Conflicts of Colonialism

Richard L. Roberts is the Frances and Charles Field Professor of History at Stanford University, where he has served as the Director for the Center for African Studies for over two decades. One of the leading social historians of French West Africa, his research has been supported by fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Social Science Research Council, and the Guggenheim Foundation. He has published numerous books and edited collections including Marriage by Force? Contestation over Consent and Coercion in Africa (2016), Litigants and Households: African Disputes and Colonial Courts in the French Soudan, 1895-1912 (2005) and Two Worlds of Cotton: Colonialism and the Regional Economy in the French Soudan, 1800-1946 (1996).

• Introduction; 1. Mademba and the foundations of the bargains of collaboration, 1852–1888; 2. Conquest and construction of indirect rule in the French Soudan, 1886–1891; 3. 'A world of deception and defection': Misrule, rebellion, and indirect rule revisted, 1891–1895; 4. 'A curious and very engaging mixture of European and Native customs': Republican traditions and African kings, 1895–1899; 5. The coming storm, 1898–1899; 6. Rule of law and the bargains of collaboration: Mademba on trial, 1899–1900; 7: 'An unexpected and precious collaborator': Mademba's redemption, 1900–1906; 8: Remaking Mademba, 1906–1931; Conclusion.

'Richard Roberts paints a vivid and revealing portrait of an African leader who was called at various times an imperial intermediary or a collaborator of the colonizing regime. He brings out brilliantly the uncertainties and violence of the early years of colonial rule in West Africa.' Frederick Cooper, NYU, New York