elect representatives to the Senate, and was a part of Metropolitan France. This started me wondering; what if all French colonies had been divided into departments, been able to choose senators and vote for the President?

Could this be done and what would the impact be? Would it fuel nuttery of the 'not real Frenchmen' variety from Le Pen? Would all parts of this new France have equal representation in the Senate? What would the international consequences be?

PS: This is my first thread, so if I have got anything wrong, please let me know.
 
I was rather bored in school earlier today and was thinking about history. I remembered Algeria was divided into departments and could elect representatives to the Senate, and was a part of Metropolitan France. This started me wondering; what if all French colonies had been divided into departments, been able to choose senators and vote for the President?

Could this be done and what would the impact be? Would it fuel nuttery of the 'not real Frenchmen' variety from Le Pen? Would all parts of this new France have equal representation in the Senate? What would the international consequences be
PS: This is my first thread, so if I have got anything wrong, please let me know.
The nuttery would still be there. France is historically a country receiving migrants from everywhere due to its geographical position at the crossroads of Europe - I’m barely third generation myself. For the senate thing, I guess you don’t really know how the chambers work in France. The lower chamber, the most powerful, is made of MP elected by the people while the Senate, the upper chamber, is elected by elected people like mayors, city councillors, MPs, etc., and isn’t doesn’t have the last word in the legislative system.

For whether it could have been done? It was the ultimate goal, actually. Unlike the British take on colonies, the French tended to push towards convergence, integration, the transition from Colonial Law to French Civil Law, the formation of local elites who could, if they culturally integrated into the French system, be part of the system just as well as a Paris-born French. The ideal example of it is Félix Éboué, Guyanese, black, and colonial governor of almost half of French Africa, who joined de Gaulle very early and one of the first Compagnons de la Libération, the rarest of decorations for the most important people of the Free French.

But it was too little, too late. A strong program of integration, more people like Éboué pushing for strong programs of the integration of locals and give living examples of success for that system? Maybe it might have worked? After the World Wars? France was too weakened, the Soviets and US would push towards decolonization. The despicable actions of de Gaulle towards colonial troops did not help either, of course.

I’d say you would need a PoD during the 19th century, probably the absence of World Wars, to give such a scenario a chance of working. Low, but existing.
 
Sorry, I don't really understand the intricacies of French politics - please excuse cette Rosbif!
No prob. :p

But in the end, yep, remove the World Wars, you might have a working integration. The process was absurd in a way: Senegalese kids were taught about ’’Our ancestors the Gauls.’’, the idea being to create French citizens through education, and there was a combination of two legal system. Well, not was. Still is. In New Caledonia, there is still the system of the Indigene Code and the Civil Code. An indigenous individual was submitted to customary law based on the tribal laws of the time before colonization, but if they asked for it, they could transition towards the Civil Code, with the same rights and duties of any French citizen. The same system is still partially there, the same that was in Algeria and the other colonies. Long story short, it was the plan to make the islands, the African colonies, Indochina just as French as Corsica, Guyana or Britanny. But it would have taken a good century of stability to work. A century France never had.

Though, even then, it wouldn’t have been a guaranteed success, the World Wars showed that the metropolitan French were not seeing the colonials equally either, even when they spilled their blood for France on the fields of France. A shameful display that saddens me to this day.
 
While we didn’t threat colonials well by any scretch of the imagination, I like to think we did better than anyone else. A lot of WW2 Problems though came from the Allied side, who basically told De Gaulle the black people and to a lesser extent muslims weren’t welcome in the spotlight of the war, by then France wasn’t in a state to do anything but nod.
WW1 broke something in French psych I think.
*sigh*
 
While we didn’t threat colonials well by any scretch of the imagination, I like to think we did better than anyone else. A lot of WW2 Problems though came from the Allied side, who basically told De Gaulle the black people and to a lesser extent muslims weren’t welcome in the spotlight of the war, by then France wasn’t in a state to do anything but nod.
WW1 broke something in French psych I think.
*sigh*
I wouldn't be eager to blame the Allies for what we ended up doing to our colonial troops. We were asses by ourselves without outside suggestion, and de Gaulle was really asshollish to them.
 
Fully integration of colonies would be difficult out of parliamentary arithmetics. You had about 30 millions citizens and what, 70 millions subjects? At least around that if you trust recruitment posters.
That means that the Métropole wouldn't be the centre of power anymore, not without serious gerrymandering.
So you'd get a second parliament with limited power (the EU parliament comes to mind) and limited territories like the 4 communes of Sénégal integrated.
More and more territories would get absorbed through osmosis, like Mayotte was recently added as a département while bigger chunks get turned into protectorate.
If anything, Françafrique is probably a decent projection of what it would have been in term of diplomacy and relations, except with less interventions to prop up dictators as it'd be governors.

I wouldn't be eager to blame the Allies for what we ended up doing to our colonial troops. We were asses by ourselves without outside suggestion, and de Gaulle was really asshollish to them.
While it was certainly better being white, there was a long standing tradition of former subjects in power, like General Dumas during the Révolution or Gaston Monnerville in the 50's/60's. He was president of the Senate which made him vice president.
No source but I read once many years ago that he had to leave the office if vice president under American pressure who didn't want to deal with the eventuality of a black president
 
That means that the Métropole wouldn't be the centre of power anymore, not without serious gerrymandering.
Exactly, any arrangement that gives the vote to the colonies will have to massively "nerf" the voting powers of the colonial population vis a vis the metropole/white settlers to avoid massive electoral backlash and reversal of said policies, and if that ends up working somehow expect the colonial population to start questioning those arrangements pretty hard as time goes on (i mean, in the end the metropole and the pieds noirs could be seen as having given these rights as some kind of sick experiment and being able to take those "scraps" back at will (and you bet people will use that as an electoral plank), given their numbers on the legislature.)
 
ASB: Too poor,too big, and too non-white
. . . You had about 30 millions citizens and what, 70 millions subjects? . . .

Exactly, any arrangement that gives the vote to the colonies will have to massively "nerf" . . .
But people don’t really believe in communism. :p

To the dismay of many revolutionaries and would-be revolutionaries (!) (!) you cannot really get an genuine majority who believe in full-bore redistribution. And when you have a growing economy, even less of an issue.
 

Well, fairness was never a really big part of colonialism.

I mean look at french africa right now, it is france's backyard/mine/place for legionnaires to do nasty shit to kids; some of the world's poorest countries have the distinction of using a currency guaranteed by the french treasury, with a fixed exchange rate to the Euro to boot.
I just can't imagine a country that still practices large scale thievery against those same places to just say "you know what, you are departements now!" Fifty years ago!
Nah not gonna happen, some Dumases and a vice president whose name nobody remembers do not make it easier.
 
I was rather bored in school earlier today and was thinking about history. I remembered Algeria was divided into departments and could elect representatives to the Senate, and was a part of Metropolitan France. This started me wondering; what if all French colonies had been divided into departments, been able to choose senators and vote for the President?

Could this be done and what would the impact be? Would it fuel nuttery of the 'not real Frenchmen' variety from Le Pen? Would all parts of this new France have equal representation in the Senate? What would the international consequences be?

PS: This is my first thread, so if I have got anything wrong, please let me know.

I think it is just about doable, but everything needs to go just right.

There are really two major ingredients that are needed:

1) France must invest significantly in their colonies - not only does this tie the colonies to the metropole in a concrete way, it also means jobs for the educated youngsters who became the leaders of the various independence movements. Also, investment to spur on education and urbanization would help reduce population growth and the French really want to ensure that their empire doesn't grow too much more populous than France itself was.

2) French practice of how they treat the other "Frenchmen" in the colonies needs to catch up to their own rhetoric. Now, the French have an advantage here in that they do have an ideology that might barely support complete integration, or more likely lead to an imperial federation where the colonies all grow to having a status close to what SSRs in the Soviet Union did. But there was racism and injustice in French colonies the same as in all colonies.

It's just about possible to imagine ways that this could come about. No WW1 or a less politically chaotic interwar period could both have led in this direction. It's hard though. There's a huge amount to do and France has other calls on her attention and little time.

fasquardon
 
Well, fairness was never a really big part of colonialism.

I mean look at french africa right now, it is france's backyard/mine/place for legionnaires to do nasty shit to kids; some of the world's poorest countries have the distinction of using a currency guaranteed by the french treasury, with a fixed exchange rate to the Euro to boot.
I just can't imagine a country that still practices large scale thievery against those same places to just say "you know what, you are departements now!" Fifty years ago!
Nah not gonna happen, some Dumases and a vice president whose name nobody remembers do not make it easier.
The VP is more for people in France, to give an example of people in power not all being from Corrèze.
It's similar to people from North Africa or from Guyane. You can point to Taubira or Dati and say "look, power is shared according to merit" (although not to dismiss the very existing racism, especially toward Taubira)
In the context of a federation of some kind, this kind of people would be very important.
In a way, you could argue that Françafrique gig so bad because France could keep doing the bad things without having any responsibility to do the few good things (political stability-is) anymore as it wasn't the empire and there wasn't any propaganda boost to be had
Exactly, any arrangement that gives the vote to the colonies will have to massively "nerf" the voting powers of the colonial population vis a vis the metropole/white settlers to avoid massive electoral backlash and reversal of said policies, and if that ends up working somehow expect the colonial population to start questioning those arrangements pretty hard as time goes on (i mean, in the end the metropole and the pieds noirs could be seen as having given these rights as some kind of sick experiment and being able to take those "scraps" back at will (and you bet people will use that as an electoral plank), given their numbers on the legislature.)
Or you could go the way the Vietnamese wanted it in the 20's and go with a heavy protectorate with "shared rule"
1) France must invest significantly in their colonies - not only does this tie the colonies to the metropole in a concrete way,
Don't have the numbers but seem to remember there were big programs between the wars and especially after, but that was too late
 
. . . I mean look at french africa right now, it is france's backyard/mine/place for legionnaires to do nasty shit to kids; . . .
If you're talking about peacekeeping soldiers engaging in sexual abuse, often with teenage girls sometimes with teenage boys, it's a very serious topic and one which we as citizens should address forthrightly.

I think we might have to go back to the camp follower model, in which non-local sex workers are hired to accompany the soldiers. Make sure they have a dorm mom so to speak, or perhaps even a mature couple who can make sure that both male and female prostitutes are treated decently. And invite the sex workers to form a labor union if they'd like.

The alternative is, that you have primarily young guys there as peacekeeping soldiers, high stress job, not much off time, but when they do have off time, they really want to blow off steam and they have a lot of money. The situation almost becomes a sponge for sexual trafficking.

And yes, I welcome better alternatives in addition or even instead of legal and regulated sex work.

For example, if we could just be more relaxed about masturbation. And yes, male masturbation is plenty macho and masculine enough, whatever the jokes. It's normal. And plus, it's healthy. Although for whatever reason women do seem ahead of us men in viewing masturbation as a good thing. And I am aware that even people who masturbate healthily still want some skin-on-skin contact with another.
 
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If you're talking about peacekeeping soldiers engaging in sexual abuse, often with teenage girls sometimes with teenage boys, it's a very serious topic and one which we as citizens should address forthrightly
Exactly, more specifically the cases during ""peacekeeping"" missions in the CAR.
 
Avoid world war 1 or have a Franco-Prussian like war at worse. I think France could intergrate them in this situation. In a German dominated Europe I could see France focusing more on its African lands. They might want to modernize it and utilize it fully to compete or even keep up with Germany in this type of world. This could lead to Africans being treated more as “proper Frenchmen” out of necessity.
 
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