Brainstorming session with Mr. Pierre Joxe

The Ibrahim Abu-Lughod Institute of International Studies hosted Mr. Pierre Joxe, Former Defense and Interior Minister of the French Republic, former member of the Constitutional Council, for a brainstorming session, on Saturday, 30 April 2011.

Mr. Joxe swiftly presented the series of colonial wars conducted by France after world war two (in Indochina to 1954, in Algeria from 1954 to 1962). And he expressed his opposition to those colonial wars, and the associated violence and torture such wars brought against civilians. Contrary to widespread expectations, the former colonies in Africa south of the Sahara and in the Arab world, did not bring democracy along with independence. On the contrary, the majority of these newly independent countries became corrupt military or civilian dictatorships. Though Mr. Joxe believes that the present Arab uprising is a very promising development.