Ivory Coast - HISTORY

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Ivory Coast - History

OBSERVERS OF AFRICA have often characterized C�te d'Ivoire as different from the rest of Africa. Borrowing the metaphor of F�lix Houphou�t-Boigny, president of C�te d'Ivoire, they have described it as an oasis of political stability and economic prosperity--in short, the "Ivoirian miracle." Indeed, if judged on the basis of political stability and economic performance during its first twenty years of independence, C�te d'Ivoire does appear unique: it has had only one president and no coups since gaining independence, and between 1960 and 1979 the gross national product (GNP) grew by almost 8 percent per year, compared with minimal or negative growth rates elsewhere in Africa. However, that growth produced large--some would have said dysfunctional--disparities in wealth and income and skewed development. Consequently, the country was ill prepared when, in the late 1970s, world prices for coffee and cocoa, C�te d'Ivoire's principal export commodities, dropped, while prices for its principal imports rose. Meanwhile, foreign borrowing to finance massive investments in infrastructure and public enterprises (that lost money) raised C�te d'Ivoire's foreign debt beyond its ability to meet its obligations. Budget reductions and a structural adjustment program forced the vast majority of the population to lower its expectations, which in turn contributed to, among other social ills, heightened frustrations and a sharp increase in violent crime. By the end of the 1980s, C�te d'Ivoire was confronting the same problems of political and economic development as other African countries and having to respond with many of the same difficult and often inadequate solutions.

In the early precolonial period, the dense forests covering the southern half of the area that became C�te d'Ivoire created barriers to large-scale sociopolitical organizations. In the savanna region to the north, dissimilar populations had neither the incentive nor the strength to overcome ethnic differences and forge a larger state. Prior to the eighteenth century, polities consisted of villages or clusters of villages whose contacts with the larger world were filtered through long-distance traders.

European--in this case French--interest in the area remained desultory until late in the nineteenth century. Following the Franco-Prussian War in 1871, for example, the French ministry responsible for colonies offered to exchange C�te d'Ivoire with the British for the Gambia, which bisected the French colony of Senegal. The British refused, and France officially abandoned the territory. By the late 1880s, however, the scramble for colonies gripped both France and Britain. In the western Sudan, French military officers and freebooters extended French domains, often without the knowledge or consent of the home government. Unsubstantiated rumors of gold and a lucrative trade in the hinterland of C�te d'Ivoire once again stimulated French interest in the colony. In 1886 France again exercised direct control over the trading posts on the Ivoirian coast, and in 1887 and 1888 Captain Louis Binger and Maurice Treich-Lapl�ne negotiated a series of agreements with local chiefs in the north-central and northeastern regions of C�te d'Ivoire to bolster French claims of effective occupation. Thus, by the end of the decade, France exercised sovereignty over most of the coastal region of C�te d'Ivoire and claimed influence over certain regions of the interior. In 1893 C�te d'Ivoire became a colony, and Binger served as its first governor.

Over the next twenty years, French administrators used the military to subdue African populations that, with few exceptions, openly resisted French intrusions. In the 1890s, Samori Tour�, seeking to construct a kingdom across much of the Sahel, including northern C�te d'Ivoire, withstood French (and British) forces until he was captured in 1898. At about the same time in eastern C�te d'Ivoire, the Agni (Anyi) and Abron peoples first resisted the French and, after military setbacks, either sabotaged or circumvented the colonial administration. In the early twentieth century, the Baoul� of central C�te d'Ivoire openly defied colonial authorities until forcibly subdued in a bloody, so-called pacification campaign undertaken in 1906 by Governor Gabriel Angoulvant.

The French administered C�te d'Ivoire in a more direct, systematic style than did their British counterparts, who preferred indirect rule. French authorities routinely dismissed locally selected chiefs, replacing them with others having no legitimate claim to authority, and regrouped or consolidated villages in an attempt to impose a uniform administration throughout the country. As late as 1958, Paris still appointed governors, who administered the colony using a system of direct, centralized rule that left little room for Ivoirian participation. Most of the inhabitants were considered subjects of France with no political rights and a separate system of law. Thus, all adult males were forced to work ten days for no pay each year, often on plantations owned by the French, as part of a tax obligation to the state, and rural males were routinely drafted to work, again for no pay, on public works projects like roads and the railroad.

World War II profoundly affected all of French West Africa (Afrique Occidentale Fran�aise--AOF). The rapid surrender of France and the institution of highly discriminatory policies under the Vichy regime alienated the African political elite, many of whom had served France in World War I and expected greater respect. During the immediate postwar years, an emergent, educated African elite demanded reforms in colonial policy. In response, France joined with its colonies in 1946 to form a community known as the French Union and granted to African members rights of free speech, free association, and free assembly. France also eliminated separate legal codes and the practice of unlimited forced labor.

Despite these concessions, wealthy Ivoirian planters were still incensed at having to work on the plantations of French settlers, who by law received more for their crops than they themselves did. As a result, the Ivoirian planters formed the African Agricultural Union (Syndicat Agricole Africain--SAA) to fight for equal rights. In 1946 the SAA gave rise to C�te d'Ivoire's sole political party, the Democratic Party of C�te d'Ivoire (Parti D�mocratique de C�te d'Ivoire--PDCI) under the leadership of F�lix Houphou�t-Boigny. During the postwar years, the party, in cooperation with a regional coalition of anticolonialist groups, militantly challenged French policies in C�te d'Ivoire. Confrontation led to such violence and repression that by 1951 the party was in near ruin. To stave off a collapse, Houphou�t-Boigny abandoned his alliance with the French Communist Party and the radical politics of earlier years in favor of practical cooperation with French authorities. France then granted significant political and economic concessions to the colony, which soon became the wealthiest in French West Africa.

In 1956 the French government authorized for all of its African colonies a series of momentous and fundamental reforms, which in effect substituted autonomy for integration with France as the cornerstone of French colonial policy. Two years later, under the leadership of President Charles de Gaulle, the constitution of the French Fifth Republic provided for the free association of autonomous republics within the French Community, in which France was the senior partner. C�te d'Ivoire voted in favor of the constitution, which was thought to be a more pragmatic course than complete independence. Nevertheless, following the lead of Senegal and Mali, C�te d'Ivoire withdrew from the French Community and in August 1960 declared its independence. Houphou�t-Boigny became C�te d'Ivoire's first president, an office he still held in late 1989.

The original drafters of the Ivoirian Constitution of October 1960 intended to establish a democratic government with a presidential system incorporating the principles of the separation of powers and an independent judiciary. Within a short time, however, governance became highly authoritarian. Party leadership equated a unified state with unanimous support for the PDCI under the untested belief that competition among parties would waste resources, lead to corruption, and destroy unity. By circumscribing the prerogatives of the National Assembly and tailoring election laws, Houphou�t-Boigny effectively denied the assembly an independent voice; and by doling out patronage, co-opting opponents, and pitting rivals against one another, he tightened his grip on government.

Even those who objected to Houphou�t-Boigny's style admired the results of his policies: twenty years of economic growth and political stability. Nevertheless, invidious habits and attitudes that had developed over the twenty years of economic growth posed a potential threat to the political order. In few other countries was materialism as open and avowed an ideology. By the 1980s, the elite, using its official positions and connections to obtain wealth, had replaced the struggle for independence with the pursuit of privilege, leading to manifest extremes of wealth and poverty. This elite was infected with consumerism, and it could not afford to lose or even share power. At the same time, the sharp economic downturn of the 1980s and Houphou�t-Boigny's advancing age caused fears that the ethnic rivalries he sought to dampen might ignite under a less charismatic successor.

For C�te d'Ivoire, ethnicity was a particularly thorny problem. The population included some sixty indigenous ethnic groups. The largest group (that of Houphou�t-Boigny) was the Baoul�, which comprised 15 percent of the population and was centered in the forest region southeast of Bouak�. The Baoul� were part of the larger Akan ethnic cluster, which also included the Abron and the Agni groups. The chief rivals of the Baoul� were the B�t�, who in the 1980s made up approximately 6 percent of the population. During the twentieth century, the B�t� achieved recognition for their success in cash cropping and for their widespread acceptance of Christianity. Because the B�t� nurtured strong beliefs in the superiority of their culture and had a long history of resistance to foreign domination, they have often been accused of fomenting antigovernment dissent. Other major ethnic groups included the Dan, the Malink�, the Juula, the S�noufo, and the Agni. The largest single foreign minority group was the Burkinab� (natives of Burkina Faso, formerly known as Upper Volta), who were generally Mossi. They were concentrated in rural areas, where they worked as farm laborers. The Lebanese, officially estimated at 60,000 but possibly numbering 180,000, dominated sectors of the wholesale and retail trade. In 1988 there were approximately 30,000 French citizens in C�te d'Ivoire, or about the same number as at independence.

Because no single ethnic group held a preponderance of power, none could automatically impose its will. Ethnic politics, therefore, were important in C�te d'Ivoire, notwithstanding presidential statements to the contrary. And because of that cultural diversity, Houphou�t-Boigny, making a virtue of necessity, perfected the politics of inclusion. All major ethnic groups were represented in his cabinet and the major policy-making bodies of the PDCI, making it easier to deflect responsibility at a time when the rising expectations of Ivoirians were being thwarted.

The Ivoirian economy in the late 1980s continued its downward spiral, primarily because world prices for coffee and cocoa, the country's two principal exports, remained low. At the same time, exports of timber, the third largest source of foreign exchange, declined because of continued overexploitation. Two offshore petroleum fields, which in the early 1970s were projected to make C�te d'Ivoire self-sufficient in fuel, failed to achieve projected outputs, let alone self-sufficiency. Because of the relatively low world prices for petroleum and C�te d'Ivoire's high production costs, all the wells in one field were capped.

Beginning in the mid-1970s, the government undertook a major effort to diversify the export economy by expanding production of palm oil, natural rubber, coconut oil, cotton, sugar, and tropical fruits. Ten years later, the government implemented a program to modernize its import substitution industries, sell off unprofitable parastatals, and further expand exports to include processed foods, textiles, wood, and such nonagricultural products as building materials, chemicals, and electronics.

The results of all three plans were mixed. The market for palm and coconut oils was eroded by substitutes with less saturated fat; sugar, produced by a grossly inefficient parastatal, simply added to a world surplus; and in other areas C�te d'Ivoire was competing with other states of Africa and Asia producing many of the same tropical agricultural goods. Exports produced under the industrial expansion program were more expensive--at least initially--than similar goods produced elsewhere and so required export subsidies. Subsidies, however, required scarce funds. Meanwhile, Houphou�t- Boigny adamantly refused to cut producer prices for coffee and cocoa; consequently, production levels increased--some estimates for the 1988-89 cocoa harvest were as high as 700,000 tons--,which further depressed commodity prices. Finally, divestment from parastatals yielded lower returns than anticipated. Moreover, the larger, more profitable companies were purchased by foreign interests, further adding to capital flight.

The lack of investment capital was the undoing of the Ivoirian miracle. To finance development, C�te d'Ivoire borrowed substantial amounts abroad, especially during the mid-1970s when unusually high coffee and cocoa prices led planners to overestimate the potential of the economy. Thus, by 1976 high debt payments together with repatriated profits and foreign worker remittances had produced a negative net reserve position for the first time in the country's history. Debt servicing costs continued to mount to the extent that in May 1987 the government announced that it would suspend payments on its foreign debt.

To stave off a financial collapse, C�te d'Ivoire negotiated an economic recovery and structural adjustment program with the Paris Club, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the London Club that provided a respite from debt repayment. The subsequent retrenchments mandated by the programs affected all income groups in the country, but they had the greatest impact on the poor. These measures gave rise to such symptoms of violent social dislocation as drug abuse and crime--which required additional expenditures and new political options from the government.

The party-government of C�te d'Ivoire in the mid-1980s most closely resembled an old-fashioned political machine. Although it called itself a one-party democracy, C�te d'Ivoire was not a democracy in the Western sense: the government controlled the press, limited civil liberties, and allowed no institutionalized opposition to frame debate. As economic austerity exacerbated political tensions, individuals and informal groups called for greater political choice, which the government seemed unprepared to grant.

Meanwhile, students protested against the role of foreigners in the economy and the government, which they saw as controlled by a small number of party leaders for the benefit of a privileged class of bureaucrats and landowners. Corruption in the business community, long considered an affliction of other African states, was becoming embarrassingly obvious in C�te d'Ivoire. Reduced services, coupled with wage freezes and higher costs, were alienating mid-level civil servants and professionals. And increasingly brazen attacks against expatriates by well-armed bandits were affecting tourism and foreign investment. A growing number of Ivoirians was questioning whether these problems could be solved by a government dominated by an octogenarian president with no apparent successor.

In the late 1980s, the choice of a successor to Houphou�t- Boigny remained a dominant issue in Ivoirian politics. Because the style, form, tone, and policies of the government were the personal creation of the president, the succession question had substantial implications. Two plausible contenders in 1989 were Philippe Yac� and Henri Konan Bedi�, representing, respectively, the first and second generations of Ivoirian politics. Houphou�t-Boigny refused to designate an heir and left the decision to the political process, believing that the Ivoirian polity was mature enough to make a decision without recklessly endangering national security or precipitating military intervention into civilian politics.

With the exception of a small uprising (the true size of which has never been documented) in 1970 near Gagnoa in the B�t� region, the military has played no role in domestic peacekeeping. Moreover, Houphou�t-Boigny co-opted the military with sufficiently attractive perquisites (including high salaries and positions in the party) so that the senior officer corps had little interest in political meddling. To further promote satisfaction, the military was equipped with advanced equipment purchased from France.

In its foreign affairs, C�te d'Ivoire either befriended or attempted to isolate its immediate neighbors. Recognizing that the "oasis never encroaches upon the desert," Houphou�t-Boigny sought mutually beneficial ties with C�te d'Ivoire's neighbors despite ideological differences. And for good measure, he insisted that France maintain a battalion of marines near Abidjan to buttress his own military.

As C�te d'Ivoire faced the 1990s, the problems of finding a successor to Houphou�t-Boigny, discontent on the campus of its only university, an ossified party, and a beggar-thy-neighbor materialism concerned Ivoirians. At the same time, a history of political stability coupled with a tradition of civilian rule and an apparent willingness on the part of the second and third generation of Ivoirian politicians to liberalize the political process and accommodate divergent views promised a less troubled future for the country.

In mid-1989, as the economy continued its decline, even leading members of the establishment began voicing discontent, albeit in guarded terms. In September 1989, Houphouet-Boigny invited political leaders--critics and supporters--to Abidjan for what was called "five days of dialogue." Uncharacteristically sharp and candid criticisms of the party and government over the five days conveyed a lack of confidence in the ruling elite, which was labeled narrow and selfish, and called for a more responsive party in a multi-party system. Less than a month later on October 16, 1989, Houphouet-Boigny reshuffled his cabinet and, in response to World Bank recommendations, reduced it from 29 to 21 members.

Four months later, students protested recently announced wage cuts, tax increases, and the longstanding issue of single party rule with large scale demonstrations that at times turned into violent confrontations with police in the streets of Abidjan and, in one instance, in Abidjan's Roman Catholic cathedral. In April and May 1990, army and air force recruits protesting the cost- cutting decision to limit their military service to a single tour of duty demonstrated in bases across C�te d'Ivoire; a group of armed air force recruits even took over the international airport outside Abidjan for twelve hours. Police and firefighters also staged highly visible protests for higher wages. By mid-May, Houphouet-Boigny had capitulated on the issues of military duty and higher wages for police and firefighters, and he scrapped plans to increase income taxes. Most significantly, he pledged for the first time to legalize opposition parties and promised to name a successor, although as of June 1990, he had not yet done either.

Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast - PRE-EUROPEAN PERIOD

Little is known about the original inhabitants of C�te d'Ivoire. Historians believe that they were all either displaced or absorbed by the ancestors of the present inhabitants. The first recorded history is found in the chronicles of North African traders, who, from early Roman times, conducted a caravan trade across the Sahara in salt, slaves, gold, and other items. The southern terminals of the trans-Saharan trade routes were located on the edge of the desert, and from there supplemental trade extended as far south as the edge of the rain forest. The more important terminals--Djenn�, Gao, and Timbuctu--grew into major commercial centers around which the great Sudanic empires developed. By controlling the trade routes with their powerful military forces, these empires were able to dominate neighboring states.

The Sudanic empires also became centers of Islamic learning. Islam had been introduced into the western Sudan by Arab traders from North Africa and spread rapidly after the conversion of many important rulers. From the eleventh century, by which time the rulers of the Sudanic empires had embraced Islam, it spread south into the northern areas of contemporary C�te d'Ivoire.

Ghana, the earliest of the Sudanic empires, flourished in present-day eastern Mauritania from the fourth to the thirteenth century. At the peak of its power in the eleventh century, its realms extended from the Atlantic Ocean to Timbuctu. After the decline of Ghana, the Mali Empire grew into a powerful Muslim state, which reached its apogee in the early part of the fourteenth century. The territory of the Mali Empire in C�te d'Ivoire was limited to the northwest corner around Odienn�. Its slow decline starting at the end of the fourteenth century followed internal discord and revolts by vassal states, one of which, Songhai, flourished as an empire between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries. Songhai was also weakened by internal discord, which led to factional warfare. This discord spurred most of the migrations of peoples southward toward the forest belt.

The dense rain forest covering the southern half of the country created barriers to large-scale political organizations as seen further north. Inhabitants lived in villages or clusters of villages whose contacts with the outside world were filtered through long-distance traders. Villagers subsisted on agriculture and hunting.

Five important states flourished in C�te d'Ivoire in the preEuropean era. The Muslim empire of Kong was established by the Juula in the early eighteenth century in the north-central region inhabited by the S�noufo, who had fled Islamization under the Mali Empire. Although Kong became a prosperous center of agriculture, trade, and crafts, ethnic diversity and religious discord gradually weakened the kingdom. The city of Kong was destroyed in 1895 by Samori Tour�.

The Abron kingdom of Jaman was established in the seventeenth century by an Akan group, the Abron, who had fled the developing Asante confederation in what is present-day Ghana. From their settlement south of Bondoukou, the Abron gradually extended their hegemony over the Juula in Bondoukou, who were recent �migr�s from the market city of Begho. Bondoukou developed into a major center of commerce and Islam. The kingdom's Quranic scholars attracted students from all parts of West Africa.

In the mid-eighteenth century in east-central C�te d'Ivoire, other Akan groups fleeing the Asante established a Baoul� kingdom at Sakasso and two Agni kingdoms, Ind�ni� and Sanwi. The Baoul�, like the Asante, elaborated a highly centralized political and administrative structure under three successive rulers, but it finally split into smaller chiefdoms. Despite the breakup of their kingdom, the Baoul� strongly resisted French subjugation. The descendants of the rulers of the Agni kingdoms tried to retain their separate identity long after C�te d'Ivoire's independence; as late as 1969, the Sanwi of Krinjabo attempted to break away from C�te d'Ivoire and form an independent kingdom.

Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast - ARRIVAL OF THE EUROPEANS

The African continent, situated between Europe and the imagined treasures of the Far East, quickly became the destination of the European explorers of the fifteenth century. The first Europeans to explore the West African coast were the Portuguese. Other European sea powers soon followed, and trade was established with many of the coastal peoples of West Africa. At first, the trade included gold, ivory, and pepper, but the establishment of American colonies in the sixteenth century spurred a demand for slaves, who soon became the major export from the West African coastal regions. Local rulers, under treaties with the Europeans, procured goods and slaves from inhabitants of the interior. By the end of the fifteenth century, commercial contacts with Europe had spawned strong European influences, which permeated areas northward from the West African coast.

C�te d'Ivoire, like the rest of West Africa, was subject to these influences, but the absence of sheltered harbors along its coastline prevented Europeans from establishing permanent trading posts. Seaborne trade, therefore, was irregular and played only a minor role in the penetration and eventual conquest by Europeans of C�te d'Ivoire. The slave trade, in particular, had little effect on the peoples of C�te d'Ivoire. A profitable trade in ivory, which gave the area its name, was carried out during the seventeenth century, but it brought about such a decline in elephants that the trade itself virtually had died out by the beginning of the eighteenth century.

The earliest recorded French voyage to West Africa took place in 1483. The first West African French settlement, Saint Louis, was founded in the mid-seventeenth century in Senegal, while at about the same time the Dutch ceded to the French a settlement at Ile de Gor�e off Dakar. A French mission was established in 1687 at Assini, and it became the first European outpost in that area. Assini's survival was precarious, however, and only in the midnineteenth century did the French establish themselves firmly in C�te d'Ivoire. By that time, they had already established settlements around the mouth of the Senegal River and at other points along the coasts of what are now Senegal, Gambia, and Guinea-Bissau. Meanwhile, the British had permanent outposts in the same areas and on the Gulf of Guinea east of C�te d'Ivoire.

Activity along the coast stimulated European interest in the interior, especially along the two great rivers, the Senegal and the Niger. Concerted French exploration of West Africa began in the mid-nineteenth century but moved slowly and was based more on individual initiative than on government policy. In the 1840s, the French concluded a series of treaties with local West African rulers that enabled the French to build fortified posts along the Gulf of Guinea to serve as permanent trading centers. The first posts in C�te d'Ivoire included one at Assini and another at GrandBassam , which became the colony's first capital. The treaties provided for French sovereignty within the posts and for trading privileges in exchange for fees or costumes paid annually to the local rulers for the use of the land. The arrangement was not entirely satisfactory to the French because trade was limited and misunderstandings over treaty obligations often arose. Nevertheless, the French government maintained the treaties, hoping to expand trade. France also wanted to maintain a presence in the region to stem the increasing influence of the British along the Gulf of Guinea coast.

The defeat of France in the Franco-Prussian War (1871) and the subsequent annexation by Germany of the French province of AlsaceLorraine caused the French government to abandon its colonial ambitions and withdraw its military garrisons from its French West African trading posts, leaving them in the care of resident merchants. The trading post at Grand-Bassam in C�te d'Ivoire was left in the care of a shipper from <"http://worldfacts.us/France-Marseille.htm">Marseille, Arthur Verdier, who in 1878 was named resident of the Establishment of C�te d'Ivoire.

Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast - FRENCH EXPANSION IN C�TE D'IVOIRE

In 1885 France and Germany brought all the European powers with interests in Africa together at the Berlin Conference. Its principal objective was to rationalize what became known as the European scramble for colonies in Africa. Prince Otto von Bismarck also wanted a greater role in Africa for Germany, which he thought he could achieve in part by fostering competition between France and Britain. The agreement signed by all participants in 1885 stipulated that on the African coastline only European annexations or spheres of influence that involved effective occupation by Europeans would be recognized. Another agreement in 1890 extended this rule to the interior of Africa and set off a scramble for territory, primarily by France, Britain, Portugal, and Belgium.

Local Resistance and Establishment of Protectorates

In 1886, to support its claims of effective occupation, France again assumed direct control of its West African coastal trading posts and embarked on an accelerated program of exploration in the interior. In 1887 Lieutenant Louis Binger began a two-year journey that traversed parts of C�te d'Ivoire's interior. By the end of the journey, he had concluded four treaties establishing French protectorates in C�te d'Ivoire. Also in 1887, Verdier's agent, Maurice Treich-Lapl�ne, negotiated five additional agreements that extended French influence from the headwaters of the Niger River Basin through C�te d'Ivoire.

By the end of the 1880s, France had established what passed for effective control over the coastal regions of C�te d'Ivoire, and in 1889 Britain recognized French sovereignty in the area. That same year, France named Treich-Lapl�ne titular governor of the territory. In 1893 C�te d'Ivoire was made a French colony, and then Captain Binger was appointed governor. Agreements with Liberia in 1892 and with Britain in 1893 determined the eastern and western boundaries of the colony, but the northern boundary was not fixed until 1947 because of efforts by the French government to attach parts of Upper Volta (present-day Burkina Faso) and French Sudan (present-day Mali) to C�te d'Ivoire for economic and administrative reasons.

Throughout the process of partition, the Africans were little concerned with the occasional white person who came wandering by. Many local rulers in small, isolated communities did not understand or, more often, were misled by the Europeans about the significance of treaties that compromised their authority. Other local leaders, however, thought that the Europeans could solve economic problems or become allies in the event of a dispute with belligerent neighbors. In the end, the loss of land and freedom by all the local rulers resulted more from their inability to counter European deception and brute strength than from a loss of will to respond to European encroachment.

Throughout the early years of French rule, French military contingents were sent inland to establish new posts. The African population resisted French penetration and settlement, even in areas where treaties of protection had been in force. Among those offering greatest resistance was Samori Tour�, who in the 1880s and 1890s was establishing an empire that extended over large parts of present-day Guinea, Mali, Burkina Faso, and C�te d'Ivoire. Samori's large, well-equipped army, which could manufacture and repair its own firearms, attracted strong support throughout the region. The French responded to Samori's expansion of regional control with military pressure. French campaigns against Samori, which were met with fierce resistance, intensified in the mid-1890s until he was captured in 1898.

France's imposition of a head tax in 1900, aimed at enabling the colony to undertake a public works program, provoked a number of revolts. Ivoirians viewed the tax as a violation of the terms of the protectorate treaties because it seemed that France was now demanding the equivalent of a coutume from the local kings rather than the reverse. Much of the population, especially in the interior, also considered the tax a humiliating symbol of submission.

Repression and Conquest

In 1906 Gabriel Angoulvant was appointed governor of C�te d'Ivoire. Angoulvant, who had little prior experience in Africa, believed that the development of C�te d'Ivoire could proceed only after the forceful conquest, or so-called pacification, of the colony. He thus embarked on a vigorous campaign, sending military expeditions into the hinterland to quell resistance. As a result of these expeditions, local rulers were compelled to obey existing antislavery laws, supply porters and food to the French forces, and ensure the protection of French trade and personnel. In return, the French agreed to leave local customs intact and specifically promised not to intervene in the selection of rulers. But the French often disregarded their side of the agreement, deporting or interring rulers regarded as instigators of revolt. They also regrouped villages and established a uniform administration throughout most of the colony. Finally, they replaced the coutume with an allowance based on performance.

Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast - FRENCH RULE UNTIL WORLD WAR II

Evolution of Colonial Policy

French colonial policy incorporated concepts of assimilation and association. Assimilation presupposed the inherent superiority of French culture over all others, so that in practice the assimilation policy in the colonies meant extension of the French language, institutions, laws, and customs.

The policy of association also affirmed the superiority of the French in the colonies, but it entailed different institutions and systems of laws for the colonizer and the colonized. Under this policy, the Africans in C�te d'Ivoire were allowed to preserve their own customs insofar as they were compatible with French interests. An indigenous elite trained in French administrative practice formed an intermediary group between the French and the Africans.

Assimilation was practiced in C�te d'Ivoire to the extent that after 1930 a small number of Westernized Ivoirians were granted the right to apply for French citizenship. Most Ivoirians, however, were classified as French subjects and were governed under the principle of association.

Until 1958, governors appointed in Paris administered the colony of C�te d'Ivoire, using a system of direct, centralized administration that left little room for Ivoirian participation in policy making. The French colonial administration also adopted divide-and-rule policies, applying ideas of assimilation only to the educated elite. The French were also interested in ensuring that the small but influential elite was sufficiently satisfied with the status quo to refrain from any anti-French sentiment. In fact, although they were strongly opposed to the practices of association, educated Ivoirians believed that they would achieve equality with their French peers through assimilation rather than through complete independence from France, a change that would eliminate the enormous economic advantages of remaining a French possession. But after the assimilation doctrine was implemented entirely, at least in principle, through the postwar reforms, Ivoirian leaders realized that even assimilation implied the superiority of the French over the Ivoirians and that discrimination and inequality would end only with independence.

Colonial Administration

French expansion in Africa during the last quarter of the nineteenth century was so rapid that it was difficult to find enough administrators to govern the growing number of possessions effectively. For a brief period, therefore, the French adopted a system of indirect rule using indigenous leaders as their surrogates. The local rulers, however, exercised authority only by sanction of the French administrators. Those rulers who refused to submit to French directives were deposed and replaced with more cooperative ones.

With the consolidation of French power in West Africa at the end of the nineteenth century, French officials increasingly assumed direct administrative powers, and they reduced local rulers to the level of low-ranking civil servants. In 1895 France grouped the French West African colonies of C�te d'Ivoire, Dahomey (present-day Benin), Guinea, Niger, French Sudan (present-day Mali), Senegal, Upper Volta, and Mauritania together and subordinated their governors to the governor of Senegal, who became governor general. A series of additional decrees in 1904 defined the structure of this political unit and organized it into French West Africa (Afrique Occidentale Fran�aise--AOF).

France divided the individual colonies into districts known as cercles, each of which was governed by a district commander (commandant du cercle) who, because of poor communications between the cercles and the colonial governors, exercised his responsibilities with relative autonomy. Within a cercle, the commander ruled through a hierarchy of local rulers, whom he appointed and could dismiss at will. He was advised by a council of notables (conseil des notables) consisting of these local rulers and of other individuals appointed by him.

Most of the inhabitants of the colonies were subjects of France with no political rights. Moreover, they were drafted for work in mines, on plantations, as porters, and on public projects as part of their tax responsibility. They were also expected to serve in the military and were subject to the indig�nat, a separate system of law.

Economic Development and Social Change

As France consolidated its holdings in C�te d'Ivoire, it began to take steps to make the colony self-supporting. In 1900 the French initiated a policy that made each colony responsible for securing the resources--both money and personnel--needed for its administration and defense; France would offer assistance only when needed.

The public works programs undertaken by the Ivoirian colonial government and the exploitation of natural resources required massive commitments of labor. The French therefore imposed a system of forced labor under which each male adult Ivoirian was required to work for ten days each year without compensation as part of his obligation to the state. The system was subject to extreme misuse and was the most hated aspect of French colonial rule. Because the population of C�te d'Ivoire was insufficient to meet the labor demand on French plantations and forests, which were among the greatest users of labor in the AOF, the French recruited large numbers of workers from Upper Volta to work in C�te d'Ivoire. This source of labor was so important to the economic life of C�te d'Ivoire that in 1932 the AOF annexed a large part of Upper Volta to C�te d'Ivoire and administered it as a single colony.

In addition to the political and economic changes produced by colonial rule, the French also introduced social institutions that brought about fundamental changes to Ivoirian culture. Catholic missionaries established a network of churches and primary schools, which in time provided the literate Ivoirians needed by government and commerce. Some of the wealthier and more ambitious Ivoirians continued their educations at the few secondary schools and at French universities, adopting European culture and values and becoming members of a new African elite. The members of this elite were accepted as cultural and social equals by their white counterparts and were exempt from military and labor service.

Except in remote rural areas, the colonial government gradually destroyed the traditional elite by reducing the local rulers to junior civil servants and by indiscriminately appointing as rulers people with no legitimate claims to such titles. In areas where traditional leaders retained their position and power, they often developed strong rivalries with educated Ivoirians who tried to usurp that leadership on the grounds that their education and modern outlook better suited them for the position.

Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast - IMPACT OF WORLD WAR II

World War II had a profound effect on the future of all French West Africa. The fall of France and the establishment of the German-allied Vichy government in France forced the French colonies to declare loyalty either to the Vichy regime or to the Free French under General Charles de Gaulle. Although all the AOF governors remained loyal to the Vichy government, Ivoirians largely favored the Free French.

The Vichy government, espousing Nazi racial theories, subjected French West Africa to economic exploitation and overt racism. French planters intensified their labor recruitment practices and military conscription. Farmers were forced to meet production quotas to supply the armed forces at the expense of the local residents, whose standard of living had already been greatly lowered by the cutoff of imports from Europe.

The onset of World War II and the rapid surrender of France, the self-described purveyor of a so-called higher civilization, sharply revised political thinking in C�te d'Ivoire. Ivoirians resented Vichy policies and began to express feelings of Ivoirian nationalism. Ivoirian intellectuals were attracted by some of the Marxist ideas introduced by anti-Nazi movements and by some French teachers and labor organizers. In 1943 branches of an organization known as Communist Study Groups were established in the principal cities of West Africa, including Abidjan in C�te d'Ivoire. Many African intellectuals in these groups later became prominent as postwar national leaders.

Brazzaville Conference

After the defeat of France and the alignment of many West Africans with the Free French, the political maturity of the indigenous populations developed. De Gaulle recognized the need to revise the relationship between France and its colonies in Africa. In January 1944, Free French politicians and high-ranking colonial officials from the French African colonies met in Brazzaville (in present-day Congo). The Brazzaville Conference, as it came to be known, recommended political, social, and economic reforms. It accepted the representation of the colonies in the French Constituent Assembly, which was to draw up a new French constitution after the war, and the subsequent representation of the colonies in whatever parliamentary body the constitution established. The conference also recommended that the colonies be administered with greater autonomy and that both French citizens and Africans be permitted to elect a legislative assembly. In addition, the conference committed the French government to respect local customs, abolish the indig�nat, adopt a new penal code, end labor conscription, improve health and educational facilities, and open positions in the colonial administration to Africans.

The only immediate effect of the conference was the passage of a law in August 1944 granting workers in the AOF the right to organize. In October 1945, after the defeat of Germany and the end of the war, the first countrywide elections were held in C�te d'Ivoire to choose two delegates for the French Constituent Assembly, which was to meet in Paris before the end of the year. French citizens residing in C�te d'Ivoire elected one delegate, and a restricted African electorate chose F�lix Houphou�t-Boigny as the other delegate. Houphou�t-Boigny, a wealthy African planter and French-educated physician, was the cofounder of the African Agricultural Union (Syndicat Agricole Africain--SAA), which was formed in 1944 to fight for the abolition of forced labor and the rights of African planters. Much of Houphou�t-Boigny's support came from the SAA, whose members included some 20,000 African planters as well as laborers, civil servants, traders, and other Africans engaged in the money economy. In spite of his popularity, however, Houphou�t-Boigny won by only a narrow margin.

Two factors explain the closeness of the vote. First, the French colonial administration disapproved of the SAA and consequently supported the candidacy of a Mossi, costing Houphou�tBoigny the votes of the majority of Mossi, who constituted one of the largest ethnic groups in Upper Volta. And second, Houphou�tBoigny , a Baoul�, faced rival candidates from the B�t� and Agni ethnic groups. Houphou�t-Boigny's support came from most of the rural voters in the south and the forest area, but he would not have won the election without the support of most of the voters in the Bobo Dioulasso region in Upper Volta (a part of C�te d'Ivoire's annexed territory).

When the French Constituent Assembly met in Paris, 63 of the 600 delegates represented the African colonies. The African delegates, all members of the educated elite, demanded liberal reforms in the colonial system, for which they received support from French socialist and communist delegates. In the end, the assembly reevaluated colonial policy and drafted a plan for the union of France and the colonies.

In addition to abolishing the indig�nat and forced labor system, in 1945 and 1946 the French government decreed a number of other important reforms concerning Africans. It granted freedom of speech, association, and assembly to the residents of the colonies; it provided funds for economic and social development; it permitted the AOF to adopt a new penal code; and it granted all inhabitants of French colonies French citizenship. France's failure to define closely the rights of citizenship, however, prevented the indigenous populations of the colonies from the full exercise of civil rights on the grounds that they were not yet ready for it.

French Union

The first draft of the French Fourth Republic's constitution, which included whole passages of the Brazzaville recommendations, proved too liberal for the French electorate, which rejected it in a May 1946 referendum. When a second Constituent Assembly convened in June, pressure from conservative elements in France and in the colonies was strong, and sharp differences of opinion developed among the delegates. The advocates of colonial autonomy included all the colonial deputies and the French political left wing. Most African deputies, including Houphou�t-Boigny, supported the idea of local self-government and political equality for the French and the Africans. The French political right and center, however, favored a nominally federalist system, within which France would preserve its dominant position. A compromise was finally reached, and the plan for the French Union was written into a new draft constitution, which was adopted by the assembly on September 28, 1946. It was approved as the constitution of the Fourth Republic in a referendum held in France and the overseas possessions on October 13, 1946.

Under the French Union, the French West African colonies were designated as overseas territories. The French government exercised all legislative and executive powers, and the administration of C�te d'Ivoire continued under the Ministry of Overseas France (Minist�re de la France d'Outre-Mer).

Despite the acceptance of the French Union in C�te d'Ivoire, longstanding economic grievances gave rise to the development of anticolonial sentiment. With the large-scale introduction of cash crops between World War I and World War II, a wealthy African planter class emerged. These Africans competed with Europeans who had come to C�te d'Ivoire to make their fortunes. Colonial policies strongly favored the Europeans: they received free labor under the forced labor system, higher prices for their crops, and access to protected markets. African resentment against this discrimination grew during World War II, when economic hardships weighed especially heavily on African plantation owners.

The rights to free speech and assembly, guaranteed by the constitutional reforms of 1946, permitted the formation of African political parties. A number of parties based on ethnic and regional interests were organized in C�te d'Ivoire and elected members to the Territorial Assembly, created as a result of the 1946 reforms, and the Abidjan municipal council. The Democratic Party of C�te d'Ivoire (Parti D�mocratique de C�te d'Ivoire--PDCI), created in 1946 out of the SAA to appeal to a wider following than its predecessor, became the dominant party. It soon attracted the radical intellectuals from the wartime Communist Study Groups and became a significant political force in French West Africa. Its leader, Houphou�t-Boigny, was rapidly becoming a prominent national figure. Having successfully sponsored the law abolishing forced labor, he had regained support from the Mossi of Upper Volta. He served in 1946 as a delegate to the French Constituent Assembly and, later that year, to the newly constituted French National Assembly.

Regional Political Cooperation

Increasing political activity and a growing national consciousness were both responsible for and stimulated by the postwar constitutional reforms. Pressure from the SAA and similar organizations in other territories brought about most of the 1946 reforms. The reforms grouped the territories into the AOF under one elected council, the Grand Council in Dakar, thereby encouraging cooperation across territorial boundaries. As a result, in 1947 Houphou�t-Boigny and several other French West African leaders formed the African Democratic Rally (Rassemblement D�mocratique Africain--RDA).

The RDA was established during a critical period in French history. In 1946 and 1947, France was confronted by open rebellion in Indochina and Madagascar and by unrest in North Africa. Internally, the alliance between conservatives and communists, uneasy from the start, was collapsing. The French viewed the RDA, which called for full equality and consequently enjoyed the support of African and French communists, as another serious threat to French colonial interests. As a result, the French colonial administration harassed the RDA, which was also opposed by Africans allied with the more moderate French Socialist Party. Nevertheless, the RDA soon emerged as the dominant political force in French West Africa, and C�te d'Ivoire, where African and European planters were in direct competition, provided the most fertile ground for recruiting a militant African party. Consequently, C�te d'Ivoire became the stronghold of the RDA, and Houphou�t-Boigny became the RDA leader. Thus, France also considered C�te d'Ivoire and Houphou�t-Boigny's party, the PDCI, as threats to French colonial rule.

After a strongly conservative and discriminatory colonial administration was installed in 1947, relations between the PDCI and the administration became openly hostile. The administration actively sponsored rival parties and manipulated elections. It dismissed PDCI supporters from government jobs and jailed most PDCI leaders. Only his parliamentary immunity enabled Houphou�t-Boigny to escape imprisonment. The PDCI retaliated by organizing strikes, boycotts of European goods and services, and mass demonstrations. In 1949 the hostility erupted into violence as government troops fired on African demonstrators on several occasions.

By 1951 the PDCI was close to collapse. Its alliance, through the RDA, with the French Communist Party had alienated the more moderate elements of the party. Government-sponsored rival parties had eroded much of its popular support and drastically weakened its position in elective bodies of the French Union. Houphou�t-Boigny, in a radical effort to preserve the PDCI, severed connections with the French Communist Party and expelled the RDA's secretary general, who supported the communist association. He then abandoned the PDCI policy of militant opposition to the administration and embarked on a policy of practical cooperation. This policy change restored the strength and prestige of the PDCI at home and of the RDA in the rest of the AOF and France. Also, it led to political concessions as well as significant economic cooperation with France and members of the local French community. Within a short time, C�te d'Ivoire became the wealthiest territory in the AOF.

Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast - DEMOCRATIC PARTY OF C�TE D'IVOIRE

By the end of 1946, the PDCI achieved its political monopoly by bargaining with potential contenders, rather than through open competition. In any event, the party received widespread support throughout the country. For example, an African could be elected in C�te d'Ivoire only with the endorsement of the PDCI.

The organization of the PDCI, based on that of the French Communist Party, was determined during the party's First Territorial Congress in October 1947. The Executive Committee presided over party cells located throughout the country. Although the PDCI became a direct party, operating on the principle of democratic centralism, it deviated from French Communist Party organization in that it was not a vanguard party with restricted membership. Instead, it became a mass organization whose members were required only to purchase a party card and pay annual dues.

Ideologically, the PDCI discouraged the transition to independence or even greater democracy on the pretext that intraparty disagreements prevented the party from implementing its democratic governing mechanisms. Instead, the PCDI's leadership gave Houphou�t-Boigny almost autocratic control. In addition, sous-section (subsection at the cercle level) officials and others in positions of responsibility frequently nominated village committees in rural areas instead of allowing them to be elected. As a result, most rural party committees reflected the preexisting ethnic imbalance. At the national level, PDCI leaders had stipulated from the party's birth that party congresses would be held annually as part of the democratic process. In fact, by 1956 only two had been held: in 1947 and 1949. Consequently, those in party offices enjoyed long, uncontested tenures.

Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast - REFORM AND THE FRENCH COMMUNITY

The reforms of 1956, or loi cadre, passed by the French Fourth Republic, acknowledged the growing nationalism and a developing political consciousness in the AOF. From its inception, the loi cadre drew on the suggestions of African leaders who were permitted to participate in the decision-making process.

Conceptually, the loi cadre ended the integrationalist phase of French colonial policy and granted considerable internal autonomy to the overseas territories. Universal suffrage and the elimination of the dual college electoral system led to the creation of district and local representative councils and a great enlargement of the powers of the territorial assemblies. Each territory could formulate its own domestic policies, although the territories continued to rely on France for decisions concerning foreign affairs, defense, higher education, and economic aid. As its most important provision, the loi cadre established the Council of Government, which assumed the major executive functions of each territory, until that time carried out by a colonial official appointed in Paris.

After the dissolution of the French Fourth Republic in 1958, General Charles de Gaulle, the first president of the Fifth Republic, had even more extensive reforms written into a new constitution, reflecting not only de Gaulle's own pragmatic and anti-imperialist ideas but also the economic and political changes that had occurred since 1946. The French constitution of 1958, creating the Fifth Republic, provided for the free association of autonomous republics within the newly created French Community, in which France was the senior partner. The community had jurisdiction over foreign policy, defense, currency, common ethnic and financial policy, policy on strategic raw materials, and, unless specifically excluded by agreement, higher education, internal and external communications, and the courts. An elected president, who was also the president of the Fifth Republic, presided over the community's executive, which consisted of an executive council and a senate elected indirectly by each member state in proportion to the population. Each member state was to have its own government and a separate constitution.

In September 1958, France presented a referendum to the community. Each member could accept the constitution and consequent membership in the community or reject it and immediately sever all ties with France. C�te d'Ivoire voted almost unanimously in favor of the constitution, further confirming the almost mystical feeling of brotherhood with France that more than fifty years of cultural assimilation had instilled, particularly among the economic and political elite. The elite prudently recognized that although C�te d'Ivoire was the wealthiest French African territory, it lacked the financial resources and the trained work force to develop as rapidly as it could as a member of the community. Also, because Africanization of high-level posts within the government had barely begun in 1957, too few trained Ivoirians were available to staff the administration. A continued association with France was seen as the pragmatic course.

In March 1959, C�te d'Ivoire adopted its first constitution as a self-governing republic. It provided for a unicameral legislature elected by universal, direct suffrage and an executive headed by a prime minister elected by a majority vote of the legislature and responsible to it. The PDCI won all seats of the newly formed legislature, and Houphou�t-Boigny resigned his post in the French government to form the first government of C�te d'Ivoire.

Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast - INDEPENDENCE AND THE ONE-PARTY SYSTEM

In 1959 several West African members of the French Community formed the Mali Federation. Although the federation initially included Senegal, French Sudan, Upper Volta, and Dahomey, all but Senegal and French Sudan withdrew quickly under pressure from Houphou�t-Boigny, who regarded the federation's desire for independence from France as a threat to the economic development of the former French colonies. Nonetheless, the federation gained independence in June 1960 and split into the two independent nations of Senegal and Mali.

Meanwhile, to counterbalance the Mali Federation, Houphou�tBoigny in 1959 successfully convinced several other West African leaders to form the Council of the Entente (Conseil de l'Entente-- Entente)--a loose grouping that included Niger, Dahomey (presentday Benin), Upper Volta (present-day Burkina Faso), and C�te d'Ivoire--to pool their resources for economic development.

Houphou�t-Boigny's argument against independence quickly lost its appeal among other members of the French Community following the independence of Senegal and Mali. In addition, in early 1960 the French government sponsored an amendment to the 1958 constitution that permitted community members to gain complete independence but remain within the community. Houphou�t-Boigny was opposed to this reconstituted community, which he considered a new federation, and in August 1960 C�te d'Ivoire withdrew from the community and became independent. Houphou�t-Boigny was the first head of state.

On October 31, 1960, the National Assembly of C�te d'Ivoire adopted a constitution establishing an independent republic. Those involved in the drafting of the Constitution, including Houphou�tBoigny and other PDCI members, wanted to establish a strong and stable government based on democratic principles. They also wanted a presidential system based on the separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches of government and an independent judiciary. In practice, however, a gap developed between the democratic principles written into the Constitution and political practice. The PDCI leadership equated national unity with unanimous support for the PDCI and believed that competition among political parties would waste resources and destroy unity. Therefore, election provisions made it almost impossible for another party to win seats in the National Assembly. As the sole political party, the PDCI came to exercise political control over all branches of government.

By the late 1960s, power was concentrated in the hands of Houphou�t-Boigny, who, in addition to his position as president, was also titular president of the PDCI. Loyal colleagues received positions of authority within the police and armed forces, as well as in the government and PDCI. Philippe Yac�, who held the positions of secretary general of the PDCI and president of the National Assembly, was the second most powerful figure in C�te d'Ivoire. The president appointed the administrative heads of the 6 departments (d�partements), 24 prefectures (pr�fectures), and 107 subprefectures (souspr�fectures ), which constituted the administration of C�te d'Ivoire. Houphou�t-Boigny also selected the thirty-five members of the Economic and Social Council (Conseil Economique et Social), a government body, and, with the Political Bureau, chose the members of the National Assembly.

Houphou�t-Boigny further consolidated his power by circumscribing the prerogatives of the National Assembly. Presidential and PDCI control of assembly membership precluded an independent or opposition role by the assembly in the decision-making process. At the same time, the existence of an assembly with responsibility for approving proposed laws legitimized the government's democratic pretensions. Moreover, the PDCI used the assembly as a means of co-opting potential government opponents and securing their loyalty by providing deputies with a variety of privileges and amenities. Finally, the government channeled its major decisions through the assembly to the ethnic and interest groups that its members supposedly represented, thereby again giving the appearance of legitimate government.

Houphou�t-Boigny also took steps to ensure the new regime's security. Although C�te d'Ivoire had no military until more than a year after independence, one was finally organized and strengthened with French assistance. Ivoirian members of the French colonial marine infantry who had been born in C�te d'Ivoire were transferred to Abidjan in October 1961 and formed the core of the first battalion. By late 1962, the military comprised about 5,300 soldiers organized into four battalions.

Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast - INTERNAL DISSENT AND FURTHER CONSOLIDATION OF POWER

Despite Houphou�t-Boigny's efforts to consolidate power and build a strong military, several events in the early 1960s demonstrated the vulnerability of the new regime. In 1962 a group of young radical PDCI members, displeased with the regime's moderate policies, allegedly planned to capture Houphou�t-Boigny and other party leaders. More than 125 people were arrested and secretly tried in the president's hometown of Yamoussoukro. Fortyfour of the alleged plotters were convicted. In 1963 the government announced the discovery of another plot, which allegedly involved a coalition of hostile groups, including left-wing youth, discontented politicians, and northerners who resented southern domination in the government. In April 1971, Houphou�t-Boigny released the last of those who had been jailed following the 1963 trials and virtually admitted that the charges had been baseless.

Changes in Government and Party Structures

In 1965 Houphou�t-Boigny reorganized his administration to accommodate the growing number of Ivoirians qualified to fill government positions. The four existing d�partements were redivided into six d�partements with twenty-four pr�fectures. A corresponding increase in the number of prefects (pr�fets) took place. By the end of 1972, there were 115 subprefectures. This rise in the number of administrative subdivisions facilitated easier public access to government offices that the new civil code, implemented in 1964, necessitated.

Houphou�t-Boigny also purged the party of more than 200 party leaders in mid-1964. The group included five members of the Political Bureau and six members of the Executive Committee of the party's Youth Auxiliary, who had been implicated in alleged treasonous activities. In the ensuing overhaul of the party structure, party leaders modified the PDCI's organization to parallel the reorganized state bureaucracy; forty-five new party sections, corresponding to the number of new subprefectures in 1965, were added to the existing sections. Each was led by an elected secretary general. The number of party sections was increased again in 1970 to correspond to the increase in the number of subprefectures. The new sections were subdivided into village committees in rural areas and into ward and ethnic subcommittees in towns.

Sources of Popular Discontent

After independence, the production of export cash crops such as coffee and cocoa supported the development of nonagricultural economic growth, particularly in the Abidjan area. The commercial development of Abidjan and its growing status as the administrative center of the country consequently attracted even more French private investment and personnel. This concentration of economic and political activity in Abidjan led to population shifts toward the south and the creation of a modern capital, the life of which contrasted sharply with C�te d'Ivoire's up-country village life.

The country's increasing economic wealth, however, did not benefit all segments of the population. Rapid urbanization brought massive urban unemployment and rising conflict. Labeled by the government as the sans-travail, unemployed Ivoirians in Abidjan began to organize protest demonstrations in 1969 to pressure the government to achieve greater Ivoirianization of lowlevel jobs. On September 30, 1969, about 1,600 demonstrators were arrested in the capital, leading to resentment of both government and foreign workers among the sans-travail.

Another problem area existed between Ivoirian intellectuals and some elites on the one hand and white Europeans, mainly the French, who held numerous skilled jobs in the economy and civil service, on the other hand. The Ivoirian government was reluctant to undertake a large-scale Ivoirianization of the economy. It wanted to preserve C�te d'Ivoire's economic ties to France and to avoid staffing the administration with untrained bureaucrats. Consequently, many Ivoirians perceived Houphou�t-Boigny as favoring Europeans over Ivoirians in employment.

Another rift resulted from the influx from other African countries of hundreds of thousands of unskilled workers, most of whom were Mossi from Upper Volta. The Ivoirian government encouraged the import of cheap foreign African laborers, who worked on the large coffee and cocoa plantations and in industry. Competition between Ivoirian and foreign workers exploded into violence in September and October 1969, when widespread attacks on Mossi workers occurred in Abidjan.

A fourth area of conflict resulted from the antagonism between students and the PDCI government. This antagonism manifested itself in recurrent protests by university students. Large numbers of Ivoirian students who had studied in France or were influenced by students from many other sub-Saharan African countries rejected the PDCI's ideological movement away from socialism that had begun in 1950. They rejected what they perceived as the regime's neocolonial policies vis-�-vis France. Many students also objected to the government's placement of the major student organization under the control of the PDCI.

A confrontation between the students and the government occurred in May 1969, when the student organization, the Movement of Ivoirian Primary and Secondary School Students (Mouvement des Etudiants et El�ves de C�te d'Ivoire--MEECI), presented a list of demands to the government for specific reforms at Abidjan University (present-day National University of C�te d'ivoire) and held a strike in which 150 students participated. The government arrested all Ivoirian student protesters in Abidjan, expelled all foreign students, and closed the university for two weeks, leading to further expressions of student discontent at the university. The government's crackdown aroused the sympathy of other discontented groups, including the sans-travail and secondary students in other towns. For its part, the government considered student activity as a threat to its authority and political stability, and it blamed the strike on outside communist influences.

Consolidation of Power in the 1960s and 1970s

After the 1963 alleged coup plot, Houphou�t-Boigny took steps to ensure party and military loyalty. His success over the ensuing years lay in his carefully crafted system of checks and balances, using ethnic differences, political animosities, and co-optation to guarantee his own supremacy. To satisfy the the political elite, he resorted to state and party patronage, mostly in the form of highpaying jobs. To diffuse the potential for ethnic conflict resulting from perceived inequalities in the development process, he divided cabinet appointments among representatives of C�te d'Ivoire's major ethnic groups.

To fortify his hold over the armed forces, he assumed direct control of the police and military, the size of which he reduced from 5,300 to 3,500 members. He divided responsibility for internal security among seven groups--a 3,000-man militia linked to the party and composed almost exclusively of Baoul� (Houphou�t-Boigny's ethnic group); a 3,000-man gendarmerie; the police; a special presidential guard; a small navy; a small air force; and the army. He also broadened his executive powers so that he alone could appoint and promote senior military officers. With the removal of political rivals following the 1962 and 1963 conspiracy trials, Houphou�t-Boigny's was unchallengeable.

In the 1970s, as the Ivoirian polity became somewhat more sophisticated, Houphou�t-Boigny of necessity refined his style. He began replacing aging and loyal party militants with younger intellectuals and highly trained technocrats for whom he often created positions in his government--and who therefore owed him fealty. After the 1970 party congress, Houphou�t-Boigny also began naming younger members to the political bureau and as candidates to the National Assembly. He ingratiated himself with the middle and lower classes by speaking out frequently about the failures of government officials. His preferred method of addressing popular issues was through dialogues in which the public could air their grievances to their seemingly attentive leader. During the first dialogue in January 1974 with 2,000 party workers, Houphou�t-Boigny invited criticisms and appointed various committees to study and recommend reforms. In March a second dialogue with foreign and local business leaders elicited resolutions and warnings to inefficient and corrupt cadres and to the Lebanese and French business communities. No reforms of substance occurred following either of these sessions, but by allowing public criticism albeit in a tightly controlled environment, the president remained informed about popular dissatisfaction. Subsequently he could take steps either to remedy or to suppress problems while maintaining his firm grip over Ivoirian politics.

Houphou�t-Boigny also continued to invite traditional, or ethnic, leaders to participate in both party and government at the local level so that he could maintain constructive ties with the traditional elite. Nevertheless, he was not always able to extinguish all micronationalist sentiments. For example, the Agni of Sanwi claimed that their kingdom had become part of C�te d'Ivoire without their consent. In December 1969, the Sanwi king called for the kingdom to secede and led a separatist revolt. Government troops swiftly suppressed the rebellion. In November 1970, a B�t� leader, Gnagb� Niab� (also known as Gnab� Opadjel�) proclaimed himself grand chancellor of C�te d'Ivoire. When Houphou�t-Boigny refused to accept Gnab�'s candidacy for president or grant his request for a cabinet post, Gnab� gathered a large group of supporters and marched on Gagnoa. Again, government troops captured the rebel leader, ending the small rebellion.

Houphou�t-Boigny's ability to maintain stability lay in his belief in strong management and organization, which led him from independence to building an administration based on the solid, bureaucratic institutions left by the French. In fact, the large number of French bureaucrats and entrepreneurs remaining in C�te d'Ivoire supported Houphou�t-Boigny's monopoly on political power and thereby contributed to the perceived effectiveness of the public and private sectors of the Ivoirian economy. In November 1975, he was reelected president, claiming nearly 100 percent of the vote.

In the early 1970s, notwithstanding political calm and rapid economic growth, underemployment and unemployment continued to pose problems in C�te d'Ivoire. Immigrants continued to flood the lowest end of the job market, while whites continued to dominate the top executive jobs. In addition, the uneven distribution of social services and jobs throughout the country exacerbated the regional economic disparities arising from the growing concentration of wealth in the south. And finally, the adverse effects of the 1973 Sahelian drought on northern farmers caused even greater dissatisfaction among the rural population.

Houphou�t-Boigny relied on his charisma and the government's offers to dispel discontent. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, he gained popular favor by alternating Ivoirian independence festivities between Abidjan and the different prefecture capitals. Prefecture capitals hosting the festivities underwent massive rehabilitation, which included jobs in construction for new governmental buildings, streets, and housing. And when neither charisma nor largess mollified his critics, Houphou�t-Boigny skillfully blamed others. In July 1977, he reorganized his cabinet, dismissing four of the country's most influential political figures, who, although instrumental in the growth of the Ivoirian economy, were also accused of involvement in fraudulent schemes to enrich themselves. These figures became useful scapegoats for continuing fraud and maldistribution of the nation's wealth.

On two occasions in the early 1970s, Houphou�t-Boigny traveled to the north to convince local populations that he was not to blame for the state of affairs and to dispense politically timely aid in the form of development programs. The enthusiasm generated by the president's northern visits spread to other regions seeking largess from a presidential visit. Eager to exploit this nationwide burst of personal support, the government scheduled presidential trips throughout the country over the next several years.

The military also showed signs of restlessness. An alleged coup conspiracy by a group of discontented young officers, in June 1973 followed by the 1974 military overthrow of Niger's Hamani Diori, Houphou�t-Boigny's lifelong friend, undermined Houphou�t-Boigny's confidence in the government's security and precipitated changes in the military. Although many Ivoirian political observers thought that the conspirators of the alleged coup had done nothing more than discuss among themselves the need for greater economic equality in C�te d'Ivoire, the government dealt with them harshly. Shortly thereafter, Houphou�t-Boigny replaced two senior French military officers, who had allegedly fomented discontent among Ivoirian officers, with Ivoirians. Further changes, designed to instill military loyalty by giving the armed forces more scope in national affairs, took place in July 1974, when Houphou�t-Boigny appointed military officers to both high- and low-level positions in the civil administration. And finally, in February 1979, Houphou�t-Boigny appointed eight army officers as prefects and subprefects to give the military a greater stake in maintaining the status quo.

Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast - ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL ISSUES OF THE LATE 1970s AND 1980s

Growing Economic Problems

The worldwide economic recession at the beginning of the 1980s caused the prices of cocoa and coffee, C�te d'Ivoire's principal exports, to drop sharply, resulting in a significant economic slowdown. Combined with soaring commercial interest rates, the recession abruptly truncated the growth of the Ivoirian economy and exacerbated tensions in the labor force, where underemployment and unemployment had become acute. In mid-1978 complaints about inflation, the public debt, decreasing exports, the role of foreigners in the economy, and the succession question appeared in antigovernment tracts distributed in Abidjan. Popular manifestations of discontent with the regime's rigid policies, as well as with declining revenue, high urban unemployment, and the atrophied one-party political system, continued into the early 1980s. As was by now typical, Houphou�t-Boigny dealt quickly with the complaints by proposing more rapid Ivoirianization and steps to decentralize and democratize local administrations. The government also trimmed the budget of several development programs.

Perhaps foreseeing political problems, Houphou�t-Boigny took steps to consolidate further his own control. In 1980, again running unopposed, he was elected to a fifth term in office. In the same year, the Seventh Party Congress of the PDCI, following instructions from the president, abolished the post of PDCI secretary general and established Houphou�t-Boigny as the party's executive chairman, assisted by the new nine-member Executive Committee of the Political Bureau.

Succession Question

The question of who would succeed Houphou�t-Boigny became the significant political issue by the beginning of the 1980s. Many political observers believed that if Houphou�t-Boigny did choose a successor, internecine feuds would erupt within the PDCI. They also believed that, at least initially, no one could combine Houphou�tBoigny 's prestige, charisma, and experience with the political acumen that he had exercised over Ivoirian politics for almost thirty years.

In 1980 a constitutional amendment created the office of vicepresident , who was to succeed to the presidency in the event of a midterm vacancy and who would be chosen by and elected at the same time as the president. The next elections, however, were not scheduled until 1985, and Houphou�t-Boigny had given no indication of his plans for a vice-presidential running mate. (In 1985 Houphou�t-Boigny resolved the problem by amending the constitution, eliminating the position of vice-president.)

In the 1970s, Philippe Yac�, the president of the National Assembly and PDCI secretary general, seemed to be the most likely successor. In 1975 the National Assembly adopted a law stipulating that power would pass to the president of the assembly, confirming Yac� as the second most powerful man in the country. Nevertheless, Yac�, who was popular with party officials, had many enemies, mostly because of his role as chief accuser in the fabricated 1963 plot.

In 1980 the prospects for designating a presidential successor were even more obscured when Houphou�t-Boigny abolished the post of PDCI secretary general held by Yac�, who had fallen into disfavor with the president because he was thought guilty of pride. Shortly thereafter, Yac� was also stripped of his position as president of the National Assembly.

By the early 1980s, the list of possible successors included members of the old guard in the top echelons of the party as well as technocrats--middle-aged, university-educated Ivoirians--who filled executive positions in the administrative bureaucracy and the economy. Among the old guard who enjoyed great support inside the PDCI were Minister of State Mathieu Ekra; Senior Minister of State Auguste Denise; and president of the Economic and Social Council Mamadou Coulibaly. The most likely candidate, however, was Henri Konan Bedi�, a Baoul�, a technocrat, and the new National Assembly president. According to Article 11, amended, of the Constitution, the president of the National Assembly takes over the office of the president of the republic should the latter die or become incapacitated. The provisional president can then run for a full term in elections, which are to take place within sixty days. As provisional president, Bedi� would have an edge over possible rivals. Moreover, demographic trends favored Bedi�, who as a second generation politician enjoyed growing support from younger and middle-aged Iviorians who believed perhaps that Yac�, a first generation figure, was now too old. A third group of political rivals was a younger generation of politicians, most in their thirties, who were known for their effectiveness in the economic sphere and favored closer ties with the United States and the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany).

In the mid-1980s, political infighting threatened to spill over boundaries of the narrow circle of the party leadership, however. That Houphou�t-Boigny continued to resist naming a successor proved disconcerting to all those in positions of power, as well as to the West and especially to France, which had extensive investments in C�te d'Ivoire.

Party Decentralization

As the Ivoirian bureaucracy assumed a more prominent position in the postindependence years, the PDCI withered steadily. Increasingly it became a sinecure for the old guard, who lacked the ability to hold government office but remained personally loyal to the president. Also, by the early 1970s the one-party political structure was based on a purely ethnic system of representation at the local level that lacked any democratic procedures and that had produced an economically privileged political class. Moreover, the party and government hierarchies were characterized by nepotism and corruption. And finally, the poorly defined and overlapping responsibilities of party officials caused infighting and political rivalry.

In the late 1970s, Houphou�t-Boigny, faced with growing party disarray, began to decentralize the PDCI at the local level, where a substantial change in party leadership took place. For the first time, the local party secretary generals, previously elected as part of a slate, were now to be chosen in open elections.

Discontent on Campus

The academic community was the most vocal protest group. The first sign of difficulty occurred in 1982, when the union of students went on strike to protest government efforts to halt political speeches on the National University of C�te d'Ivoire campus. Houphou�t-Boigny responded in his typical paternalistic fashion: he chastised the students, dissolved their movement, and forced them to return to their villages until they all had apologized in writing to the government. Laurent Gbagbo, a young professor who during the strike spoke out on the need for a multiparty system, went into voluntary exile in France and became a symbol for young Ivoirians who wanted to liberalize the ruling party.

Further disturbances occurred in 1983, when approximately 4,000 secondary-school teachers, members of the National Union of Secondary School Teachers of C�te d'Ivoire (Syndicat National des Enseignants du Secondaires de C�te d'Ivoire--SYNESCI), went on strike to protest the elimination of their housing allowances. Their strike was also an expression of solidarity with those students and professors who had protested over issues of free speech the year before and, more significant, had voiced their basic opposition to Houphou�t-Boigny. Because the teachers' union was the only union independent of the PDCI (SYNESCI refused to affiliate with the official government union), the government dissolved the union during the strike. In addition, the teachers complained that Houphou�t-Boigny had unfairly penalized them and ignored cabinet members who, they alleged, had mismanaged the economy. Reacting once again in an arbitrary manner that further alienated teachers and students alike, Houphou�t-Boigny closed all the secondary schools and sent the 200,000 students home.

Other Sources of Discontent

The teachers' strike quickly expanded into a major political issue at a time when underlying popular discontent had already come close to the surface. Shortly before the strike, the president had announced an expensive move of the capital from Abidjan to his village birthplace, Yamoussoukro. The move promised to increase vastly the value of land in the region, much of which was owned by the president and his family. And then, after the strike, Houphou�t-Boigny delivered an extraordinary speech to the PDCI's Political Bureau in which he divulged the sources and use of his own extensive wealth. The consequent publication of the speech surprised much of the population, many of whom had been adversely affected by the country's increasing economic difficulties, and aroused tremendous popular disapproval.

In 1984, despite record harvests and prices for cash crops and a rescheduling of the external debt, the political atmosphere remained glum. Public investigations revealed high levels of corruption in the public housing sector and led to a protracted trial and the subsequent imprisonment of a number of high-ranking officials. More important, the trial implicated higher authorities, including past and present ministers and members of the president's family, none of whom was brought to justice.

Popular discontent also increased in response to the president's implementation of austerity measures. In the public sector, the government froze salaries. Throughout 1984 the employees retaliated by threatening strikes, work stoppages, and absenteeism. In the private sector, where politicians who were also business people had always enjoyed privileged treatment, financial irregularities were usually ignored. But the austerity measures took aim at the business people, eliminating their privileges and exposing financial scandals. For example, Emmanuel Dioulo, Abidjan's mayor, reportedly defrauded the National Agricultural Development Bank of US$32 million. At the end of March 1985, when the PDCI's Executive Committee lifted Dioulo's parliamentary immunity so that he could be tried on criminal charges, Dioulo fled the country. Following the Dioulo affair, Houphou�t-Boigny launched a series of tax investigations of Yac� and other prominent political figures who had acquired personal fortunes.

During Houphou�t-Boigny's 1984 annual summer vacation in Europe, a number of political tracts, published by unidentified opposition groups, appeared in the capital. The tracts questioned the president's political views and denounced the failure of the PDCI to manage the economy. The PDCI leadership responded to the attacks by organizing a series of trips to the interior to speak personally to the population. This measure, however, only created more tension because the leaders competed among themselves for coverage in the national media and exposed their sometimes bitter rivalry. One reason for the increasing intensity of the rivalry was the scheduled September 1985 Eighth Party Congress of the PDCI, to be followed by legislative and presidential elections.

In addition to the succession issue and the economic crisis, urban populations were faced with a worsening crime wave for which Ivoirians blamed foreigners primarily from Ghana and Burkina Faso. Some gangs, however, were directed by the Ivoirian underworld, an organized crime group that sometimes recruited unemployed youths from Upper Volta. Many of the attacks were aimed at affluent French and Lebanese business people.

Thus, by the end of 1984, uncertainty and instability permeated the Ivoirian political and economic sectors, replacing the growth and optimism of a decade earlier. The most pressing issue, however, as viewed by the Ivoirian political elite and Western governments (France in particular), was whether Houphou�t-Boigny would designate an official successor for the 1985 elections. The Ivoirian elite seemed committed to a stable transition of power, mostly to protect their economic interests. Clearly, many Ivoirian politicians believed that this designation would eliminate much of the then-pervasive popular discontent.

Ivory Coast