Compensating for the past: debating reparations for slavery in contemporary France

Abstract

The article explores the place of reparations for slavery in the contemporary politics and culture of France and the French-speaking Caribbean. Considerable attention has recently been paid to the recent decision of CARICOM leaders to set up a reparations commission, but similar questions relating to slavery and its (financial) afterlives have also been raised (and remain equally unresolved) in the Francophone world. In a press conference in Dakar in October 2012, François Hollande answered questions about the subject: “La réparation”, he claimed, “elle n'est pas que morale, elle est aussi de savoir ce que nous voulons faire ensemble.” (Weider, Thomas. “Couacs entre l'Elysée et Matignon sur les traites négrières.” Le Monde. 14 October 2012). In the wake of these comments, legal action was launched in France by the group CRAN (Conseil représentatif des associations noires) against the Caisse des dépôts, itself accused of profiting from compensation paid by Haiti to the French state from 1825 onwards. The article draws on speeches by Sarkozy and Hollande as well as recent publications by the CRAN in order to locate reparations for slavery within the wider geopolitical, historical, and memorial context of the Francosphere. In conclusion, it will analyse one of the few cultural artefacts to address the question of reparations for slavery, the controversial 2011 comedy Case départ.

Keywords:

• Slavery
• Reparations
• Abolition
• Memory
• Haiti
• Guadeloupe
• French Caribbean

Notes

1. Hollande is one of a series of Western leaders who has delivered such speeches in the context of a visit to Gorée. Most notable is George W. Bush, on whose 2003 visit to Gorée, see Medhurst and Ralph.

2. For Sala-Molins's more recent intervention in the area of reparations, see Esclavage réparation: les lumières des capucins et les lueurs des pharisiens.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Charles Forsdick

Charles Forsdick is James Barrow Professor French at the University of Liverpool and Arts and Humanities Research Council Theme Leadership Fellow for “Translating Cultures.” He has published on travel writing, colonial history, postcolonial literature, and the cultures of slavery. He is also an internationally recognized specialist on Haiti and the Haitian Revolution, and has written widely about representations of Toussaint Louverture. His publications include Victor Segalen and the Aesthetics of Diversity (Oxford U P, 2000) and Travel in Twentieth-Century French and Francophone Cultures (Oxford U P, 2005). He has also edited and co-edited a number of volumes, including Francophone Postcolonial Studies: A Critical Introduction (Arnold, 2003), Human Zoos: Science and Spectacle in the Age of Colonial Empire (Liverpool U P, 2008), Travel Writing: Critical Concepts in Literary and Cultural Studies (Routledge, 2012), and the forthcoming Black Jacobins Reader (Duke UP). Recent roles include Co-Director of the Centre for the Study of International Slavery (2010–2013) and President of the Society for French Studies (2012–2014).