ABSTRACT
The first world war brought a striking contraction of the educational system with a sharp fall in the number of pupils and of schools, as Frenchmen employed as teachers were hurriedly summoned back to France. Post-war educational expansion was achieved without a commensurate increase in teaching personnel, and thus, inevitably, at the cost of falling educational standards. Between 1918 and 1924 the educational structure which had existed embryonically since 1903 was given its definitive form. French teachers were also sometimes suspected of inculcating political radicalism into their charges—and almost all of them were bound to make loud complaints about the poverty of educational facilities. African education, and much else besides, suffered far less as a result of the machinations of colonial officials (try as they might, and did), and far more as a result of the fundamental fact of the country’s integration into a world capitalist and imperial system.
