French inspectors condemned only abusive coercion, not forced labor itself

Evidence

Like Sol’s reports, Kair’s attest to the existence of widespread abuse in the cultivation of cotton in West Africa. Confronted with the same evidence, however, both Inspectors displayed more or less the same attitude as Carde toward forced labor: that coercion was legitimate as long as it benefited the colonized. Indeed, the substance of the inspectors’ critique was not that compulsory cash-crop cultivation was in and of itself immoral-not even Kair drew that lesson-but, rather, that the ends to which coercion was being put in these instances did not justify the means. Although this emphasis reflected a genuine concern for the well-being of their subjects, it also conveniently coincided with France’s own long-term economic interests in West Africa. It was more desirable and efficient to have Africans producing cotton on their own, and at prices high enough to allow them to consume imported French goods, than to have to continue forcing them to grow cash crops. This market integration would never take place if the French continued to mistreat their labor as the inspectors had documented, or if the Africans were diverted from food production to the point that their health suffered. — Alice L. Conklin, A Mission to Civilize_ The Republican…, 819

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the broader theme across this book of how French republican ‘civilizing mission’ ideology rationalized coercion — the inspectors accept coercion as legitimate ends-based means, echoing the book’s core thesis.