History of French era Tunisia
Encyclopedia
The History of French-era Tunisia commenced in 1881 with the French protectorate
and ended in 1956 with Tunisian independence. The French
presence in Tunisia came five decades after their occupation of neighboring Algeria
. Both of these lands had been possessions of the Ottoman Empire
for three centuries, yet each had long since attained political autonomy
. Before the French arrived, Tunisia had begun a process of modern reforms, but financial difficulties mounted, resulting in a commission of European creditors. After the conquest the French government assumed Tunisia's international obligations. Major developments and improvements were undertaken by the French in several areas, including transport
and infrastructure
, industry
, the financial system
, public health
, administration
, and education
. Although these developments were welcome, nonetheless French businesses and citizens were clearly being favored over Tunisians. Their ancient national sense was early expressed in speech and in print; political organization followed. The independence movement was already active before World War I, and continued to gain strength against mixed French opposition. Its ultimate aim was achieved in 1956.
Bey
continued as the hereditary ruler the country, which since the early 18th century had been relatively autonomous, although still officially an Ottoman
province. Commerce and trade
with Europe began to increase dramatically after the Napoleonic wars
, with western merchants, most often Italians
, arriving to establish businesses in the major cities. Italian farmers, tradesmen, and laborers also were immigrating. With the increase in contacts with Europe, foreign influence grew.
Ahmad Bey
(r.1837-1855) initiated the extensive modern reform programs. In 1861, Tunisia promulgated the first constitution in the Arab world. Yet the Tunisian drive toward modernizing the state apparatus and the national economy was frustrated, encumbered by comfort-seeking insiders, by rural poverty, by regional discontent, and by political disorganization. Later Khaïreddine al-Tunsi (chief minister 1873-1877) became the leading reformer.
European banks advanced money to the Beylical government for civil improvements, the military, public works, and development projects, including those personal to the Bey, but the loans were frequently at unfavorable terms. Repayment of this foreign debt eventually grew very difficult to manage. In 1869, Tunisia declared itself bankrupt; a Commission Financière Internationale was thereafter formed, whose representatives led by France
included Italy
and Britain
. This commission then took control over the Tunisian economy.
. Italy's strong motivation derived from the substantial number of expatriate citizens already resident there, with corresponding business investment, due to its close geography. Yet in the emerging national conscience of the newly unified (1861) Italian state, the establishment of a directly ruled colony did not then attract high-priority interest in the political agenda.
France, whose possession of Algeria bordered Tunisia, and Britain, then possessing the tiny island of Malta lying off its coast, also were interested. Britain wanted to avoid a single power controlling both sides of the Strait of Sicily
. During 1871-1878, France and Britain had been co-operating to foreclose Italian political influence. Yet more often these two countries were keen rivals. "For most of their tenure [both began in 1855], Richard Wood and Léon Roches
, the consuls respectively of Britain and France, conpeted fiercely with each other to gain an economic or political edge in Tunisia."
The Congress of Berlin
, held in 1878, convened to discuss the Ottoman Empire
, the "sick man" of Europe, following its decisive defeat by Russia, with a focus on its Balkan possessions. At the Congress arrangements were also understood, e.g., in Germany and Britain, which allowed France to incorporate Tunisia. Italy was promised Tarabulus in what became Libya. Britain
supported French influence in Tunisia in exchange for its own protectorate over Cyprus (recently 'purchased' from the Ottomans), and French cooperation regarding a nationalist revolt in Egypt
. In the meantime, however, an Italian company apparently bought the Tunis-Goletta-Marsa rail line; yet French strategy worked to circumvent this and other issues created by the sizeable colony of Tunisian Italians
. Direct attempts by the French to negotiate with the Bey their entry into Tunisia failed. France waited, searching to find reasons to justify the timing of a pre-emptive strike, now actively contemplated. Italians would call such strike the Schiaffo di Tunisi.
.png)
In northwest Tunisia the Khrumir [Khmir] tribe episodically launched raids into the surrounding countryside. In Spring of 1881 they raided across the border into French Algeria
. France responded by invading Tunisia
, sending an army of about 36,000. Their advance to Tunis was rapidly executed. The Bey was soon compelled to come to terms with the French occupation of the country, in the first of a series of treaties
. These documents provided that the Bey continue as head of state, but with the French given effective control over a great deal of Tunisian governance, in the form of the Protectorat français en Tunisie.
With her own substantial interests in Tunisia, Italy protested but would not risk a confrontation with France. Hence Tunisia officially became a French protectorate
on May 12, 1881, when the ruling Sadik Bey
(1859–1882) signed the Treaty of Bardo
(Al Qasr as Sa'id). Later in 1883 his younger brother and successor 'Ali Bey
signed the al-Marsa Convention. Resistance by autonomous local forces in the south, encouraged by the Ottomans in Tarabulus, continued for half a year longer, with instability remaining for several years.
Paul Cambon
, the first Resident-Minister (after 1885 called the Resident-General) of the French Protectorate, arrived in early 1882. According to agreement he assumed the office of the Bey's foreign minister, while the general commanding French troops became the minister of war. Soon another Frenchman became director-general of finance. Sadiq Bey died within a few months. Cambon wanted to demonstrate the complete disestablishment of Ottoman claims to suzerainty in Tunisia. The Ottomans beforehand agreed to acquiesce. Accordingly Cambon designed and orchestrated the accession ceremony of 'Ali Bey (1882–1902). Cambon personally accompanying him from his La Marsa residence to the Bardo Palace where Cambon invested him as the new Bey in the name of France.
{Under construction}
The French progressively assumed more of the important administrative positions, and by 1884 they directed, or supervised the Tunisian administration of, government bureaus dealing with finance
, post
, education
, telegraph, public works
and agriculture
. After deciding to guarantee the Tunisian state debt
(chiefly to European investors), the Protectorate then abolished the international finance commission. French settlements in the country were being actively encouraged; the number of French colons grew from 10,000 in 1891, to 46,000 in 1911, and then to total 144,000 in 1945.
The transportation system was developed by the construction of railroads and highways, as well as sea ports. Already by 1884 the Compagnie du Bône-Guelma had built a rail line running from Tunis
west 1,600 km to Algiers, passing through the fertile Medjerda river valley near Beja
and over the high tell
. Eventually rail lines were built all along the coast from the northwest at Tabarka
to Bizerte
, to Tunis and Sousse
, to Sfax
and Gabès
; inland routes went from the coastal ports to Gafsa
, to Kasserine
, and to El Kef
. Highways were also constructed. Geologists from French mining companies scrutinized the land for hidden resources, and invested in various projects. Railroads and ports often became ancillary developments to mining operations. Among the deposits discovered and extracted for export, phosphates (a salt of phosphoric acid, used chiefly as fertilizer) became the most important, mined near the south-central city of Gafsa
. One company was awarded the concession to develop the mines
and build the railroad, another to construct the port facilities at Sfax
. The Compagnie des Phosphates et Chemins de Fer de Gafsa became the largest employer and taxpayer in the Protectorate. Iron and other minerals including zinc, lead, and copper, were also first profitably mined during the French era.
Tunisian nationalists would complain that these improvements, e.g., the rail and mining operations, were intended to benefit primarily France; the French profited most, and the employment opportunities were open more to French colons than to Tunisians. French companies provided their own engineers, technicians, managers, and accountants, and most of the skilled work force. Another major greivance of nationalist critics regarded the 'flood' of cheap manufactured goods entering the Tunisian market. This competition worked havoc with the large artisan
class, until then in good health and vigor, who made comparable goods by hand according to tradition. Here, the French did no more than passively introduce into Tunisia the fruits of advanced production techniques, and then let neutral market forces
wreck their destruction on the local merchants, who could not compete on price.
Under the Protectorate, the social infrastructure
was also improved, e.g., by school construction (see above, Education reform), and the erection of public buildings for meetings and performances. Civic improvements included the provision of new sources of clean water and the construction of public sanitation facilities in Tunis, and other large cities. Hospital
s were built, the number of medical doctors increased, vacinations became common, hence fatalities due to epidemic
s and other ills decreased; the per annum death-rate dropped dramatically. As a result the Tunisian population
steadily increased, the number of Muslims about doubling between 1881 and 1946.
Regarding agriculture, French settlers and companies acquired farm lands in such quantities as to cause resentment among Tunisians. Habis rural properties (held in religious trust or wafq), and also tribal lands held in common, were made available for monetary purchase due to fundamental changes in the land law legislated by the Protectorate. The social utility of farm lands, in extent and intensity, advanced, especially regarding production of olive groves and of vineyards.
In rural areas the French administration strengthened the local officials (qa'ids) and weakened the independent tribes. Nationwide an additional judicial system was established for Europeans but available generally, set-up without interfering with the existing Sharia
courts, available as always for the legal matters of Tunisians.
projects had already been an articulated goal of the reform movements initiated under the Beys prior to the French. Among the areas of study that were sought for their practical value were agriculture, mining, urban sanitation, business and commerce, banking and finance, state administration, manufacture and technology, and education.
Prior to the Protectorate the schools open to the majority of Tunisians were religious, e.g., the many local kuttab whose curriculum centered on the memorization and study of the Qur'an. These schools were usually proximous to the mosque and run by the imam
. Students might progress to further instruction at advanced schools. Especially noteworthy in this regard, but at the highest level, was the leading theological facility at the Mosque of Uqba in Kairouan
, founded circa 670; during the 9th-11th centuries, in addition to religious subjects, medicine, botany, astronomy, and math were taught. Above all it was the center of the Maliki
school of law
. Muslim scholars, the ulama
from throughout northern Africa, came here to study and continue to do so.
Yet educational modernizing had preceded the French to a limited extent. The Zitouna Mosque school in Tunis, which accepted the best graduates of the kuttab primary schools, had begun to add more secular topics to its predominantly Muslim curriculum. Also, the reforming prime minister Khair al-Din al-Tunsi had at Tunis in 1875 established Sadiki College
, a secondary school (lycee), which from the first taught a curriculum oriented toward the modern world, instruction being in Arabic
and also in several European languages. Jews also had maintained their own schools, as did the more recently arrived Italians.
During the French Protectorate, Tunisian general educational objectives developed to include more and more the introduction of different, modern fields of study, namely, those leading toward the utilitarian knowledge practiced in Europe. Such skills were well known in France, and a French technical vocabulary was in use in Tunisia for various Protectorate projects. The French language
was the favored medium in new schools set up by the French Church, initially established primarily for children of French settlers, such as Collège Saint-Charles de Tunis in 1875. Yet many urban Tunisians also sought for their children learning opportunities oriented to the acquisition of modern skills useful in the workplace. Over time, and not without contested issues, a new educational regime was created, including instruction in French open to Tunisians. This took place in the political context of the Protectorate, of course, affecting the existing Muslim institutions of learning, and also those of the French colons.
These innovations in education
raised major social issues in Tunisia. Yet many of such controversies were not new to the French, whose own educational institutions had met fundamental change during the 19th century. As France had come to develop and employ new technologies and the learning of the industrial age
, French schooling adapted—and also became open to scrutiny. The balance between the teaching of traditional morality versus modern utilitarian skills, as well as exactly how and which morals to teach, became greatly contested in light of the wider French debate between religious versus secular values; it involved left-republican anticlerical politics. Similar issues arose later in Tunisia, with the addition of nationalist political views.
The French in 1883 set up a Direction de l'Enseignement Public (Directorate of Public Education) to promote schools for teaching children of French officials and colons, and to further the spreading use of the French language
. Its goals widened to include education in general. This Directorate eventually administered, or directed, all the different educational institutions and systems in Tunisia, which it sought to modernize, coordinate, grow and expand. Soon established in Tunis were the new mixed Collège Alaoui, and for women the new École Rue du Pacha.
Several separate educational systems eventually resulted under the Protectorate. Serving French colons and Tunisians also was a primary and secondary system closely coordinated with Metropolitan France, using the French language. From here students might attend a university in France. The government also directed a modern secular system of schools using mixed French and Arabic. The kuttab primary schools remained, keeping their religious instruction, yet enhanced by arithmetic, history, French, and hygiene, taught in Arabic; the kuttab received government support. Thus Zitouna Mosque students might come from either the mixed secular or the kuttab religious schools. Zitouna education continued to expand, running four-year secondary schools at Tunis
, Sfax
, and Gabes
, and also a program at the university level, while remaining a traditional Islamic institution. Sadiki College, however, became the premier lycée in the country, which offered to an emerging Tunisian elite a secular, well-developed, French-language program. These reforms set the stage for further advances made in Tunisian education
since independence.
France was not unfamiliar with rule over foreign lands, i.e., two distinct phases of expansion outside Europe, and one within: the 16th–18th century ventures in North America and in India, which lands were lost by the monarchy in 1763 prior to the French Revolution
; the Napoleonic
conquests over most of western and central Europe, lost in 1815; and then the 19th and 20th century colonialism
in Africa, Asia, and Oceania.
The latter expansion began when the restored royalist
regime captured Algiers
in 1830. That same year, however, the Légitimist Bourbon
king was overthrown by the July Revolution
in favor of a new Orléanist
king, another constitutional monarchy
perhaps more liberal
. Yet this result did not resolve the persistent social conflict between the traditional royalists (now divided), the arrived and courted middle class
, and the neglected republicans (called "neo-Jacobin
s" after the French Revolution
). The latter supported popular sovereignty
and, from a distance, the emerging urban working class
. In aristocrat and peasant, religious practice generally remained strong; in the emergent middle class, religion competed with secular values backed by "scientism
"; many urban workers began neglecting religious practice; in the late 19th century, republican anti-clericalism
peaked. The divergent viewpoints evident here, under various guises, continued to divide French society, whether subtlely, or dramatically, or catastrophically, well into the 20th century. A dissimilar though somewhat analogous social array may be discerned at work in the political dynamics of 20th-century Tunisia.
In 1848
the French people overthrew
the July Monarchy
of King Louis-Philippe, though radical urban workers were quelled. Although for a time democracy
replaced royalty, the voters remained conservative, still fearful of instability from the republican left, and under the sway of traditional social hierarchies. Over the republican candidate, Napoleon III won the December election of 1848 by a huge landslide. An 1851 coup
resulted in the Second French Empire
. Because of his 1871 defeat by Germany, France lost its two-centuries-old position as the leading power in continental Europe. Yet the new French Third Republic
(1871–1940) arose, and quickly prospered. Many progressives from Asia, Africa, and the Americas still "regarded Paris as the spiritual capital of the world". France returned to popular sovereignty. After first turning to constitutional monarchists who nonetheless instituted the republic
, the voters later elected republicans
and radicals, even socialists
on occasion. The right was stymied by its own illusions in the Dreyfus Affair
. Even though divided politically, in the next conflict, the disastrous World War
(1914–1918), France emerged triumphant.
It was Jules Ferry
(1832–1893), the republican premier and moderate anti-cleric
, who worked for a political consensus in 1881 that enabled him to order the French army's occupation of Tunisia. During the subsequent Protectorate a change in French political fortunes could directly impact Tunisian issues. For example, the 1936 election of Léon Blum and the Front Populaire
reportedly improved official French comprehension of Tunisian aspirations. During the 1920s Habib Bourguiba
while studying for his law degree at the University of Paris
astutely observed first hand how French politicians formulated and strategized their domestic agendas. Politically, Bourguiba's mind "had been formed in the Paris of the Third Republic." As independence leader and later the first President of Tunisia, Habib Bourguiba (1903–2000) became the constitutional architect of the Republic.
In appraising the great significance of the French era on Tunisia, an expanatory reason might be the large number of Europeans who became permanent residents in the country. Compared with the Ottomans, who settled perhaps several tens of thousands from their empire in Tunisia, the French and their Italian 'allies' settled hundreds of thousands.
Most Tunisians are accustomed to references made about the Muslim world, for spiritual inspiration, literary metaphor, historical analogy. Within Islam (apart from sectarian differences), the three primary cultural spheres, each stemming from a world ethno-linguistic civilization, are: Arab, Iranian, and Turkish. The Arab sphere includes Arabia, the Mashriq
, Egypt, and the Maghreb
; the Iranian includes more than Iran proper, e.g., Afghanistan and historic lands of Mughal India; the Turkish not only the former Ottoman Empire but also Muslim Central Asia
, where Turkish or Mongol are spoken. Each influenced Islam as a whole, as its sophisticated cultural contours bear witness. Each likewise benefited Tunisia.
Immediately preceding the French protectorate in Tunisia, the Ottoman Turks exercized varying degrees of suzerainty, and the ruling strata of Tunisia then spoke Turkish. Under the quasi-independent Beys an attempt at modern reform was made, using as a model similar reforms in the Ottoman Empire
. Such Turkish influence was discussed previously, in History of Ottoman era Tunisia. Influence of the Iranian-sphere on Tunisia through the government has been only indirect, occasional, at the periphery, i.e., the 8th-10th century Rustamid
s (discussed previously in History of early Islamic Tunisia
), or by the influence of individuals, e.g., al-Afghani (see below).
Arab culture has strongly affected Tunisia since the 8th century conquest. Tunisia has become predominately an Arabic-speaking country. The original medium of the Qu'ran and of Islam
, of course, is the Arabic language
, which remains by far the most influential in the Muslim world. The people of Arabia once had reaped lasting renown in history as a result of the founding and spread of Islam. Long before the recent rise of Europe, and for centuries sharing this distinction with distant China, Muslim Arab civilization led the world in the refinement and in the prosperity of its citizens.
Yet since, the Turks had arrived and eventually moved into leadership position of various central Muslim polities, beginning about the 10th century. Thereafter, the Arabs had rested content seemingly under their foreign, albeit Islamic, rule. Moreover, about the year 1500 European Christians, "at last caught up with and overtook Islam, though the latter was quite unaware of what was happening."
Nonetheless the majority of Middle Eastern people now called Arabs still retained a well-acknowledged double esteem as (a) the creators of the ancient world's earliest civilizations (when most spoke another Semitic language or Egyptian
), and later as (b) co-creators of the celebrated Arab Caliphate and its civilization, when as cousins 'adopted' by the desert Arabs (the original people of Muhammad). Despite having earned and enjoyed such high esteem, the Arabs in more recent times found themselves in need of rejuvenation and renewal. During the 19th century a great renaissance began to stir among Arabs and among the Muslim peoples in general, giving rise to political reformers.
Khaïreddine al-Tunsi (1810–1889) was an early reformer, of imperial Ottoman origin, a Pasha
who spend many years in the service of several Bey
s of Tunisia (1840s-1877), and later of the Ottoman Sultan. Khaïreddine has been discussed previously. Khaïreddine came of age in the era of the Ottoman Tanzimat
, a series of modern reforms (begun in 1839). He preceded al-Afghani. When a youth Khaïreddine had traveled to Tunisia to enter the Turkish-speaking elite. He advocated a modern rationalism in the reform of society and government, yet one respectful of Muslim institutions. Once in power in Tunisia to implement his reforms (1873–1877), Khaïreddine encountered stiff opposition and was replaced mid-steam.
Inspiring and enigmatic, Jamal al-Din al-Afghani
(1839–1897) traveled widely to rally the Muslim world to unity and internal reform. Later while in Paris in 1884 al-Afghani published with Muhammad 'Abduh (see below) a journal al-'Urwa al-wuthqa to propagate his message. He himself sought a leading position in government to initiate reinvigorating reforms. He managed for a time to associate with an Ottoman Pasha, and later with the Shah of Iran, but to no effect. Although advocating a pan-Islamic solution, al-Afghani also taught that with universal reason Muslim societies might be reformed under Islamic principles, to be followed by mastery of European sciences; industry would transform Muslim material culture. Such modernizing did not convince the more traditionist of the ulema, but did energize a following across Islam which became committed to reform agendas. It was rational principles that were adopted by Tunisian nationalists. Another reformer with lasting influence in Tunisia was Muhammad 'Abduh (1849–1905), a follower of al-Afghani, a gifted teacher, who eventually became the Mufti
of Egypt. 'Abduh cultivated reason and held the controversial view that in Muslim law
the doors of ijtihad
were open, i.e., permitting the learned to make an original interpretation of sacred texts.
Alongside the pan-Islamic were pan-Arab and pan-Turkic views. Yet many Arabic-speaking countries had grown weary under the Ottoman Empire; there arose a popular desire for self-rule under an Arab nationalism. In this regard Tunisia differed: an Arabic-speaking country but in the 19th century already long an autonomous province where the Ottoman hand was faint, a mere ceremony. Whereas later during World War I many Arabs of the east fought against Turkish armies for their independence, Tunisia experienced no anti-Turkish warfare. Yet in 1881 Tunisia fell under European rule, as did Egypt and the Mashriq following World War I. Accordingly, the emerging Tunisian nationalist movement had two distinct sources of Islamic political culture for fraternity, and for example against which to compare ideas and programs: the Ottomans (latter Turkey), and the Arab east.
The Bey was considered the head of the Tunisian people under the treaties establishing the Protectorate. Accordingly, he voiced their concerns and interests—from the point of view of his monarchy, whose rule continued but under the de facto control of the Resident General appointed by the French.
Many welcomed the progressive changes brought by France, but the general consensus was that Tunisians preferred to manage their own affairs. Kayr al-Din in the 1860s and 1870s had introduced modernizing reforms before the French occupation. Some of his companions later founded the weekly magazine al-Hadira in 1888. A more radical one al-Zahra ran from 1890 until suppressed in 1896; as was the Sabil al-Rashad of 'Abd al-'Aziz al-Tha'alibi, who was inspired by Muhammad 'Abduh of Cairo, among others.
Bashir Sfar initiated the discussion group Khalduniya in 1896. 'Ali Bash Hamba founded the French language journal Tunisien to inform the French public of the Tunisian complaints, but only increased the level of unrest. Tha'alibi founded the Arabic language Tunisien in 1909, to challenge Hamba from a Tunisian view point. In 1911 civil disturbances started within the universities. One result was that Hamba and Tha'alibi reached an accord. A political party was begun, al-Ittihad al-Islami [The Evolutionist], which had pro-Ottoman leanings.
Issues concerning a Muslim cemetery, the Jallaz, sparked large demonstrations which ended with martial law and the killing of many Tunisians in late 1911. Further demonstrations in 1912 led to a general boycott
of the streetcar lines in Tunis. In response the French authorities led to the closing of the nationalist newspapers and the exile of nationalist leaders.
Although always relatively small in numbers, French settlers or colons became a very influential social stratum in Tunisia. They combined commercial-industrial expertise and know-how, with government privilege. Although not all the French were equally prosperous, ranging from rich to poor, nonetheless group cohesion was strong. French capital invested in such activities as mining
and railroads, which resulted in large returns. Their use of modern technology required a trained workforce, and French immigrants were invariably the workers hired. Such skilled jobs were among the highest paid in Tunisia. Settler homes and urban neighborhoods were often built following French models. Eventually a sense of pride and accomplishment in the modern development of the country came to be felt and relished by the newly dominant French community. Local Tunisians came to be often seen as too narrow and biased, the more rural the more primitive or confused. The settlers organized themselves into interest groups in order to maintain their leading position, to protect their engine of money-making and of Tunisia's relatively rapid development.
Many Tunisians, who had manifested a desire to modernize before the French came, clearly appreciated the many improvements that the French Protectorate rather quickly accomplished, and those yet planned. Understandably, of course, they chafed at being made second-class citizens in their own country. In French public relations, a major point winnng Tunisian favor was the French ability to modernize the economy and administration. Tunisians, however, wanted to share in the work and rewards of the new French-built enterprises. The more far-seeing among resident French administrators, accordingly, were somewhat prone to draft French development plans so as to include significant participation by the Tunisian people. Nonetheless, other French administrators were more inclinded to award business and employment opportunities to French settlers, for both practical and colonial
reasons.
Usually, in response to any proposed economic development, French settlers would marshal their influence in order to reap the major benefits. For many French, such benefits were the raison d'être for their living in Tunisia. If the local French administrator on occasion decided against them, they would appeal to their political contacts in Paris
, whom they carefully cultivated, e.g., the large, political-pressure group Parti-Colonial. A growing conflict emerged between the interests of the settlers and those of Tunisians; a struggle which became increasingly bitter. The French officials themselves were sometimes uncomfortably divided as to exactly which course to take.
Settlers expressed their views in their political and cultural associations, and commercial trade groups. Newspapers and magazines in French
were published by and for the settler communities, e.g., La Tunisie Française. These various forums naturally enabled the individual settler to follow discussions that articulated their hopes and anxieties, to read journalists whose reports were pitched to their points of view, and to discern the talking points of their politicians, all of which enhanced their solidarity and effectiveness. Settler interests could be diverse across the gamut of social issues at home in France, while in North Africa they united for the struggle to defend their common advantages and privileges. Even so, some scorned settlers were known to support maghrib
an independence, e.g., the academic author Jacques Berque
favored independence and, after the French exodus, still remained attached to the Maghrib.
French control of North Africa endured for many decades. During its course local maghriban resistance was articulated in sharper and more combative terms as the independence movement intensified. Especially bitter in accusation yet famous would be the works of an anti-colonial writer living in Algeria, Frantz Fanon
. Earlier in Tunisia Albert Memmi
had voiced a less sanguinary but nonetheless harsh appraisal of many French settlers. He writes of the colon that if "his living standards are high, it is because those of the colonized are low." He describes the settler's motives and identity:
This dismal portrait assumed the impending tragedy. After Tunisian independence the new sovereign regime began to make distinctions between its citizens and foreigners living in Tunisia. The majority of French residents, including families in Tunisia for generations, made arrangements to return to their "own land." Tunisians filled their vacated positions. "Between 1955 and 1959, 170,000 Europeans--roughly two-thirds of the total--left the country." This disastrous ending belies the otherwise mixed but not unfavorable results of the French era. Jacques Berque comments, "Greater progress would have to be made, great sufferings undergone before either side would consent to admit the other's [place in history]."
The Church and the political left managed to cooperate in the spreading the 'advantages' of French culture in Africa and Asia. Italian settlers became associated yet remained distinct. The Church sent missionaries, who were directed from its cathedral in Tunisia, south across the Sahara to Franco-phone Black Africa where many churches were established. Tunisians began to appeal to the self-proclaimed public virtues of the French state, e.g., droit humaine, in order to obtain equal treatment with the French settlers, but became more often than not disappointed, increasingly so, enough that many became cynical regarding the Protectorate. Yet not all French officials were non-responsive. The fundamental nature of the colonial enterprise has been disputed: merely for economic markets and resources, for cultural expansion and prestige, or a frontier for the military. {In process}
Organized nationalist sentiment among Tunisians, driven underground in 1912, resurfaced after the Great War. Tha'alibi tried to present Tunisia's case against the Protectorate to the Versailles Peace Conference and also published the book La Tunisie martyre, which endorsed a constitutional program. Encouragement came from many directions in 1919, e.g., the formation of the League of Nations
, and especially from Wafdist tafwid [delegation] of Egypt.
Nationalists established the Destour
[Constitution] Party in 1920. In 1922 the French granted minor reforms: a Ministry of Justice under Tahir b. Khayr al-Din, and a Grand Council of Tunisia which was purely consultative and in which the French were over-represented. This setback provoked a split in the Destour Party; Tha'alibi left Tunis in 1923. Nationalist attention focused on economic issues in 1924. A mutual aid soiety was begun, but did not survive a wave of strikes. Then the labor union, C.G.T.T. or Conféderation Générales des Travailleurs Tunisiens was founded, despite opposition from the Destour Party and the French Socialist.
Called popularly Le Destour, the official name was Al-Hisb Al-Horr Ad-Destouri At-Tounsi or Le Parti Libre Constitutionnel Tunisien.
Habib Bourguiba
and others established and led a successor to Destour, the Neo-Destour Party, in 1934. French authorities later banned this new party. Oddly enough, support came from those Tunisian Italians
who were supporting the fascist government in Italy; later in 1942 Mussolini
obtained the liberation of Bourghiba from a Vichy
jail. During World War II the nationalist movements struggled to survive.
During World War II
, French authorities in Tunisia initially supported the rightest Vichy
regime, which continued to govern the southern provinces of France after its capitulation to German forces in 1940. Many Tunisians had felt some satisfaction at France's defeat. In July, 1942, Moncef Bey acceded to the Husaynid
throne. Immediately he took a nationalist position, asserting Tunisian rights against the new Resident General appointed by Vichy. He toured the country, dispensing with beylical protocol. Soon becoming very popular as the new voice of Tunisians, Moncef Bey had assumed the place of leaders of the effectively suppressed Destour and Neo-Destour parties.
In Africa east of Tunisia, after initial victories the German General Erwin Rommel
, lacking supplies and reinforcements, in November 1942 lost the decisive battle of al-Alamein (near Alexandria, Egypt) to the newly replenished British General Bernard Montgomery, the fighting ending November 4, 1942. On November 7, the Allies
began landing forces in Morocco (Operation Torch
). The German Afrika Korps
retreated from Egypt westward to Tunisia and set up defensive positions at the Mareth Line
south of Gabès
. The British following on its heels here eventually broke through. Rommel did have some success against the "green" American
and Free French troops advancing from the west. General George Patton, however, later beat Rommel in battle. The fighting ended in May 1943. Tunisia became a staging area for operations in the invasion of Sicily
later that year. General Dwight Eisenhower subsequently wrote of the occupation of Tunisia (evidently following an anti-colonial policy, yet one compromised) "far from governing a conquered country, we were attempting only to force a gradual widening of the base of government, with the final objective of turning all internal affairs over to popular control."
Following the Allied landings in Morocco in late 1942, Vichy France and Tunisia were taken over by the Axis, Tunisia being flooded with German forces. During this period (November 1942 to May 1943) Moncef Bey "judiciously refused to take sides". He did, however, use what leverage he could muster to appoint the first Tunisian government since 1881, which was inclusive of the then political landscape, containing some pro-Allied elements. Later, with the advent of Allied control, French colons began falsely denouncing Moncef Bey as a German collaborator
and seeking his removal; they were appeased. "Late in 1943 Musif Bey was deposed by the French on the pretext that he had collaborated with the enemy."
Habib Bourguiba
, the leading figure in the Neo-Destour party, had been taken to Rome from Vichy France by the Germans, and feted there to further Italian designs on Tunisia; then he was repatriated to his Axis-occupied homeland. But Bourguiba remained pro-Independence without being anti-French (his wife being French). In Tunisia, however, some pro-German Destour leaders had been willing to work with the Third Reich, despite Bourguiba's persistent warnings. After the war, Bourguiba's American connections managed to clear him of false charges that he was a collaborator. Then with Salah Ben Yusef he began to rebuild the Neo-Destour political organization.
Following World War II the French managed to regain control of Tunisia as well as other administered territories in North Africa. However, the struggle for national independence continued and intensified.
The Neo-Destour Party reemerged under Habib Bourguiba
. Yet with a lack of signigicant progress, violent resistance to French rule began in the mountains during 1954. The Tunisians coordinated with independence movements in Algeria and Morocco, although it was Tunisia that first became independent. Ultimately, in the decades-long struggle for independence, Neo-Destour leaders were able to gain sovereignty for the people by maneuver and finesse.
French Protectorate of Tunisia
The French protectorate of Tunisia was established in 1881, during the Scramble for Africa, and lasted until Tunisian independence in 1956....
and ended in 1956 with Tunisian independence. The French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
presence in Tunisia came five decades after their occupation of neighboring Algeria
Algeria
Algeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria , also formally referred to as the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of Northwest Africa with Algiers as its capital.In terms of land area, it is the largest country in Africa and the Arab...
. Both of these lands had been possessions of the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
for three centuries, yet each had long since attained political autonomy
Autonomy
Autonomy is a concept found in moral, political and bioethical philosophy. Within these contexts, it is the capacity of a rational individual to make an informed, un-coerced decision...
. Before the French arrived, Tunisia had begun a process of modern reforms, but financial difficulties mounted, resulting in a commission of European creditors. After the conquest the French government assumed Tunisia's international obligations. Major developments and improvements were undertaken by the French in several areas, including transport
Transport
Transport or transportation is the movement of people, cattle, animals and goods from one location to another. Modes of transport include air, rail, road, water, cable, pipeline, and space. The field can be divided into infrastructure, vehicles, and operations...
and infrastructure
Infrastructure
Infrastructure is basic physical and organizational structures needed for the operation of a society or enterprise, or the services and facilities necessary for an economy to function...
, industry
Industry
Industry refers to the production of an economic good or service within an economy.-Industrial sectors:There are four key industrial economic sectors: the primary sector, largely raw material extraction industries such as mining and farming; the secondary sector, involving refining, construction,...
, the financial system
Finance
"Finance" is often defined simply as the management of money or “funds” management Modern finance, however, is a family of business activity that includes the origination, marketing, and management of cash and money surrogates through a variety of capital accounts, instruments, and markets created...
, public health
Public health
Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals" . It is concerned with threats to health based on population health...
, administration
Public administration
Public Administration houses the implementation of government policy and an academic discipline that studies this implementation and that prepares civil servants for this work. As a "field of inquiry with a diverse scope" its "fundamental goal.....
, and education
Education
Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
. Although these developments were welcome, nonetheless French businesses and citizens were clearly being favored over Tunisians. Their ancient national sense was early expressed in speech and in print; political organization followed. The independence movement was already active before World War I, and continued to gain strength against mixed French opposition. Its ultimate aim was achieved in 1956.
Beylical debt
As the 19th century commenced, the HusaynidHusainid Dynasty
The Husainid Dynasty is the former ruling dynasty of Tunisia originally of Cretan origin. They came to power under Al-Husayn I ibn Ali at-Turki in 1705 replacing the Muradid Dynasty. After taking power the Husainids ruled as Beys with succession to the throne determined by age with the oldest...
Bey
Bey
Bey is a title for chieftain, traditionally applied to the leaders of small tribal groups. Accoding to some sources, the word "Bey" is of Turkish language In historical accounts, many Turkish, other Turkic and Persian leaders are titled Bey, Beg, Bek, Bay, Baig or Beigh. They are all the same word...
continued as the hereditary ruler the country, which since the early 18th century had been relatively autonomous, although still officially an Ottoman
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
province. Commerce and trade
Trade
Trade is the transfer of ownership of goods and services from one person or entity to another. Trade is sometimes loosely called commerce or financial transaction or barter. A network that allows trade is called a market. The original form of trade was barter, the direct exchange of goods and...
with Europe began to increase dramatically after the Napoleonic wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
, with western merchants, most often Italians
Tunisian Italians
The Italian Tunisians were the Italians living in Tunisia who promoted the possession of this northern African country by the Kingdom of Italy and even promoted a form of Italian irredentism of Tunisia during the era of Fascism....
, arriving to establish businesses in the major cities. Italian farmers, tradesmen, and laborers also were immigrating. With the increase in contacts with Europe, foreign influence grew.
Ahmad Bey
Ahmad I ibn Mustafa
Ahmad I ibn Mustafa was the tenth leader of the Husainid Dynasty and ruled Tunisia as Bey of Tunis from October 10, 1837 to his death on May 30, 1855.-References:...
(r.1837-1855) initiated the extensive modern reform programs. In 1861, Tunisia promulgated the first constitution in the Arab world. Yet the Tunisian drive toward modernizing the state apparatus and the national economy was frustrated, encumbered by comfort-seeking insiders, by rural poverty, by regional discontent, and by political disorganization. Later Khaïreddine al-Tunsi (chief minister 1873-1877) became the leading reformer.
European banks advanced money to the Beylical government for civil improvements, the military, public works, and development projects, including those personal to the Bey, but the loans were frequently at unfavorable terms. Repayment of this foreign debt eventually grew very difficult to manage. In 1869, Tunisia declared itself bankrupt; a Commission Financière Internationale was thereafter formed, whose representatives led by France
Second French Empire
The Second French Empire or French Empire was the Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 1852 to 1870, between the Second Republic and the Third Republic, in France.-Rule of Napoleon III:...
included Italy
History of Italy as a monarchy and in the World Wars
This articles covers the history of Italy as a monarchy and in the World Wars.-Italian unification :Modern Italy became a nation-state during the Risorgimento on March 17, 1861 when most of the states of the Italian Peninsula and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies were united under king Victor...
and Britain
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
. This commission then took control over the Tunisian economy.
French regime
Presented here are the commencement and the early history of the Protectorate, including institutional profiles, economic accomplishments, and reforms. "On the whole the urban and settled parts of the Tunisian population did not evince great hostility to the French protectorate in the pre-First World War period." The changing political configurations variously dominant in Metropolitan France are also summarized.Establishment
Initially, Italy was the country most interested in incorporating Tunisia into its sphere of influenceSphere of influence
In the field of international relations, a sphere of influence is a spatial region or conceptual division over which a state or organization has significant cultural, economic, military or political influence....
. Italy's strong motivation derived from the substantial number of expatriate citizens already resident there, with corresponding business investment, due to its close geography. Yet in the emerging national conscience of the newly unified (1861) Italian state, the establishment of a directly ruled colony did not then attract high-priority interest in the political agenda.
France, whose possession of Algeria bordered Tunisia, and Britain, then possessing the tiny island of Malta lying off its coast, also were interested. Britain wanted to avoid a single power controlling both sides of the Strait of Sicily
Strait of Sicily
The Strait of Sicily is the strait between Sicily and Tunisia. It is about wide and divides the Tyrrhenian Sea and the western Mediterranean Sea from the eastern Mediterranean. Its maximum depth is ....
. During 1871-1878, France and Britain had been co-operating to foreclose Italian political influence. Yet more often these two countries were keen rivals. "For most of their tenure [both began in 1855], Richard Wood and Léon Roches
Léon Roches
Léon Roches was a representative of the French government in Japan from 1864 to 1868.Léon Roches was a student at the Lycée de Tournon in Grenoble, and followed an education in Law...
, the consuls respectively of Britain and France, conpeted fiercely with each other to gain an economic or political edge in Tunisia."
The Congress of Berlin
Congress of Berlin
The Congress of Berlin was a meeting of the European Great Powers' and the Ottoman Empire's leading statesmen in Berlin in 1878. In the wake of the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78, the meeting's aim was to reorganize the countries of the Balkans...
, held in 1878, convened to discuss the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
, the "sick man" of Europe, following its decisive defeat by Russia, with a focus on its Balkan possessions. At the Congress arrangements were also understood, e.g., in Germany and Britain, which allowed France to incorporate Tunisia. Italy was promised Tarabulus in what became Libya. Britain
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...
supported French influence in Tunisia in exchange for its own protectorate over Cyprus (recently 'purchased' from the Ottomans), and French cooperation regarding a nationalist revolt in Egypt
Urabi Revolt
The Urabi Revolt or Orabi Revolt , also known as the Orabi Revolution, was an uprising in Egypt in 1879-82 against the Khedive and European influence in the country...
. In the meantime, however, an Italian company apparently bought the Tunis-Goletta-Marsa rail line; yet French strategy worked to circumvent this and other issues created by the sizeable colony of Tunisian Italians
Tunisian Italians
The Italian Tunisians were the Italians living in Tunisia who promoted the possession of this northern African country by the Kingdom of Italy and even promoted a form of Italian irredentism of Tunisia during the era of Fascism....
. Direct attempts by the French to negotiate with the Bey their entry into Tunisia failed. France waited, searching to find reasons to justify the timing of a pre-emptive strike, now actively contemplated. Italians would call such strike the Schiaffo di Tunisi.
French rule in Algeria
French Algeria lasted from 1830 to 1962, under a variety of governmental systems. From 1848 until independence, the whole Mediterranean region of Algeria was administered as an integral part of France, much like Corsica and Réunion are to this day. The vast arid interior of Algeria, like the rest...
. France responded by invading Tunisia
French occupation of Tunisia
The French conquest of Tunisia occurred in two phases in 1881: the first consisting of the invasion and securing of the country before the signing of a treaty of protection, and the second consisting in the suppression of a rebellion...
, sending an army of about 36,000. Their advance to Tunis was rapidly executed. The Bey was soon compelled to come to terms with the French occupation of the country, in the first of a series of treaties
Treaty
A treaty is an express agreement under international law entered into by actors in international law, namely sovereign states and international organizations. A treaty may also be known as an agreement, protocol, covenant, convention or exchange of letters, among other terms...
. These documents provided that the Bey continue as head of state, but with the French given effective control over a great deal of Tunisian governance, in the form of the Protectorat français en Tunisie.
With her own substantial interests in Tunisia, Italy protested but would not risk a confrontation with France. Hence Tunisia officially became a French protectorate
Protectorate
In history, the term protectorate has two different meanings. In its earliest inception, which has been adopted by modern international law, it is an autonomous territory that is protected diplomatically or militarily against third parties by a stronger state or entity...
on May 12, 1881, when the ruling Sadik Bey
Muhammad III as-Sadiq
Muhammad III as-Sadiq, GCB was the ruler of Tunisia from 23 September 1859 to 28 October 1881, when he abdicated. He signed the Treaty of Bardo with France on 12 May 1881 signifying Tunisia as a French Protectorate.-References:...
(1859–1882) signed the Treaty of Bardo
Treaty of Bardo
The Treaty of Bardo was signed on May 12, 1881 between representatives of the French Republic and Tunisian bey Muhammed as-Sadiq. A raid of Algeria by the Tunisian Kroumer tribe served as a pretext for French armed forces to invade Tunisia...
(Al Qasr as Sa'id). Later in 1883 his younger brother and successor 'Ali Bey
Ali Muddat ibn al-Husayn
Ali III Bey ibn al-Husayn was the ruler of Tunisia from 1882 until 1902. He was the first ruler under the French protectorate....
signed the al-Marsa Convention. Resistance by autonomous local forces in the south, encouraged by the Ottomans in Tarabulus, continued for half a year longer, with instability remaining for several years.
Paul Cambon
Paul Cambon
Pierre Paul Cambon was a French diplomat and brother to Jules Martin Cambon.-Biography:He was called to the Parisian bar, and became private secretary to Jules Ferry in the préfecture of the Seine...
, the first Resident-Minister (after 1885 called the Resident-General) of the French Protectorate, arrived in early 1882. According to agreement he assumed the office of the Bey's foreign minister, while the general commanding French troops became the minister of war. Soon another Frenchman became director-general of finance. Sadiq Bey died within a few months. Cambon wanted to demonstrate the complete disestablishment of Ottoman claims to suzerainty in Tunisia. The Ottomans beforehand agreed to acquiesce. Accordingly Cambon designed and orchestrated the accession ceremony of 'Ali Bey (1882–1902). Cambon personally accompanying him from his La Marsa residence to the Bardo Palace where Cambon invested him as the new Bey in the name of France.
Economic advance
The French progressively assumed more of the important administrative positions, and by 1884 they directed, or supervised the Tunisian administration of, government bureaus dealing with finance
Finance
"Finance" is often defined simply as the management of money or “funds” management Modern finance, however, is a family of business activity that includes the origination, marketing, and management of cash and money surrogates through a variety of capital accounts, instruments, and markets created...
, post
Mail
Mail, or post, is a system for transporting letters and other tangible objects: written documents, typically enclosed in envelopes, and also small packages are delivered to destinations around the world. Anything sent through the postal system is called mail or post.In principle, a postal service...
, education
Education
Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
, telegraph, public works
Public works
Public works are a broad category of projects, financed and constructed by the government, for recreational, employment, and health and safety uses in the greater community...
and agriculture
Agriculture
Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...
. After deciding to guarantee the Tunisian state debt
Debt
A debt is an obligation owed by one party to a second party, the creditor; usually this refers to assets granted by the creditor to the debtor, but the term can also be used metaphorically to cover moral obligations and other interactions not based on economic value.A debt is created when a...
(chiefly to European investors), the Protectorate then abolished the international finance commission. French settlements in the country were being actively encouraged; the number of French colons grew from 10,000 in 1891, to 46,000 in 1911, and then to total 144,000 in 1945.
The transportation system was developed by the construction of railroads and highways, as well as sea ports. Already by 1884 the Compagnie du Bône-Guelma had built a rail line running from Tunis
Tunis
Tunis is the capital of both the Tunisian Republic and the Tunis Governorate. It is Tunisia's largest city, with a population of 728,453 as of 2004; the greater metropolitan area holds some 2,412,500 inhabitants....
west 1,600 km to Algiers, passing through the fertile Medjerda river valley near Beja
Beja
Beja may refer to:*Beja , a city in Portugal, or**Beja Municipality, its municipality**Beja District, the district it is in**Beja Airbase, the nearby airbase*Béja, a town in Tunisia, or...
and over the high tell
Tell
A tell or tel, is a type of archaeological mound created by human occupation and abandonment of a geographical site over many centuries. A classic tell looks like a low, truncated cone with a flat top and sloping sides.-Archaeology:A tell is a hill created by different civilizations living and...
. Eventually rail lines were built all along the coast from the northwest at Tabarka
Tabarka
Tabarka is a coastal town located in north-western Tunisia, at about , close to the border with Algeria. It has been famous for its coral fishing, the Coral Festival of underwater photography and the annual jazz festival. Tabarka's history is a colorful mosaic of Phoenician, Roman, Arabic and...
to Bizerte
Bizerte
Bizerte or Benzert , is the capital city of Bizerte Governorate in Tunisia and the northernmost city in Africa. It has a population of 230,879 .-History:...
, to Tunis and Sousse
Sousse
Sousse is a city in Tunisia. Located 140 km south of the capital Tunis, the city has 173,047 inhabitants . Sousse is in the central-east of the country, on the Gulf of Hammamet, which is a part of the Mediterranean Sea. The name may be of Berber origin: similar names are found in Libya and in...
, to Sfax
Sfax
Sfax is a city in Tunisia, located southeast of Tunis. The city, founded in AD 849 on the ruins of Taparura and Thaenae, is the capital of the Sfax Governorate , and a Mediterranean port. Sfax has population of 340,000...
and Gabès
Gabès
Gabès , also spelt Cabès, Cabes, Kabes, Gabbs and Gaps, the ancient Tacape, is the capital city of the Gabès Governorate, a province of Tunisia. It lies on the coast of the Gulf of Gabès. With a population of 116,323 it is the 6th largest Tunisian city.-History:Strabo refers to Tacape as an...
; inland routes went from the coastal ports to Gafsa
Gafsa
Gafsa is the capital of Gafsa Governorate of Tunisia. Its name was appropriated by archaeologists for the Mesolithic Capsian culture. With a population of 84,676, it is the 9th Tunisian city.-Overview:...
, to Kasserine
Kasserine
Kasserine is the capital city of the Kasserine Governorate, in west-central Tunisia. It is situated below Jebel ech Chambi, Tunisia's highest mountain. Its population is 76,243 . In classical antiquity it was a Roman colony known as Colonia Cillilana or plain Cillium.- See also :* Battle of the...
, and to El Kef
El Kef
El Kef , also known as Le Kef, is a city in north western Tunisia and the capital of the Kef Governorate.Situated in the northwest of the country, to the west of Tunis and some east of the border between Algeria and Tunisia, El Kef has a population of . The old town is built on the cliff face...
. Highways were also constructed. Geologists from French mining companies scrutinized the land for hidden resources, and invested in various projects. Railroads and ports often became ancillary developments to mining operations. Among the deposits discovered and extracted for export, phosphates (a salt of phosphoric acid, used chiefly as fertilizer) became the most important, mined near the south-central city of Gafsa
Gafsa
Gafsa is the capital of Gafsa Governorate of Tunisia. Its name was appropriated by archaeologists for the Mesolithic Capsian culture. With a population of 84,676, it is the 9th Tunisian city.-Overview:...
. One company was awarded the concession to develop the mines
Mining
Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, from an ore body, vein or seam. The term also includes the removal of soil. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, rock...
and build the railroad, another to construct the port facilities at Sfax
Sfax
Sfax is a city in Tunisia, located southeast of Tunis. The city, founded in AD 849 on the ruins of Taparura and Thaenae, is the capital of the Sfax Governorate , and a Mediterranean port. Sfax has population of 340,000...
. The Compagnie des Phosphates et Chemins de Fer de Gafsa became the largest employer and taxpayer in the Protectorate. Iron and other minerals including zinc, lead, and copper, were also first profitably mined during the French era.
Tunisian nationalists would complain that these improvements, e.g., the rail and mining operations, were intended to benefit primarily France; the French profited most, and the employment opportunities were open more to French colons than to Tunisians. French companies provided their own engineers, technicians, managers, and accountants, and most of the skilled work force. Another major greivance of nationalist critics regarded the 'flood' of cheap manufactured goods entering the Tunisian market. This competition worked havoc with the large artisan
Artisan
An artisan is a skilled manual worker who makes items that may be functional or strictly decorative, including furniture, clothing, jewellery, household items, and tools...
class, until then in good health and vigor, who made comparable goods by hand according to tradition. Here, the French did no more than passively introduce into Tunisia the fruits of advanced production techniques, and then let neutral market forces
Market Forces
Market Forces is a science fiction novel by Richard Morgan, first published in 2004.Set in 2049 in the wake of a global economic downturn called the Domino Recessions, it follows up-and-coming executive Chris as he plunges into the profitable field of Conflict Investment...
wreck their destruction on the local merchants, who could not compete on price.
Under the Protectorate, the social infrastructure
Infrastructure
Infrastructure is basic physical and organizational structures needed for the operation of a society or enterprise, or the services and facilities necessary for an economy to function...
was also improved, e.g., by school construction (see above, Education reform), and the erection of public buildings for meetings and performances. Civic improvements included the provision of new sources of clean water and the construction of public sanitation facilities in Tunis, and other large cities. Hospital
Hospital
A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment by specialized staff and equipment. Hospitals often, but not always, provide for inpatient care or longer-term patient stays....
s were built, the number of medical doctors increased, vacinations became common, hence fatalities due to epidemic
Epidemic
In epidemiology, an epidemic , occurs when new cases of a certain disease, in a given human population, and during a given period, substantially exceed what is expected based on recent experience...
s and other ills decreased; the per annum death-rate dropped dramatically. As a result the Tunisian population
Population
A population is all the organisms that both belong to the same group or species and live in the same geographical area. The area that is used to define a sexual population is such that inter-breeding is possible between any pair within the area and more probable than cross-breeding with individuals...
steadily increased, the number of Muslims about doubling between 1881 and 1946.
Regarding agriculture, French settlers and companies acquired farm lands in such quantities as to cause resentment among Tunisians. Habis rural properties (held in religious trust or wafq), and also tribal lands held in common, were made available for monetary purchase due to fundamental changes in the land law legislated by the Protectorate. The social utility of farm lands, in extent and intensity, advanced, especially regarding production of olive groves and of vineyards.
In rural areas the French administration strengthened the local officials (qa'ids) and weakened the independent tribes. Nationwide an additional judicial system was established for Europeans but available generally, set-up without interfering with the existing Sharia
Sharia
Sharia law, is the moral code and religious law of Islam. Sharia is derived from two primary sources of Islamic law: the precepts set forth in the Quran, and the example set by the Islamic prophet Muhammad in the Sunnah. Fiqh jurisprudence interprets and extends the application of sharia to...
courts, available as always for the legal matters of Tunisians.
Education reform
The French presence, despite its negatives, did present Tunisians with opportunities to become better acquainted with recent European advances. ModernizingModernization
In the social sciences, modernization or modernisation refers to a model of an evolutionary transition from a 'pre-modern' or 'traditional' to a 'modern' society. The teleology of modernization is described in social evolutionism theories, existing as a template that has been generally followed by...
projects had already been an articulated goal of the reform movements initiated under the Beys prior to the French. Among the areas of study that were sought for their practical value were agriculture, mining, urban sanitation, business and commerce, banking and finance, state administration, manufacture and technology, and education.
Prior to the Protectorate the schools open to the majority of Tunisians were religious, e.g., the many local kuttab whose curriculum centered on the memorization and study of the Qur'an. These schools were usually proximous to the mosque and run by the imam
Imam
An imam is an Islamic leadership position, often the worship leader of a mosque and the Muslim community. Similar to spiritual leaders, the imam is the one who leads Islamic worship services. More often, the community turns to the mosque imam if they have a religious question...
. Students might progress to further instruction at advanced schools. Especially noteworthy in this regard, but at the highest level, was the leading theological facility at the Mosque of Uqba in Kairouan
Kairouan
Kairouan , also known as Kirwan or al-Qayrawan , is the capital of the Kairouan Governorate in Tunisia. Referred to as the Islamic Cultural Capital, it is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The city was founded by the Arabs around 670...
, founded circa 670; during the 9th-11th centuries, in addition to religious subjects, medicine, botany, astronomy, and math were taught. Above all it was the center of the Maliki
Maliki
The ' madhhab is one of the schools of Fiqh or religious law within Sunni Islam. It is the second-largest of the four schools, followed by approximately 25% of Muslims, mostly in North Africa, West Africa, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and in some parts of Saudi Arabia...
school of law
Madhhab
is a Muslim school of law or fiqh . In the first 150 years of Islam, there were many such "schools". In fact, several of the Sahābah, or contemporary "companions" of Muhammad, are credited with founding their own...
. Muslim scholars, the ulama
Ulama
-In Islam:* Ulema, also transliterated "ulama", a community of legal scholars of Islam and its laws . See:**Nahdlatul Ulama **Darul-uloom Nadwatul Ulama **Jamiatul Ulama Transvaal**Jamiat ul-Ulama -Other:...
from throughout northern Africa, came here to study and continue to do so.
Yet educational modernizing had preceded the French to a limited extent. The Zitouna Mosque school in Tunis, which accepted the best graduates of the kuttab primary schools, had begun to add more secular topics to its predominantly Muslim curriculum. Also, the reforming prime minister Khair al-Din al-Tunsi had at Tunis in 1875 established Sadiki College
Sadiki College
Sadiki College, also known as Collège Sadiki, is a lycée in Tunis, Tunisia. It was established in 1875. Associations formed by its alumni played a major role in the early constitutionalist movement in the country....
, a secondary school (lycee), which from the first taught a curriculum oriented toward the modern world, instruction being in Arabic
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
and also in several European languages. Jews also had maintained their own schools, as did the more recently arrived Italians.
During the French Protectorate, Tunisian general educational objectives developed to include more and more the introduction of different, modern fields of study, namely, those leading toward the utilitarian knowledge practiced in Europe. Such skills were well known in France, and a French technical vocabulary was in use in Tunisia for various Protectorate projects. The French language
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
was the favored medium in new schools set up by the French Church, initially established primarily for children of French settlers, such as Collège Saint-Charles de Tunis in 1875. Yet many urban Tunisians also sought for their children learning opportunities oriented to the acquisition of modern skills useful in the workplace. Over time, and not without contested issues, a new educational regime was created, including instruction in French open to Tunisians. This took place in the political context of the Protectorate, of course, affecting the existing Muslim institutions of learning, and also those of the French colons.
Education
Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
raised major social issues in Tunisia. Yet many of such controversies were not new to the French, whose own educational institutions had met fundamental change during the 19th century. As France had come to develop and employ new technologies and the learning of the industrial age
Industrial Age
Industrial Age may refer to:*Industrialisation*The Industrial Revolution...
, French schooling adapted—and also became open to scrutiny. The balance between the teaching of traditional morality versus modern utilitarian skills, as well as exactly how and which morals to teach, became greatly contested in light of the wider French debate between religious versus secular values; it involved left-republican anticlerical politics. Similar issues arose later in Tunisia, with the addition of nationalist political views.
The French in 1883 set up a Direction de l'Enseignement Public (Directorate of Public Education) to promote schools for teaching children of French officials and colons, and to further the spreading use of the French language
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
. Its goals widened to include education in general. This Directorate eventually administered, or directed, all the different educational institutions and systems in Tunisia, which it sought to modernize, coordinate, grow and expand. Soon established in Tunis were the new mixed Collège Alaoui, and for women the new École Rue du Pacha.
Several separate educational systems eventually resulted under the Protectorate. Serving French colons and Tunisians also was a primary and secondary system closely coordinated with Metropolitan France, using the French language. From here students might attend a university in France. The government also directed a modern secular system of schools using mixed French and Arabic. The kuttab primary schools remained, keeping their religious instruction, yet enhanced by arithmetic, history, French, and hygiene, taught in Arabic; the kuttab received government support. Thus Zitouna Mosque students might come from either the mixed secular or the kuttab religious schools. Zitouna education continued to expand, running four-year secondary schools at Tunis
Tunis
Tunis is the capital of both the Tunisian Republic and the Tunis Governorate. It is Tunisia's largest city, with a population of 728,453 as of 2004; the greater metropolitan area holds some 2,412,500 inhabitants....
, Sfax
Sfax
Sfax is a city in Tunisia, located southeast of Tunis. The city, founded in AD 849 on the ruins of Taparura and Thaenae, is the capital of the Sfax Governorate , and a Mediterranean port. Sfax has population of 340,000...
, and Gabes
Gabès
Gabès , also spelt Cabès, Cabes, Kabes, Gabbs and Gaps, the ancient Tacape, is the capital city of the Gabès Governorate, a province of Tunisia. It lies on the coast of the Gulf of Gabès. With a population of 116,323 it is the 6th largest Tunisian city.-History:Strabo refers to Tacape as an...
, and also a program at the university level, while remaining a traditional Islamic institution. Sadiki College, however, became the premier lycée in the country, which offered to an emerging Tunisian elite a secular, well-developed, French-language program. These reforms set the stage for further advances made in Tunisian education
Education in Tunisia
Since gaining independence from the French in 1956, Tunisian education sector has shown great progress. The government of Tunisia has focused on developing an education system which produces a solid human capital base that could respond to the changing needs of a developing nation...
since independence.
French context
The French brought all the contradictions, the internal conflicts of their sophisticated culture to North Africa. Briefly a review follows of the broad context in which France approached, traded with and financed, invaded, and then administered Tunisia. It will be seen that modern French politics not only guided the direction of the French colonial venture, but also informed indirectly and in combination the politics of their clients, the Tunisian people and leaders.France was not unfamiliar with rule over foreign lands, i.e., two distinct phases of expansion outside Europe, and one within: the 16th–18th century ventures in North America and in India, which lands were lost by the monarchy in 1763 prior to the French Revolution
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
; the Napoleonic
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
conquests over most of western and central Europe, lost in 1815; and then the 19th and 20th century colonialism
Colonialism
Colonialism is the establishment, maintenance, acquisition and expansion of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony and the social structure, government, and economics of the colony are changed by...
in Africa, Asia, and Oceania.
Bourbon Restoration
The Bourbon Restoration is the name given to the period following the successive events of the French Revolution , the end of the First Republic , and then the forcible end of the First French Empire under Napoleon – when a coalition of European powers restored by arms the monarchy to the...
regime captured Algiers
Algiers
' is the capital and largest city of Algeria. According to the 1998 census, the population of the city proper was 1,519,570 and that of the urban agglomeration was 2,135,630. In 2009, the population was about 3,500,000...
in 1830. That same year, however, the Légitimist Bourbon
House of Bourbon
The House of Bourbon is a European royal house, a branch of the Capetian dynasty . Bourbon kings first ruled Navarre and France in the 16th century. By the 18th century, members of the Bourbon dynasty also held thrones in Spain, Naples, Sicily, and Parma...
king was overthrown by the July Revolution
July Revolution
The French Revolution of 1830, also known as the July Revolution or in French, saw the overthrow of King Charles X of France, the French Bourbon monarch, and the ascent of his cousin Louis-Philippe, Duke of Orléans, who himself, after 18 precarious years on the throne, would in turn be overthrown...
in favor of a new Orléanist
Orléanist
The Orléanists were a French right-wing/center-right party which arose out of the French Revolution. It governed France 1830-1848 in the "July Monarchy" of king Louis Philippe. It is generally seen as a transitional period dominated by the bourgeoisie and the conservative Orleanist doctrine in...
king, another constitutional monarchy
Constitutional monarchy
Constitutional monarchy is a form of government in which a monarch acts as head of state within the parameters of a constitution, whether it be a written, uncodified or blended constitution...
perhaps more liberal
Economic liberalism
Economic liberalism is the ideological belief in giving all people economic freedom, and as such granting people with more basis to control their own lives and make their own mistakes. It is an economic philosophy that supports and promotes individual liberty and choice in economic matters and...
. Yet this result did not resolve the persistent social conflict between the traditional royalists (now divided), the arrived and courted middle class
Middle class
The middle class is any class of people in the middle of a societal hierarchy. In Weberian socio-economic terms, the middle class is the broad group of people in contemporary society who fall socio-economically between the working class and upper class....
, and the neglected republicans (called "neo-Jacobin
Jacobin Club
The Jacobin Club was the most famous and influential political club in the development of the French Revolution, so-named because of the Dominican convent where they met, located in the Rue St. Jacques , Paris. The club originated as the Club Benthorn, formed at Versailles from a group of Breton...
s" after the French Revolution
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
). The latter supported popular sovereignty
Popular sovereignty
Popular sovereignty or the sovereignty of the people is the political principle that the legitimacy of the state is created and sustained by the will or consent of its people, who are the source of all political power. It is closely associated with Republicanism and the social contract...
and, from a distance, the emerging urban working class
Working class
Working class is a term used in the social sciences and in ordinary conversation to describe those employed in lower tier jobs , often extending to those in unemployment or otherwise possessing below-average incomes...
. In aristocrat and peasant, religious practice generally remained strong; in the emergent middle class, religion competed with secular values backed by "scientism
Scientism
Scientism refers to a belief in the universal applicability of the systematic methods and approach of science, especially the view that empirical science constitutes the most authoritative worldview or most valuable part of human learning to the exclusion of other viewpoints...
"; many urban workers began neglecting religious practice; in the late 19th century, republican anti-clericalism
Anti-clericalism
Anti-clericalism is a historical movement that opposes religious institutional power and influence, real or alleged, in all aspects of public and political life, and the involvement of religion in the everyday life of the citizen...
peaked. The divergent viewpoints evident here, under various guises, continued to divide French society, whether subtlely, or dramatically, or catastrophically, well into the 20th century. A dissimilar though somewhat analogous social array may be discerned at work in the political dynamics of 20th-century Tunisia.
Revolutions of 1848
The European Revolutions of 1848, known in some countries as the Spring of Nations, Springtime of the Peoples or the Year of Revolution, were a series of political upheavals throughout Europe in 1848. It was the first Europe-wide collapse of traditional authority, but within a year reactionary...
the French people overthrew
French Revolution of 1848
The 1848 Revolution in France was one of a wave of revolutions in 1848 in Europe. In France, the February revolution ended the Orleans monarchy and led to the creation of the French Second Republic. The February Revolution was really the belated second phase of the Revolution of 1830...
the July Monarchy
July Monarchy
The July Monarchy , officially the Kingdom of France , was a period of liberal constitutional monarchy in France under King Louis-Philippe starting with the July Revolution of 1830 and ending with the Revolution of 1848...
of King Louis-Philippe, though radical urban workers were quelled. Although for a time democracy
French Second Republic
The French Second Republic was the republican government of France between the 1848 Revolution and the coup by Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte which initiated the Second Empire. It officially adopted the motto Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité...
replaced royalty, the voters remained conservative, still fearful of instability from the republican left, and under the sway of traditional social hierarchies. Over the republican candidate, Napoleon III won the December election of 1848 by a huge landslide. An 1851 coup
French coup of 1851
The French coup d'état on 2 December 1851, staged by Prince Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte , ended in the successful dissolution of the French National Assembly, as well as the subsequent re-establishment of the French Empire the next year...
resulted in the Second French Empire
Second French Empire
The Second French Empire or French Empire was the Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 1852 to 1870, between the Second Republic and the Third Republic, in France.-Rule of Napoleon III:...
. Because of his 1871 defeat by Germany, France lost its two-centuries-old position as the leading power in continental Europe. Yet the new French Third Republic
French Third Republic
The French Third Republic was the republican government of France from 1870, when the Second French Empire collapsed due to the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, to 1940, when France was overrun by Nazi Germany during World War II, resulting in the German and Italian occupations of France...
(1871–1940) arose, and quickly prospered. Many progressives from Asia, Africa, and the Americas still "regarded Paris as the spiritual capital of the world". France returned to popular sovereignty. After first turning to constitutional monarchists who nonetheless instituted the republic
French Constitutional Laws of 1875
The Constitutional Laws of 1875 are the laws passed in France by the National Assembly between February and July 1875 which established the Third French Republic.The constitution laws could be roughly divided into three laws:...
, the voters later elected republicans
Opportunist Republicans
The Opportunist Republicans , also known as the Moderates , were a faction of French Republicans who believed, after the proclamation of the Third Republic in 1870, that the regime could only be consolidated by successive phases...
and radicals, even socialists
French Socialist Party (1902)
The French Socialist Party was founded in 1902. It came from the merger of the "possibilist" Federation of the Socialist Workers of France , Jean Allemane's Revolutionary Socialist Workers' Party and some independent socialist politicians like Jean Jaurès...
on occasion. The right was stymied by its own illusions in the Dreyfus Affair
Dreyfus Affair
The Dreyfus affair was a political scandal that divided France in the 1890s and the early 1900s. It involved the conviction for treason in November 1894 of Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a young French artillery officer of Alsatian Jewish descent...
. Even though divided politically, in the next conflict, the disastrous World War
World War I casualties
The total number of military and civilian casualties in World War I were over 35 million. There were over 15 million deaths and 20 million wounded ranking it among the deadliest conflicts in human history....
(1914–1918), France emerged triumphant.
It was Jules Ferry
Jules Ferry
Jules François Camille Ferry was a French statesman and republican. He was a promoter of laicism and colonial expansion.- Early life :Born in Saint-Dié, in the Vosges département, France, he studied law, and was called to the bar at Paris in 1854, but soon went into politics, contributing to...
(1832–1893), the republican premier and moderate anti-cleric
Anti-clericalism
Anti-clericalism is a historical movement that opposes religious institutional power and influence, real or alleged, in all aspects of public and political life, and the involvement of religion in the everyday life of the citizen...
, who worked for a political consensus in 1881 that enabled him to order the French army's occupation of Tunisia. During the subsequent Protectorate a change in French political fortunes could directly impact Tunisian issues. For example, the 1936 election of Léon Blum and the Front Populaire
Popular Front (France)
The Popular Front was an alliance of left-wing movements, including the French Communist Party , the French Section of the Workers' International and the Radical and Socialist Party, during the interwar period...
reportedly improved official French comprehension of Tunisian aspirations. During the 1920s Habib Bourguiba
Habib Bourguiba
Habib Bourguiba was a Tunisian statesman, the Founder and the first President of the Republic of Tunisia from July 25, 1957 until 7 November 1987...
while studying for his law degree at the University of Paris
University of Paris
The University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...
astutely observed first hand how French politicians formulated and strategized their domestic agendas. Politically, Bourguiba's mind "had been formed in the Paris of the Third Republic." As independence leader and later the first President of Tunisia, Habib Bourguiba (1903–2000) became the constitutional architect of the Republic.
Tunisian politics
Relating chiefly to the initiation and early decades of the French Protectorate, the political factors discussed here persisted throughout the course of French rule in Tunisia. Their relative strengths, one to the other, however, changed markedly over time.In appraising the great significance of the French era on Tunisia, an expanatory reason might be the large number of Europeans who became permanent residents in the country. Compared with the Ottomans, who settled perhaps several tens of thousands from their empire in Tunisia, the French and their Italian 'allies' settled hundreds of thousands.
Islamic context
Mashriq
Mashriq or Mashreq is derived from the Arabic consonantal root sh-r-q relating to the east or the sunrise, and essentially means "east"...
, Egypt, and the Maghreb
Maghreb
The Maghreb is the region of Northwest Africa, west of Egypt. It includes five countries: Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, and Mauritania and the disputed territory of Western Sahara...
; the Iranian includes more than Iran proper, e.g., Afghanistan and historic lands of Mughal India; the Turkish not only the former Ottoman Empire but also Muslim Central Asia
Central Asia
Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...
, where Turkish or Mongol are spoken. Each influenced Islam as a whole, as its sophisticated cultural contours bear witness. Each likewise benefited Tunisia.
Immediately preceding the French protectorate in Tunisia, the Ottoman Turks exercized varying degrees of suzerainty, and the ruling strata of Tunisia then spoke Turkish. Under the quasi-independent Beys an attempt at modern reform was made, using as a model similar reforms in the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
. Such Turkish influence was discussed previously, in History of Ottoman era Tunisia. Influence of the Iranian-sphere on Tunisia through the government has been only indirect, occasional, at the periphery, i.e., the 8th-10th century Rustamid
Rustamid
The Rustamid dynasty of Ibāḍī Kharijite imām that ruled the central Maghreb as a Muslim theocracy for a century and a half from their capital Tahert in present Algeria until the Ismailite Fatimid Caliphs destroyed it. The dynasty had a Persian origin...
s (discussed previously in History of early Islamic Tunisia
History of early Islamic Tunisia
The History of early Islamic Tunisia opens with the arrival of the Arabs who brought their language and the religion of Islam, and its calendar. The Arab conquest followed strategy designed by the Umayyad Caliphate regarding ist long-term conflict with the Byzantine Empire...
), or by the influence of individuals, e.g., al-Afghani (see below).
Arab culture has strongly affected Tunisia since the 8th century conquest. Tunisia has become predominately an Arabic-speaking country. The original medium of the Qu'ran and of Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
, of course, is the Arabic language
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
, which remains by far the most influential in the Muslim world. The people of Arabia once had reaped lasting renown in history as a result of the founding and spread of Islam. Long before the recent rise of Europe, and for centuries sharing this distinction with distant China, Muslim Arab civilization led the world in the refinement and in the prosperity of its citizens.
Yet since, the Turks had arrived and eventually moved into leadership position of various central Muslim polities, beginning about the 10th century. Thereafter, the Arabs had rested content seemingly under their foreign, albeit Islamic, rule. Moreover, about the year 1500 European Christians, "at last caught up with and overtook Islam, though the latter was quite unaware of what was happening."
Nonetheless the majority of Middle Eastern people now called Arabs still retained a well-acknowledged double esteem as (a) the creators of the ancient world's earliest civilizations (when most spoke another Semitic language or Egyptian
Egyptian language
Egyptian is the oldest known indigenous language of Egypt and a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. Written records of the Egyptian language have been dated from about 3400 BC, making it one of the oldest recorded languages known. Egyptian was spoken until the late 17th century AD in the...
), and later as (b) co-creators of the celebrated Arab Caliphate and its civilization, when as cousins 'adopted' by the desert Arabs (the original people of Muhammad). Despite having earned and enjoyed such high esteem, the Arabs in more recent times found themselves in need of rejuvenation and renewal. During the 19th century a great renaissance began to stir among Arabs and among the Muslim peoples in general, giving rise to political reformers.
Pasha
Pasha or pascha, formerly bashaw, was a high rank in the Ottoman Empire political system, typically granted to governors, generals and dignitaries. As an honorary title, Pasha, in one of its various ranks, is equivalent to the British title of Lord, and was also one of the highest titles in...
who spend many years in the service of several Bey
Bey
Bey is a title for chieftain, traditionally applied to the leaders of small tribal groups. Accoding to some sources, the word "Bey" is of Turkish language In historical accounts, many Turkish, other Turkic and Persian leaders are titled Bey, Beg, Bek, Bay, Baig or Beigh. They are all the same word...
s of Tunisia (1840s-1877), and later of the Ottoman Sultan. Khaïreddine has been discussed previously. Khaïreddine came of age in the era of the Ottoman Tanzimat
Tanzimat
The Tanzimât , meaning reorganization of the Ottoman Empire, was a period of reformation that began in 1839 and ended with the First Constitutional Era in 1876. The Tanzimât reform era was characterized by various attempts to modernize the Ottoman Empire, to secure its territorial integrity against...
, a series of modern reforms (begun in 1839). He preceded al-Afghani. When a youth Khaïreddine had traveled to Tunisia to enter the Turkish-speaking elite. He advocated a modern rationalism in the reform of society and government, yet one respectful of Muslim institutions. Once in power in Tunisia to implement his reforms (1873–1877), Khaïreddine encountered stiff opposition and was replaced mid-steam.
Inspiring and enigmatic, Jamal al-Din al-Afghani
Jamal al-Din al-Afghani
Sayyid Muḥammad ibn Ṣafdar Husaynī , better known as Sayyid Jamāl-ad-Dīn al-Afghānī and Sayyid Jamal-ad-Din Asadabadi , , was a political activist and Islamic ideologist in the Muslim world during the late 19th century, particularly in the Middle East, South Asia and Europe...
(1839–1897) traveled widely to rally the Muslim world to unity and internal reform. Later while in Paris in 1884 al-Afghani published with Muhammad 'Abduh (see below) a journal al-'Urwa al-wuthqa to propagate his message. He himself sought a leading position in government to initiate reinvigorating reforms. He managed for a time to associate with an Ottoman Pasha, and later with the Shah of Iran, but to no effect. Although advocating a pan-Islamic solution, al-Afghani also taught that with universal reason Muslim societies might be reformed under Islamic principles, to be followed by mastery of European sciences; industry would transform Muslim material culture. Such modernizing did not convince the more traditionist of the ulema, but did energize a following across Islam which became committed to reform agendas. It was rational principles that were adopted by Tunisian nationalists. Another reformer with lasting influence in Tunisia was Muhammad 'Abduh (1849–1905), a follower of al-Afghani, a gifted teacher, who eventually became the Mufti
Mufti
A mufti is a Sunni Islamic scholar who is an interpreter or expounder of Islamic law . In religious administrative terms, a mufti is roughly equivalent to a deacon to a Sunni population...
of Egypt. 'Abduh cultivated reason and held the controversial view that in Muslim law
Sharia
Sharia law, is the moral code and religious law of Islam. Sharia is derived from two primary sources of Islamic law: the precepts set forth in the Quran, and the example set by the Islamic prophet Muhammad in the Sunnah. Fiqh jurisprudence interprets and extends the application of sharia to...
the doors of ijtihad
Ijtihad
Ijtihad is the making of a decision in Islamic law by personal effort , independently of any school of jurisprudence . as opposed to taqlid, copying or obeying without question....
were open, i.e., permitting the learned to make an original interpretation of sacred texts.
Alongside the pan-Islamic were pan-Arab and pan-Turkic views. Yet many Arabic-speaking countries had grown weary under the Ottoman Empire; there arose a popular desire for self-rule under an Arab nationalism. In this regard Tunisia differed: an Arabic-speaking country but in the 19th century already long an autonomous province where the Ottoman hand was faint, a mere ceremony. Whereas later during World War I many Arabs of the east fought against Turkish armies for their independence, Tunisia experienced no anti-Turkish warfare. Yet in 1881 Tunisia fell under European rule, as did Egypt and the Mashriq following World War I. Accordingly, the emerging Tunisian nationalist movement had two distinct sources of Islamic political culture for fraternity, and for example against which to compare ideas and programs: the Ottomans (latter Turkey), and the Arab east.
Nationalism
{Under construction}The Bey was considered the head of the Tunisian people under the treaties establishing the Protectorate. Accordingly, he voiced their concerns and interests—from the point of view of his monarchy, whose rule continued but under the de facto control of the Resident General appointed by the French.
Many welcomed the progressive changes brought by France, but the general consensus was that Tunisians preferred to manage their own affairs. Kayr al-Din in the 1860s and 1870s had introduced modernizing reforms before the French occupation. Some of his companions later founded the weekly magazine al-Hadira in 1888. A more radical one al-Zahra ran from 1890 until suppressed in 1896; as was the Sabil al-Rashad of 'Abd al-'Aziz al-Tha'alibi, who was inspired by Muhammad 'Abduh of Cairo, among others.
Bashir Sfar initiated the discussion group Khalduniya in 1896. 'Ali Bash Hamba founded the French language journal Tunisien to inform the French public of the Tunisian complaints, but only increased the level of unrest. Tha'alibi founded the Arabic language Tunisien in 1909, to challenge Hamba from a Tunisian view point. In 1911 civil disturbances started within the universities. One result was that Hamba and Tha'alibi reached an accord. A political party was begun, al-Ittihad al-Islami [The Evolutionist], which had pro-Ottoman leanings.
Issues concerning a Muslim cemetery, the Jallaz, sparked large demonstrations which ended with martial law and the killing of many Tunisians in late 1911. Further demonstrations in 1912 led to a general boycott
Boycott
A boycott is an act of voluntarily abstaining from using, buying, or dealing with a person, organization, or country as an expression of protest, usually for political reasons...
of the streetcar lines in Tunis. In response the French authorities led to the closing of the nationalist newspapers and the exile of nationalist leaders.
Settler positions
When the French army occupied Tunisia, few Europeans were resident there, most being from Italy. France soon sought to discover ways to increase the French population. Various incentives, chiefly economic, began to be offered to citizens who would relocate to Tunisia. Since France itself enjoyed a higher standard of living, to be attractive the incentives to potential settlers had to be quite substantial when compared to Tunisian incomes.Although always relatively small in numbers, French settlers or colons became a very influential social stratum in Tunisia. They combined commercial-industrial expertise and know-how, with government privilege. Although not all the French were equally prosperous, ranging from rich to poor, nonetheless group cohesion was strong. French capital invested in such activities as mining
Mining
Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, from an ore body, vein or seam. The term also includes the removal of soil. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, rock...
and railroads, which resulted in large returns. Their use of modern technology required a trained workforce, and French immigrants were invariably the workers hired. Such skilled jobs were among the highest paid in Tunisia. Settler homes and urban neighborhoods were often built following French models. Eventually a sense of pride and accomplishment in the modern development of the country came to be felt and relished by the newly dominant French community. Local Tunisians came to be often seen as too narrow and biased, the more rural the more primitive or confused. The settlers organized themselves into interest groups in order to maintain their leading position, to protect their engine of money-making and of Tunisia's relatively rapid development.
Many Tunisians, who had manifested a desire to modernize before the French came, clearly appreciated the many improvements that the French Protectorate rather quickly accomplished, and those yet planned. Understandably, of course, they chafed at being made second-class citizens in their own country. In French public relations, a major point winnng Tunisian favor was the French ability to modernize the economy and administration. Tunisians, however, wanted to share in the work and rewards of the new French-built enterprises. The more far-seeing among resident French administrators, accordingly, were somewhat prone to draft French development plans so as to include significant participation by the Tunisian people. Nonetheless, other French administrators were more inclinded to award business and employment opportunities to French settlers, for both practical and colonial
Colonialism
Colonialism is the establishment, maintenance, acquisition and expansion of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony and the social structure, government, and economics of the colony are changed by...
reasons.
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, whom they carefully cultivated, e.g., the large, political-pressure group Parti-Colonial. A growing conflict emerged between the interests of the settlers and those of Tunisians; a struggle which became increasingly bitter. The French officials themselves were sometimes uncomfortably divided as to exactly which course to take.
Settlers expressed their views in their political and cultural associations, and commercial trade groups. Newspapers and magazines in French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
were published by and for the settler communities, e.g., La Tunisie Française. These various forums naturally enabled the individual settler to follow discussions that articulated their hopes and anxieties, to read journalists whose reports were pitched to their points of view, and to discern the talking points of their politicians, all of which enhanced their solidarity and effectiveness. Settler interests could be diverse across the gamut of social issues at home in France, while in North Africa they united for the struggle to defend their common advantages and privileges. Even so, some scorned settlers were known to support maghrib
Maghrib
The Maghrib prayer , prayed just after sunset, is the fourth of five formal daily prayers performed by practicing Muslims.The formal daily prayers of Islam comprise different numbers of units, called rak'at. The Maghrib prayer has three obligatory rak'at. The first two fard rak'at are prayed...
an independence, e.g., the academic author Jacques Berque
Jacques Berque
Jacques Augustin Berque was a French Islamic scholar and sociologist. His expertise was the decolonisation of Algeria and Morocco.-Biography:...
favored independence and, after the French exodus, still remained attached to the Maghrib.
French control of North Africa endured for many decades. During its course local maghriban resistance was articulated in sharper and more combative terms as the independence movement intensified. Especially bitter in accusation yet famous would be the works of an anti-colonial writer living in Algeria, Frantz Fanon
Frantz Fanon
Frantz Fanon was a Martiniquo-Algerian psychiatrist, philosopher, revolutionary and writer whose work is influential in the fields of post-colonial studies, critical theory and Marxism...
. Earlier in Tunisia Albert Memmi
Albert Memmi
Albert Memmi is a Tunisian Jewish writer and essayist who migrated to France.- Biography :Born in colonial Tunisia,from a Tunisian Jewish mother and a Tunisian-Italian Jewish father, he speaks Hebrew and Tunisian-Arabic...
had voiced a less sanguinary but nonetheless harsh appraisal of many French settlers. He writes of the colon that if "his living standards are high, it is because those of the colonized are low." He describes the settler's motives and identity:
"The change involved in moving to a colony... must first of all bring a substantial profit. ... You go to a colony because jobs are guaranteed, wages high, careers more rapid and business more profitable. The young graduate is offered a position, the public servant a higher rank, the businessman substantially lower taxes, the industrialist raw materials and labor at attractive prices." *** Perhaps later "he is often heard dreaming aloud: a few more years and he will take leave of this profitable purgatory and will buy a house in his own country." *** Yet if in fact "one day his livelihood is affected, if 'situations' are in real danger, the settler then feels threatened and, seriously this time, thinks of returning to his own land."
This dismal portrait assumed the impending tragedy. After Tunisian independence the new sovereign regime began to make distinctions between its citizens and foreigners living in Tunisia. The majority of French residents, including families in Tunisia for generations, made arrangements to return to their "own land." Tunisians filled their vacated positions. "Between 1955 and 1959, 170,000 Europeans--roughly two-thirds of the total--left the country." This disastrous ending belies the otherwise mixed but not unfavorable results of the French era. Jacques Berque comments, "Greater progress would have to be made, great sufferings undergone before either side would consent to admit the other's [place in history]."
French policy
{Under construction}The Church and the political left managed to cooperate in the spreading the 'advantages' of French culture in Africa and Asia. Italian settlers became associated yet remained distinct. The Church sent missionaries, who were directed from its cathedral in Tunisia, south across the Sahara to Franco-phone Black Africa where many churches were established. Tunisians began to appeal to the self-proclaimed public virtues of the French state, e.g., droit humaine, in order to obtain equal treatment with the French settlers, but became more often than not disappointed, increasingly so, enough that many became cynical regarding the Protectorate. Yet not all French officials were non-responsive. The fundamental nature of the colonial enterprise has been disputed: merely for economic markets and resources, for cultural expansion and prestige, or a frontier for the military. {In process}
Up to World War I
{Under construction}Organized nationalist sentiment among Tunisians, driven underground in 1912, resurfaced after the Great War. Tha'alibi tried to present Tunisia's case against the Protectorate to the Versailles Peace Conference and also published the book La Tunisie martyre, which endorsed a constitutional program. Encouragement came from many directions in 1919, e.g., the formation of the League of Nations
League of Nations
The League of Nations was an intergovernmental organization founded as a result of the Paris Peace Conference that ended the First World War. It was the first permanent international organization whose principal mission was to maintain world peace...
, and especially from Wafdist tafwid [delegation] of Egypt.
Le Destour
{Under construction}Nationalists established the Destour
Destour
The Constitutional Liberal Party , most commonly known as Destour, was a Tunisian political party, founded in 1920, which had as its the goal to liberate Tunisia from French colonial control....
[Constitution] Party in 1920. In 1922 the French granted minor reforms: a Ministry of Justice under Tahir b. Khayr al-Din, and a Grand Council of Tunisia which was purely consultative and in which the French were over-represented. This setback provoked a split in the Destour Party; Tha'alibi left Tunis in 1923. Nationalist attention focused on economic issues in 1924. A mutual aid soiety was begun, but did not survive a wave of strikes. Then the labor union, C.G.T.T. or Conféderation Générales des Travailleurs Tunisiens was founded, despite opposition from the Destour Party and the French Socialist.
Called popularly Le Destour, the official name was Al-Hisb Al-Horr Ad-Destouri At-Tounsi or Le Parti Libre Constitutionnel Tunisien.
Neo Destour
{Under construction}Habib Bourguiba
Habib Bourguiba
Habib Bourguiba was a Tunisian statesman, the Founder and the first President of the Republic of Tunisia from July 25, 1957 until 7 November 1987...
and others established and led a successor to Destour, the Neo-Destour Party, in 1934. French authorities later banned this new party. Oddly enough, support came from those Tunisian Italians
Tunisian Italians
The Italian Tunisians were the Italians living in Tunisia who promoted the possession of this northern African country by the Kingdom of Italy and even promoted a form of Italian irredentism of Tunisia during the era of Fascism....
who were supporting the fascist government in Italy; later in 1942 Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
obtained the liberation of Bourghiba from a Vichy
Vichy France
Vichy France, Vichy Regime, or Vichy Government, are common terms used to describe the government of France that collaborated with the Axis powers from July 1940 to August 1944. This government succeeded the Third Republic and preceded the Provisional Government of the French Republic...
jail. During World War II the nationalist movements struggled to survive.
World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, French authorities in Tunisia initially supported the rightest Vichy
Vichy France
Vichy France, Vichy Regime, or Vichy Government, are common terms used to describe the government of France that collaborated with the Axis powers from July 1940 to August 1944. This government succeeded the Third Republic and preceded the Provisional Government of the French Republic...
regime, which continued to govern the southern provinces of France after its capitulation to German forces in 1940. Many Tunisians had felt some satisfaction at France's defeat. In July, 1942, Moncef Bey acceded to the Husaynid
Husainid Dynasty
The Husainid Dynasty is the former ruling dynasty of Tunisia originally of Cretan origin. They came to power under Al-Husayn I ibn Ali at-Turki in 1705 replacing the Muradid Dynasty. After taking power the Husainids ruled as Beys with succession to the throne determined by age with the oldest...
throne. Immediately he took a nationalist position, asserting Tunisian rights against the new Resident General appointed by Vichy. He toured the country, dispensing with beylical protocol. Soon becoming very popular as the new voice of Tunisians, Moncef Bey had assumed the place of leaders of the effectively suppressed Destour and Neo-Destour parties.
In Africa east of Tunisia, after initial victories the German General Erwin Rommel
Erwin Rommel
Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel , popularly known as the Desert Fox , was a German Field Marshal of World War II. He won the respect of both his own troops and the enemies he fought....
, lacking supplies and reinforcements, in November 1942 lost the decisive battle of al-Alamein (near Alexandria, Egypt) to the newly replenished British General Bernard Montgomery, the fighting ending November 4, 1942. On November 7, the Allies
Allies of World War II
The Allies of World War II were the countries that opposed the Axis powers during the Second World War . Former Axis states contributing to the Allied victory are not considered Allied states...
began landing forces in Morocco (Operation Torch
Operation Torch
Operation Torch was the British-American invasion of French North Africa in World War II during the North African Campaign, started on 8 November 1942....
). The German Afrika Korps
Afrika Korps
The German Africa Corps , or the Afrika Korps as it was popularly called, was the German expeditionary force in Libya and Tunisia during the North African Campaign of World War II...
retreated from Egypt westward to Tunisia and set up defensive positions at the Mareth Line
Mareth Line
The Mareth Line was a system of fortifications built by the French between the towns of Medenine and Gabès in southern Tunisia, prior to World War II...
south of Gabès
Gabès
Gabès , also spelt Cabès, Cabes, Kabes, Gabbs and Gaps, the ancient Tacape, is the capital city of the Gabès Governorate, a province of Tunisia. It lies on the coast of the Gulf of Gabès. With a population of 116,323 it is the 6th largest Tunisian city.-History:Strabo refers to Tacape as an...
. The British following on its heels here eventually broke through. Rommel did have some success against the "green" American
Military history of the United States during World War II
The military history of the United States during World War II covers the involvement of the United States during World War II. The Empire of Japan declared war on the United States of America on 7 December 1941, immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor on the same day. On 11 December 1941,...
and Free French troops advancing from the west. General George Patton, however, later beat Rommel in battle. The fighting ended in May 1943. Tunisia became a staging area for operations in the invasion of Sicily
Sicily
Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...
later that year. General Dwight Eisenhower subsequently wrote of the occupation of Tunisia (evidently following an anti-colonial policy, yet one compromised) "far from governing a conquered country, we were attempting only to force a gradual widening of the base of government, with the final objective of turning all internal affairs over to popular control."
Collaborationism
Collaborationism is cooperation with enemy forces against one's country. Legally, it may be considered as a form of treason. Collaborationism may be associated with criminal deeds in the service of the occupying power, which may include complicity with the occupying power in murder, persecutions,...
and seeking his removal; they were appeased. "Late in 1943 Musif Bey was deposed by the French on the pretext that he had collaborated with the enemy."
Habib Bourguiba
Habib Bourguiba
Habib Bourguiba was a Tunisian statesman, the Founder and the first President of the Republic of Tunisia from July 25, 1957 until 7 November 1987...
, the leading figure in the Neo-Destour party, had been taken to Rome from Vichy France by the Germans, and feted there to further Italian designs on Tunisia; then he was repatriated to his Axis-occupied homeland. But Bourguiba remained pro-Independence without being anti-French (his wife being French). In Tunisia, however, some pro-German Destour leaders had been willing to work with the Third Reich, despite Bourguiba's persistent warnings. After the war, Bourguiba's American connections managed to clear him of false charges that he was a collaborator. Then with Salah Ben Yusef he began to rebuild the Neo-Destour political organization.
World context
{Under construction}Following World War II the French managed to regain control of Tunisia as well as other administered territories in North Africa. However, the struggle for national independence continued and intensified.
Independence
{Under construction}The Neo-Destour Party reemerged under Habib Bourguiba
Habib Bourguiba
Habib Bourguiba was a Tunisian statesman, the Founder and the first President of the Republic of Tunisia from July 25, 1957 until 7 November 1987...
. Yet with a lack of signigicant progress, violent resistance to French rule began in the mountains during 1954. The Tunisians coordinated with independence movements in Algeria and Morocco, although it was Tunisia that first became independent. Ultimately, in the decades-long struggle for independence, Neo-Destour leaders were able to gain sovereignty for the people by maneuver and finesse.
See also
- History of Tunisia: Ancient
- History of Tunisia: Medieval
- Hafsid
- Barbary CoastBarbary CoastThe Barbary Coast, or Barbary, was the term used by Europeans from the 16th until the 19th century to refer to much of the collective land of the Berber people. Today, the terms Maghreb and "Tamazgha" correspond roughly to "Barbary"...
- List of Beys of Tunis
- Tunisian ItaliansTunisian ItaliansThe Italian Tunisians were the Italians living in Tunisia who promoted the possession of this northern African country by the Kingdom of Italy and even promoted a form of Italian irredentism of Tunisia during the era of Fascism....
- French occupation of TunisiaFrench occupation of TunisiaThe French conquest of Tunisia occurred in two phases in 1881: the first consisting of the invasion and securing of the country before the signing of a treaty of protection, and the second consisting in the suppression of a rebellion...
- Tunisian Campaign
- TunisiaTunisiaTunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...
- History of TunisiaHistory of TunisiaThe History of Tunisia is subdivided into the following articles:*Outlines of early Tunisia*History of Punic era Tunisia*History of Roman era Tunisia*History of early Islamic Tunisia*History of medieval Tunisia*History of Ottoman era Tunisia...
- History of AfricaHistory of AfricaThe history of Africa begins with the prehistory of Africa and the emergence of Homo sapiens in East Africa, continuing into the present as a patchwork of diverse and politically developing nation states. Agriculture began about 10,000 BCE and metallurgy in about 4000 BCE. The history of early...