France made substantial material and infrastructural improvements in Algeria

Evidence

Before one dissects the deficiencies, however, one needs briefly to pay tribute to the truly remarkable material achievements that France had wrought in Algeria during the course of her tenancy of a century and a quarter. Even a decade after the ending of France’s rule, a visitor to Algeria could not help but be impressed by the depth of the roots her civilisation left behind; an excellent network of roads often as good in quality as those of France, and over terrain as difficult as anywhere in the world; modern railways and airfields; great cities and a score of ports; electricity and gas and a (slightly less efficient) telecommunications system. She created a medical service and imposed standards of hygiene where none had existed. In agriculture, she increased the 2,000 cultivable square miles of 1830 to 27,000 in 1954; with her capital and know-how, she dug mines and set up vast industries that would not otherwise have existed; she provided jobs in France for several hundred thousand Algerian immigrant workers, and subsidised some eighty per cent of the country’s budget deficit. — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 176

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s interest in France’s mixed colonial legacy that both enabled development and built resentment. — connects to: French colonial administration was concentrated in Algiers while vast regions were under-administered; The Constantine Plan proposed deep economic integration of Algeria with France — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 937; The Constantine Plan made unprecedented economic investment in Algeria — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 1028 (+1 more)

Related

• The Constantine Plan made unprecedented economic investment in Algeria (similarity 0.86)
• The Constantine Plan proposed deep economic integration of Algeria with France (similarity 0.85)
• French colonial administration was concentrated in Algiers while vast regions were under-administered (similarity 0.84)
• The Constantine Plan produced measurable Algerian economic and educational gains. (similarity 0.83)
• Algerians credited France’s Algerian achievements as benefiting French settlers, not natives. (similarity 0.83)
• Severing Algeria proved a net economic gain for France (similarity 0.82)
• Defeat in Algeria paradoxically produced a stronger France (similarity 0.82)
• Demographic pressure rather than French presence produced Algerian misery (similarity 0.81)
• The Constantine Plan’s achievements fell far short of its targets. (similarity 0.80)
• Defeated OAS destroyed Algeria’s French-built infrastructure and institutions (similarity 0.80)
• Algeria’s loss paradoxically produced a stronger postcolonial France (similarity 0.80)
• Algerian independence coincided with the start of France’s economic miracle. (similarity 0.80)
• Algerian integration would numerically swamp metropolitan France politically. (similarity 0.80)
• Algerians could not ascribe each destroyed site to a particular side (similarity 0.79)
• Interdependence forced reconciliation between France and Algeria despite violence. (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Defeated OAS destroyed Algeria’s French-built infrastructure and institutions #contradicts (0.60)