French colonial empire and the popular front

At the dawn of a new millennium, it is clear that one of the most significant events of the twentieth century is the end of the empire. Yet the importance of France's empire in shaping contemporary France and French national identity has been neglected, or at least substantially under-estimated, by historians. In keeping with this trend, the traditional focus of histories of the Popular Front has been exclusively on metropolitan France. The central interest of this book is that it shifts the focus from the metropole to empire. In so doing, it shows that the history of the former cannot be divorced from the latter. At the same time, by extending our perspective to empire, it widens our understanding of the Popular Front experience and demonstrates how the 1936-8 period represents an important turning-point in French history, marking the beginning of an irreversible process of reform that was ultimately to lead to decolonisation and the end of empire. This book will be essential reading for historians of twentieth-century France, as well as those with an interest in the history of empire, colonialism, the colonial legacy and postcolonialism.