Forced labor continued on roads and grew with cotton cultivation in the 1920s

Evidence

Although the actual incidence of coercion by the French in West Africa is impossible to quantify in the 192o’s, the persistence of prestations indicates that forced labor continued everywhere in the upkeep of local roads and administration buildings. The promulgation of directives encouraging cotton cultivation and legitimating the use of force suggests, moreover, an upsurge in coercion wherever this crop was tried out in the 192o’s. — Alice L. Conklin, A Mission to Civilize_ The Republican…, 783