France created a West African federation to move colonial decisions out of Paris

Evidence

One of the primary reasons for instituting an overarching authority in West Africa was to decentralize decision making from the metropole. Only a senior official on the spot, the Paris government felt, would be sufficiently aware of events and conditions in the colony to make informed policy choices. — Alice L. Conklin, A Mission to Civilize_ The Republican…, 91

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to broad questions of imperial administrative decentralization and how distance shapes governance — parallels British indirect rule debates.