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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | 'The Little Farming Soldiers': The Evolution of a Labor Army in Post-Colonial Mali |
Author: | Bogosian, Catherine |
Year: | 2003 |
Periodical: | Mande Studies |
Volume: | 5 |
Pages: | 83-100 |
Language: | English |
Geographic term: | Mali |
Subjects: | neocolonialism forced labour civic service socialism Military, Defense and Arms Politics and Government Development and Technology Labor and Employment |
External link: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/44078824 |
Abstract: | In 1960, the government of Mali's president, Modibo Keita, established the 'Service civique rural' as an important part of its programme of building a socialist and self-sufficient Malian State. According to its design, young, mostly rural men recruited into the 'Service civique' would learn modern agricultural methods, receive lessons in literacy, and become familiar with the values of the socialist State and the duties of citizens within that State. Putting the history of these 'farming soldiers' in the context of the then all too recent past, this paper argues that the 'Service civique' was a direct descendant of the colonial forced labour policy known as the 'deuxième portion du contingent militaire': the 'second portion' of the colonial army. Though very different governments created the 'deuxième portion' and the 'Service civique', and did so in order to meet extremely different goals, the 'Service civique' echoed the 'deuxième portion' in three ways: the Malian government drew upon the legislative legacy of the colonial period; each institution, in its own way, reflected the concerns held, both by the colonial government and by the independent Malian government, about the relationship between rural citizens and the central government; individual Malians shared a communal memory of, and a communal distaste for, requisitioned labour in any form. This communal memory acted as a dead weight that hindered the potential of the 'Service civique'. Bibliogr., notes, ref. [ASC Leiden abstract] |