French officials pathologized African desertion from labor contracts as racial laziness

Evidence

It is desertions that at this time make native labor so unreliable. The true cause of such desertions is not to be found either in the at times excessive demands of the employers, or the supposed inadequacy of the salaries, which today are fair. They seem to derive almost solely from the native indolence of the blacks, which encourages them to break their contracts signed under moral pressure, whose benefits they don’t understand. 71 Despite the potential conflict of interest between its own labor needs and those of European settlers, Dakar proved sympathetic to the labor concerns expressed by private French businessmen. — Alice L. Conklin, A Mission to Civilize_ The Republican…, 834

Categorization

• XREF: Parallels with how labor resistance is attributed to worker character rather than structural conditions — echoes today’s discourse about the ‘refusal to work.’