ABSTRACT
After the Brazzaville conference of 1944 and the promise of reform in the French colonies, the Mouvement démocratique de rénovation malgache (MDRM) was founded in Madagascar to campaign for peaceful “democratic renewal.“The establishment of the French Union in 1946 failed, however, to satisfy widespread demands for a pathway towards independence and on the night of 29-30 March 1947, attacks on military bases on the east coast spread across the island. Over the following 20 months, French troops, including thousands of tirailleurs sénégalais, waged a brutal and ultimately successful war against the rebels. The chapter explores the failure of reform in the context of the start of the Cold War and postwar French ambitions, by maintaining close links with its Empire, to re-establish France as a great power. Building on the work of authors who have examined the role of the other parties in the tripartite government coalitions, it focuses on the motivation of the French Communist Party (PCF). Whereas the initial programme of the PCF might have seemed to predict its support for the independence movement, internal and international political pressures led it to adopt a more ambiguous position.
