France's Need For Colonies During The Age Of Imperialism

France’s need for colonies during the Age of Imperialism was satisfied by North West Africa. France wanted to colonize for two reasons. One was so that they could assimilate the native people into their culture. In other words, they wanted to be culturally dominant over the lands they had taken over. The other reason was for national prestige. A large reason they had colonized to begin with was because they were forced into what seemed a battle with the British. India being taken over by the British spurred the French to do the same. The “Scramble for Africa” had begun.
Assimilation was a policy that was adopted by the French in the 19th and 20th centuries. This policy considered Natives of these colonies as French citizens as long as the
Mauritania was often disregarded because of two important factors. One was that France ran all of North West Africa through Senegal so they never had a need to send anyone to any of the other countries except for trade or to meet with a government official stationed there. Also, until they expanded into Mauritania they had all the gum Arabic they needed in Senegal to be successful. Mauritania was considered by the French not worth developing. However, this idea changed when Xavier Coppolani, a French military leader, was transferred to Africa in the year 1899.2 He lead the expansion of colonial rule north of the Senegal river, and influenced southern Mauritania to accept French rule. He did this through a series of alliances that he drew up with local religious brotherhoods. They were promised protection from attacks from the local Hassane tribe and in return they would use their religious influence to persuade the local emirs to accept French rule. Coppolani’s strategy worked, and the emirates of Tagant, Trarza and Brakna all accepted French rule in 1903-04. One last emirate resisted. They resided in Adrar. Coppolani died marching his army into Adrar. Eventually the last emirate was captured and forcefully included into Mauritania and the French rule they tried so hard to