Key: Germany transferring Cameroon to France and a number of large-scale migrations led to large information and commitment problems in the country. French colonial administrative practices created many economic and political grievances. The combination of these factors created a situation in which conflict could not be avoided and it led to the Cameroonian Civil War and eventually, Cameroonian independence.

The conflict in Cameroon was largely a nationalistic anti-colonial struggle between the Cameroonian people and the Fourth French Republic. France was ruling Cameroon in the form of a League of Nations Mandate turned United Nations Trustee. In the immediate post-war period of 1945-1955, the demographics, economics, and political structure of the French Cameroon began to change dramatically. France embarked on large sale investing and infrastructure building in Cameroon, which had a considerable effect on the Cameroonian people and economy. This led to a Cameroonian nationalist movement started in the 1950s that was largely organized by the people of Bassaa-Bakoko, Bamileke, especially the Duala. Their nationalism spurred largely because of economic desperation in the face of French domination, large-scale migration, and the French attempt to control domestic politics of Cameroon. However, this alone does not explain the breakdown of bargaining and the outbreak of large-scale political violence, which was caused in part by the resolve of the French Republic to maintain control over West Africa and its own domestic political and economic climate of the post-war period. This paper will examine the causes and proliferation of Cameroonian nationalism (the symptoms) and why the relevant parties were unable or unwilling to bargain, leading to a bloody colonial civil war (bargaining failure).

Civil wars occur because of two problems. First, there are symptoms of conflict greed, grievance, and opportunity. Then, there are the reasons that negotiations or bargaining break down. Bargaining fails for two reasons: information and commitment problems. Information problems take the form of misunderstanding the other side’s strength, resolve (the willingness to accept costs), and objectives. Commitment problems are related to the level of belief that one party has regarding the other party’s willingness or ability to uphold a deal. Tragically, in Cameroon, the people and the colonial administration were unable to negotiate, which caused the political conflict to turn violent. This was due to the information and commitment problems present in Cameroon. The French did not have a good understanding of these peoples or their migrations. The geography of the country limited their ability to gather intelligence in the bush, which made the French fairly unaware of the effects of how migrations had on the resolve of the Cameroonian people. Also, when the French took over, the former German administrators gave them no information regarding the region. So, the French were thrust into an actively evolving region of the African bush with migrations and complex ethnic relations. Their colonial administration was forced to start new relationships with the natives from scratch. The Cameroonians, on the other hand, had information problems regarding the French. They did not understand the domestic politics of France in the early post-war years and how the war affected the French resolve to hold onto their foreign territories. Commitment problems arose in France’s handling of Cameroonian politics. The proscription of the Union of Populations of Cameroon forced the movement to go underground, eliminated their ability to bargain in the normal mediums, and ended the belief that France would be willing to negotiate or uphold a deal.

Migrations in the region had been occurring for some time but became more rapid during the pre- and post-war periods. The group that moved the most were the young Bamileke who were migrating due to land shortages in the highlands. Most of them moved into the Mungo river valley to their South West. The Bamileke are dynamic people, who successfully inserted themselves into the Mungo economy, and some became quite wealthy, even more so than the indigenous people. By 1955, Bamileke people made up over half of the Mungo’s population, which enlarged their sphere of shared language and culture creating a “Bamileke identity” in the Mungo (Terretta 58). Their economic success led to a three-way competition in the Mungo between the European plantations, the Bamileke, and the indigenous peoples of the Mungo. Some of the Bamileke successfully become middle-class and sought to earn political power to match their economic position, thus a political grievance. While the European Planters strove to maintain the status quo of European domination and the indigenous people of the Mungo tried to earn their way in their own homeland (African Studies 86). This polarizing competition worked to reinforce the shared identity of the now spread out Bamileke, which connected political struggle in the Mungo South with that of the northern highlands.

The Beti-Pahuin peoples, with French encouragement, migrated south across the Sanaga River to take advantage of the cocoa farming in that area. This was a part of a larger French plan of “Embourgeoisment,” creating a middle class whose wealth was dependent on the French (African Studies 85). They had relative success and a middle class of some sort was created leading to some pro-French sentiment in the region; however, this positivity came to an end in 1955 with the drop in cocoa prices, which then fueled anti-colonial sentiment. This anti-colonial sentiment caused by economic hardship was solidified across regions because of the migrations that had occurred. The migration was responsible for “creating a sizeable zone extending from the center of Cameroon all the way into Rio Muni, Gabon and Congo” of peoples who shared “common linguistic, cultural and, later, economic characteristics” (African Studies 85). Ironically, the French-encouraged migration had worked to unify even more people across a larger region against the French when their incomes from cocoa farming fell to unacceptable levels.

The people of Duala, the biggest port city, had drastic effects on the creation of Cameroonian nationalism. The Duala were the smallest, wealthiest, and the best educated of the Cameroonian natives because of their constant interaction with Europeans through trade. This allowed them to have a disproportionate amount of political power compared to their small population of 45,000 (African Studies 85). Their anti-colonial sentiments stemmed greatly from the fact that they were being left out of the new economic construction boom being headed by Europeans. The Duala tried to join the economic boom of the 1940s by selling their land, whose price had risen significantly, to Europeans. However, they sold this land while immigration from the inland side of their territory caused the demography of Duala to change faster than anticipated and they found themselves becoming a minority in their own city. As the most educated and the wealthiest of the Cameroonians it seemed as if they were being unfairly left out of the new economic ventures and their city was being hijacked by outsiders. Then, once they became a minority, their pre-existing political power dwindled and what started as an economic issue quickly became political as well. This clearly demonstrates both the economic and political grievances of the people of Duala.

Very close by, the Bassaa-Bakoko peoples living in the Sanaga Valley had their own reasons for the anti-colonial sentiment. This region was filled with unskilled workers who were employed in French construction projects. These projects began almost immediately after the war as a part of a grand financial plan by the French to build up Cameroon. Construction took place in the important trade cities of Duala, Edea, and Eseka. The result was that the Bassaa people’s place in society became “sub-proletariat” once the construction ended because the lands that they used to farm were now occupied by Bamileke and Europeans (African Studies 86). This turned the Bassaa people into the most disenfranchised from the economic and political opportunities of all the ethnic groups in Cameroon. Their disenfranchisement and political grievances were coupled with a history of being treated the most brutally by both the Germans and the French, which helped spur them on to be among the first to take part in political violence (African Studies 86). The complex circumstances surrounding these ethnic groups in terms of migrations created vast information problems for the French and resulted in a lack of understanding of the people. This was also due in part because the former German administrators left nothing for the French to work with. The French were forced to play catchup in an ever-evolving and difficult to supervise region. The colonial administration had no understanding of the Cameroonian’s resolve or shifting identities and tried to uphold the status quo as they knew it (Terretta 47).

All these groups of people had different reasons for their anti-colonial sentiment but a few political groups were able to unite them against the French. The Union of Populations of Cameroon quickly became the largest anti-colonial political party with members and sympathizers numbering around 100,000 of the 747,000 strong electorate (Terretta 83). The goal of the UPC was to fill the gap of representation of the people of Cameroon in governance and push for independence. They started as a territorial offshoot of the African Democratic Rally or RDA, which was a widespread political party in West Africa dedicated to fighting colonialism through legal means. An important aspect of their program was that Cameroon’s status as a mandate and not a colony made them unique compared to the other colonies. As such, they felt that the French strategy of Loi Cadre, granting of autonomy but not independence to colonies, was not sufficient (Britannica). As a mandate, they were entitled to complete independence as described by the United Nations itself. The UPC quickly gained ground because its rhetoric garnered support from both the British and French Mandates of Cameroon (Terretta 81-82). This was due to their ‘program’ including the unification and complete independence of not just the French Cameroon but also the British mandate in Cameroon.

The UPC was also in close affiliation with the French Communist Party or PCF, which caused the UPC to be increasingly seen as a threat to the French rule in Cameroon. The French managed to keep the party out of official Cameroonian politics for a while; however, it continued to grow in size and popularity. In the 1952 elections, it seemed possible for UPC’s Ruben Um Nyobe, the founder and leader, to win. However, the colonial administration “put into operation a campaign to sabotage the election through the efforts of its local officials” and effectively ended any chance of a UPC candidate coming to power by legitimate means (Joseph 181). Joseph states that “it was, in fact, impossible for any UPC candidate to win an election during the post-war colonial period for the simple reason that the French would not permit it” (Joseph 181). Over the next few years, a number of elections with UPC candidates as participants would be sabotaged by the French administrators through means of propaganda, bribes, and exploiting the power of local officials. By 1955, the French proscribed the group as a political entity. Ironically, after its proscription, the group actually increased its number of followers by turning it into a kind of underdog who was trying to represent the “grass-roots” Cameroonians in the face of French political oppression (Terretta 83). This was the beginning of political violence in the country. While general support for their nationalist ideas grew, the party actually splintered into factions that sided with the USSR or the Republic of China and some that remained independent, as is the case with Nyobe’s faction. Some of these factions turned to armed struggle when it seemed as if legal means of change had been exhausted. As the French pushed against the UPC, the UPC pushed back. Riots broke out throughout the country in early 1955 and a coordinated armed resistance was organized on May 26 of the same year in Edea (Joseph 269). As the violence began to escalate Lieutenant Colonel Jean Lamberton was brought to Cameroon. Under Lamberton’s leadership, the French army began rounding up Cameroonians suspected of being UPC sympathizers by the thousands and forcing them into camps. They claimed to be doing this out of concern for the Cameroonians safety, but it was a clear attempt to control and supervise the people (Terretta 222). This displayed France’s understanding that information problems existed and was their way of trying to gather intel on and actively contain the UPC. What the French did not understand, or perhaps disregarded, was the commitment problem that this created; using the military to force civilians into camps greatly decreases the level of trust and increases the commitment problems. The deliberate exclusion of the UPC and the manipulation of elections in favor of French-picked candidates had effects on both information and commitment. Banning them and actively pursuing and prosecuting its members, sometimes in the form of “concentration camps” created commitment and information problems. Forcing them underground actually hampers information flows and the formation of mini concentration camps creates immense commitment problems. The UPC had attempted to influence politics by legal means and were pushed aside and prosecuted by the colonial powers. Showing them that France was completely unwilling to bargain and would settle for no less than complete control of the domestic politics of Cameroon.

The last part of this paper will investigate why the French had such a high resolve in maintaining power in the case of the Cameroon Mandate. The circumstances surrounding French resolve were either not understood by the Cameroonians, creating an information problem. Or, they were known, and their resolve created a commitment problem by displaying France’s unwillingness to negotiate. Either way, the politics of domestic France severely hampered the ability to bargain and helped lead to civil war. France was coming out of the Second World War devastated physically and economically. A very bloody war of independence had already broken out in Algeria. They were rebuilding and trying to combat new Cold War fears of communism permeating into Western Europe. To rebuild France and restore its status as a world power, they had to embark on a series of investment projects in their colonies to turn a profit. Cameroon held vast economic potential in terms of agricultural products and international shipping based in the port of Duala. Simultaneously, the DeGaulle administration in France was partnered closely with the United States in a global effort to push back against communism in favor of capitalism. These two endeavors explain the French resolve to push back against any domestic pressures inside Cameroon against the colonial administration.

In the immediate post-war period, the French attempt to turn a profit in Cameroon took the form of huge financial investments, construction projects, and increased migration of white French nationals into Cameroon. A study of Dualan demographics shows that in 1947 Europeans made up approximately 14.1% of civil service positions compared to their African counterparts 85.9%. However, in 1955, those demographics changed to 31.4% and 68.6% respectively (Joseph 150). The increase in Europeans living in Cameroon occurred simultaneously with FIDES investments. FIDES, or the French Investment Fund for Economic and Social Development, began in the late ‘40s and continued for roughly ten years. The distribution of FIDES funds represents French interests and the levels of that funding point to which areas they deem to be the most valuable to them. When only counting FIDES investments and ignoring private investments, Cameroon accounts for almost 90 billion Francs or 18% of French investment in West Africa. Another way to look at this is by analyzing the Per Capita Investment, this analysis shows that the French government invested 4,300 Francs per inhabitant in French Cameroon compared to 2,500 Francs per inhabitant in French West Africa (The Fides Era 80-81). The scope of these investments compared to other French colonies clearly shows the perceived importance of Cameroon to the Fourth French Republic. I believe that levels of investment and the number of colonists present is directly correlated to the resolve of the colonizer, therefore decreasing the likelihood that they give the territory up or allow hostile factions to win elections.

The second source of French resolve was the anti-communist/nationalist attitude that took hold in the west immediately after WWII ended. Bloody independence conflicts in their colonies had already begun, chiefly Algeria. Around the world, western-capitalist nations were fighting communism at every turn to keep it from permeating in their societies. This is extremely important in dissecting the bargaining failure in Cameroon as the UPC joins forces with the RDA at the height of their relationship with the French Communist Party (PCF) in 1947. The UPC was unaware that in May of 1947 the French government had dismissed the PCF from the French Parliament entirely and had become quite hostile to the communist party (Joseph 171). This shift in domestic French politics had drastic effects on the colonies. French colonial administrations became more willing to act in repressive manners when dealing with nationalist movements, communist or not, claiming that they were “communist-inspired” and therefore did not deserve to be apart of governance (Joseph 171). The partnership between the UPC and the PCF made them stand out as a perceived threat regardless of their independence demands. The domestic French attitude towards communism and nationalism represents information and/or commitment problems. Either the Cameroonians were unaware of just how anti-communist/nationalist the French were, creating an information problem. Or, it created a commitment problem because it was clear that the French would not bargain with the Cameroonian people.

The symptoms of civil war in Cameroon are diverse and complex with multiple ethnic groups having separate grievances. All of them, however, are related to poor political and economic conditions. When we analyze the failure of bargaining, we look at it as a continuum with France on one side and the UPC on the other. There is a zone of agreement somewhere in the middle and that zone is the source of peace. If that zone of agreement cannot be found, then the war begins. I have shown how there are serious information and commitment problems between the Cameroonians and the French; these problems were in regard to complex migrations, the domestic politics of France, Cold War attitudes, lack of information from the German administration, and the handling of Cameroonian politics by the French. They acted to shrink the zone of agreement or make it difficult for each side to judge what that ZOA might be. Without being able to identify the ZOA, armed political conflict was inevitable.

Works Cited

Atangana, Martin R. “French Capitalism and Nationalism in Cameroon.” African Studies Review 40, no. 1 (1997): 83–111. https://doi.org/10.2307/525034.

Joseph, Richard A. Radical Nationalism in Cameroun: Social Origins of the UPC Rebellion. Oxford, 1977.

Terretta, Meredith. Nation of Outlaws, State of Violence: Nationalism, Grassfields Tradition, and State Building in Cameroon. Athens, OH, UNITED STATES: Ohio University Press, 2013. http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/utk/detail.action?docID=1743586.

“Loi Cadre | French Law | Britannica.” Accessed November 26, 2019. https://www.britannica.com/topic/loi-cadre.

Atangana, Martin, and Martin-René Atangana. French Investment in Colonial Cameroon: The FIDES Era (1946-1957). Peter Lang, 2009.