French colonial authorities built a centralized surveillance apparatus over suspect Africans

Evidence

On January 15, 1921, Dakar created a federal service anthropometrique, to compile dossiers on suspect Africans throughout the federation. Although compliance was sporadic at the local level, Dakar claimed to have 1oo,ooo fiches in 1930. — Alice L. Conklin, A Mission to Civilize_ The Republican…, 565

Categorization

• XREF: Parallels to surveillance state studies and to how the French state treated colonized subjects differently from metropole citizens.