Motorization and colonial rule: Two scandals in Dahomey, 1916

Abstract

Transport systems are not just technical solutions to bring people from one point to another: they are embedded in social structures, reflecting and producing relations of power. The introduction of a new mode of transport means more than just a new way of moving around. Since cars were introduced to African colonies in accordance with the hierarchy of the colonial system, car ownership became an effective means of consolidating not only economic, but - more importantly - social and symbolic boundaries between rulers and subordinates. The article describes how, in 1916, administrators in Dahomey twice used local chiefs and their resources in order to buy cars which were to remain in their own hands, diverting money which had originally been destined for the local population as compensation for the recruitment of soldiers during the First World War. In both cases the scandal was discovered, the cars had to be sold back and the costs were covered by the Government. Nevertheless it was the local population and its elite which was duped. While chiefs were first seduced by promises of car ownership and then excluded from it, the local population was reduced to an audience admiring the newly acquired cars of colonial officers. Although they did not profit from the introduction of cars or the establishment of a whole new infrastructure, colonized peoples were forced to construct roads. Considering the low number of cars in use at the time, the enormous expansion of the infrastructure is best interpreted as an expression of the colonial administration's need for control and planning.