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Faced with the collapse of international trade and the price of commodities as a result of the Depression, the chambers of commerce of French overseas territories met on four occasions during the 1930s to air their concerns and address requests to authorities. Their congresses provide an ideal and little-known vantage point to observe the stresses and strains of the imperial economy in troubled times. Colonial interests did not necessarily coincide with those of the mother country. The tightening of protectionism in response to the economic crisis was primarily a way of relieving metropolitan interests, sometimes at the expense of overseas French producers and merchants. Two categories of demands emerge from the congresses. The first aimed to reinforce the imperial relationship in order to assist colonial exporters, while the second implicitly questioned the very foundations of an imperial economy, a surprising anticipation of post-1945 developments.

Publisher: Michigan State University Press