Examine the role of political parties and leaders in the achievement of independence in Senegal in 1960.

Candidates will focus their responses on the impact of political parties and leaders in the achievement of Senegal’s independence. Candidate responses are likely to lean heavily on the role of Leopold Senghor in the independence movement, but they should also address the importance of his party (the Bloc Democratique Senegalais, BDS) as well as that of other parties and politicians. The role of non-Senegalese leaders (including French politicians and other West African nationalists) may also be considered.

Indicative content

• Candidates should stress the importance of aspiring Senegalese politicians such as Blaise Diagne, Lamine Gueye and Leopold Senghor, all of whom gained experience and prominence by sitting in the French National Assembly. Some, including Senghor, also served in the French cabinet.
• Senghor’s influential philosophy of negritude, which stressed pride in the achievements of Africans, in addition to his demand for a greater role for Africans in the administration of France’s West African colonies, were beneficial to the independence movement.
• The important role of the African division of the French Section of the Workers International (FSIA), which was prominent in representing black workers and organizing strike action against the colonial authorities.
• Senghor’s decision to break from the FSIA and establish the BDS in 1948 following his return to Senegal was a major development. This party was to win the support of the overwhelming majority of Senegalese people and it dominated Senegalese politics in the 1950s.
• Senghor’s role in drafting the loi-cadre of 1956, an act which—by delivering universal suffrage for Africans and devolving considerable powers from Paris to elected African politicians in the colonies—was a significant milestone on the road to full independence.
• Senghor’s commitment to a continued partnership with the French and the relative moderation of his Bloc Democratique helped to convince Paris that he would be a reliable post-independence ally.
• Candidates may also stress the importance of other non-Senegalese politicians in French West Africa, such as Sekou Toure, Senghor’s great rival, who urged the people of Guinea to reject membership of a new French West African Community and so hastened the process of decolonization. This ensured the political fragmentation of French colonies in the region. An independent Senegal emerged out of this fragmentation with its independence granted on the same day as the other colonies of French West Africa.

The above material is an indication of what candidates may elect to write about in their responses. However, the list is not exhaustive and no set answer is required.

Examiners and moderators are reminded of the need to apply the markbands that provide the “best fit” to the responses given by candidates and to award credit wherever it is possible to do so.

[20 marks]