Apostles of Modernity : Saint-Simonians and the Civilizing Mission in Algeria

Between 1830 and 1870, French army officers serving in the colonial Offices of Arab Affairs profoundly altered the course of political decision-making in Algeria. Guided by the modernizing ideologies of the Saint-Simonian school in their development and implementation of colonial policy, the officers articulated a new doctrine and framework for governing the Muslim and European populations of Algeria. Apostles of Modernity shows the evolution of this civilizing mission in Algeria, and illustrates how these 40 years were decisive in shaping the principal ideological tenets in French colonization of the region. This book offers a rethinking of 19th-century French colonial history. It reveals not only what the rise of Europe implied for the cultural identities of non-elite Middle Easterners and North Africans, but also what dynamics were involved in the imposition or local adoptions of European cultural norms and how the colonial encounter impacted the cultural identities of the colonizers themselves. This study of the specialized military Offices of Arab Affairs in Algeria during the formative decades of French rule from 1830 to 1870 disputes the conventional view that the doctrine of assimilation governed France's colonial policies and practices in the nineteenth century. ... Introduction : republicanism deferred Never the twain shall meet? The moral conquest Impermanent monstrosities Lights out Raised in our care Napoleon, emperor of the Arabs Conclusion : another Napoleon, another Waterloo.