World War I as a Revolutionary Moment in Algeria and Senegal

The dynamics of revolution-counterrevolution, central to historiography of Europe’s Great War, extended beyond the continent to North and West Africa. Drawing on French and Arabic-language memoirs, newspapers, and archival documents, as well as oral histories, this paper compares movements that harnessed the service of colonial soldiers to revolutionary claims for citizenship. Emir Khaled, a captain in the French army, used wartime bonds with Muslim Algerian soldiers to campaign for greater representation and suffrage. Blaise Diagne, elected as a member of parliament from Dakar in 1914, won passage of legislation granting Muslim soldiers from the coastal communes the right to citizenship in exchange for military service. In 1919, he won re-election with promises to extend citizenship to Muslim veterans in the hinterland. Georges Clemenceau, France’s wartime leader and leading anti-colonialist, supported both movements by granting political reforms against the vigorous protests of colonial governors. The paper argues that revolutionary expectations peaked in 1919 with grassroots support for incorporation into the French empire as citizens with full legal rights. Election of the Blue Horizon parliament in late 1919, however, fueled a counter-revolution. Clemenceau was forced out of politics in January 1920. Emir Khaled and Blaise Diagne continued to fight for expanded rights through 1922. Colonialist pressure radicalized their movements: Emir Khaled was forced into exile where he affiliated with socialists and Communists. Blaise Diagne opted to collaborate with the French, earning contempt from a movement that radicalized into anti-colonial nationalism. The paper concludes by situating these movements within what may be considered a forgotten revolutionary moment in 1918-20, when ordinary people across the globe embraced a vision of democratic unity and reconstruction after the war.