Planning Power: Town Planning and Social Control in Colonial Africa

267 Pages·2006·2.05 MB·English

by  Njoh

Planning Power

Planning Power
Town planning and social control in
colonial Africa
Ambe J. Njoh
London and New York
First published 2007
by UCL Press
The name of University College London (UCL) is a registered trademark used by
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This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2007.
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Taylor & Francis
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Published in the USA
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© 2007 Ambe J. Njoh
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Njoh, Ambe J.
Planning power : social control and planning in colonial Africa / by Ambe J. Njoh.
p. cm.
1. City planning–Africa–History. 2. Regional planning–Africa–History.
3. Colonies–Africa–Administration. 4. Social control–Africa. 5. Power (Social
sciences)–Africa. 6. Colonial cities–Africa. I. Title.
HT169.A3N47 2007
307.1’216096–dc22
2006025218
ISBN 0-203-96486-1 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN10: 1–84472–160–4 (hbk)
ISBN10: 0–203–96486–1 (ebk)
ISBN13: 978–1–84472–160–3 (hbk)
ISBN13: 978–0–203–96486–6 (ebk)
To a teacher, mentor and friend,
Michael Mattingly

Contents
Preface viii
1 Power and the built environment in colonial Africa 1
2 French colonial planning ideology and practice 14
3 British colonialism, economics and spatial structures 36
4 Town planning in British colonial West Africa 54
5 Planning in French West Africa 81
6 Planning power in French Equatorial Africa and
Madagascar 104
7 Planning in the Cameroons and Togoland 127
8 Town planning in British Southern Africa 145
9 Planning ideology and practice in British East Africa 167
10 Mining and plantation company towns 188
11 Planning, public health and spatial structures 201
12 The political economy of urban planning in colonial
Africa 223
Bibliography 236
Index 246
Preface
There is certainly no shortage of works dedicated to highlighting the distinction
between British and French colonial ideology and practice. Although consensus
on the nature and magnitude of the distinction is rare, there is a considerable level
of agreement that the two European colonial powers differed considerably on the
following three related dimensions:
• colonial administrative philosophies;
• rationales for the colonial project; and
• racial ideologies.
Colonial administrative philosophies
A lot has been written on the European colonial era in Africa. However, more often
than not, the focus is on how the colonial administrative strategy of one European
power differed from the rest. Resulting from efforts in this connection is a signifi cant
degree of consensus that the British were inclined to adopt the ‘indirect rule’ strategy
while the French favoured ‘direct rule’. A more rigorous analysis of the administrative
practices of the British, French and other European colonial powers reveal that none
of them had monopoly over any specifi c administrative strategy. Thus, the French
employed the ‘indirect rule’ strategy whenever it was convenient or necessary to do
so. Similarly, the British adopted the ‘direct rule’ strategy whenever the occasion
was apropos. Thus, the difference in the colonial administrative styles of these two
colonial powers, for example, is often exaggerated.
Rationale for colonization
Another aspect of the colonial project that is often amplifi ed relates to the objectives
of the different colonial powers. In this regard, the British colonial enterprise is said
to have been motivated by economic reasons, while the French were driven into
colonialism by a desire to bolster their country’s prestige at home, throughout Europe
and globally. Ronald E. Robinson (1964: vii) succinctly captures this perceived
difference in the following words:
viii
Preface
The liberal Anglo-Saxons painted the map red in pursuit of trade and philanthropy,
and the nationalistic French painted it blue, not for good economic reasons, but
to pump up their prestige as a great nation.
Robinson concedes that this may be an oversimplifi cation of the objectives of the
colonial projects of the two European colonial powers. However, he contends that
given the state of their economies during the Victorian age, the need for colonies was
commercially great for Britain but not for France. To be sure, while France’s economy
was self-suffi cient, with very limited, if any, foreign trade, and little appetite for
foreign imports, the British society and industries had developed a voracious appetite
for food and raw materials from abroad. This explains the fact that colonial commerce
constituted a large portion of Britain’s economic interest but a very insignifi cant part
of France’s. However, to contend, based on these differences, that Britain’s desire
for colonies was driven by economic interest, while France’s was not, constitutes
an oversimplifi cation. It is equally a brave simplifi cation to attribute exclusively to
France the desire to use colonies as tools for ameliorating the prestige of metropolitan
countries. Yet, this is exactly the impression one gets from the following statement
by Robinson (1964: ix).
French imperialism by the end of the nineteenth century was driven by nothing
more complicated than a passion for national honour and cultural extraversion.
It is foolhardy to talk of the goals and objectives of the colonial projects of different
colonial powers in absolute terms. Rather, these goals and objectives can be more
accurately discussed in terms of gradations or a continuum. Thus, the French may
rank higher on this continuum than the British with respect to employing colonialism
as a tool for attaining the goal of national honour; and lower than Britain when it
comes to using colonies to attain economic goals.
Racial ideologies
It is widely believed that the French colonial project was rooted in a sense of cultural
superiority while that of the British was grounded in a sense of racial superiority.
Thus, while the British emphasized race, the French considered culture to be the
distinguishing mark of European superiority. In theory this had two implications. On
the one hand, the British could never accept a non-Caucasian as an equal since race
is a permanent and inalterable attribute. On the other hand, the French were prepared
to accept non-Caucasians as equals as long as they could embrace French culture.
Theory and reality
It would appear that the differences characteristic of British and French colonialism
highlighted above are confi ned to theory. This assertion holds particularly true in
ix