^{Page 425 note 1} See Piaget, J., ‘Pensée égocentrique et pensée sociocentrique’, in Cahiers internationaux de sociologie (Paris), x, pp. 34–49.Google Scholar

^{Page 426 note 1} I use here the definition of assimilation developed by Piaget, J., Epistémologie génétique (Paris, 1949)Google Scholar. The problem remains, of course, whether the definition of cognitive development can be generalised from the level of the individual to the level of groups and social systems.

^{Page 427 note 1} For a discussion of the factors accounting for the high degree of centralisation in French educational institutions, see Crozier, M., The Bureaucratic Phenomenon (Chicago, 1964), pp. 238–44.Google Scholar

^{Page 427 note 2} The early instructions to local governors gave them complete latitude as to academic prograrsunes, the recruitment of teachers, and the establishment of schools. For a general discussion of the history of education in French Africa, see Clignet, R. and Foster, P., ‘French and British Colonial Education in Africa’, in Comparative Education Review (New York), VII, 1964, pp. 191–8Google Scholar, and Clignet, R. and Foster, P., The Fortunate Few (Evanston, 1966), chs. 1 and 2Google Scholar. See also Bolibaugh, J. and Hanna, P., ‘French Educational Strategies for Subsaharan Africa’ (Stanford, 1964, mimeo.)Google Scholar. It would be particularly interesting to examine how the changes since 1945 have affected the administrative hierarchy of education in Africa and to determine whether La Direction de l'enseignement pour l'A.O.F., becoming a rectorat organised along metropolitan lines, followed the instructions of the Ministére de l'éducation nationale rather than those of the Ministére de la France d'outre-mer.

^{Page 428 note 1} For a review of the changes in French colonial strategies, see Bouche, D., ‘Ecoles francaises au Soudan: 1884–1900,’ in Cahiers d'études africaines (Paris), v, 1966, pp. 228–67.Google Scholar

^{Page 428 note 2} See, for example, Aries, P. H., Centuries of Childhood (New York, 1962).Google Scholar

^{Page 429 note 1} It is interesting to note that the observed fact that patterns of behaviour and attitudes used to vary more between than within African ethnic groups had hardly any educational implications. No quotas were ever instituted to favour the educational participation of ‘underprivileged’ ethnic groups. The ‘particularist’ findings of anthropologists had no effect on the more ‘universalist’ orientations of administrators and educators. The question remains, of course, whether national integration is facilitated or impeded by the recognition of ethnic variations in educational aspirations and cognitive styles.

^{Page 429 note 2} For details on early colonial teaching materials, see Bouche, loc. cit. pp. 237 ff.

^{Page 429 note 3} Since independence, many African governments have decided to publish their own textbooks. It is, however, difficult to decide whether such a decision reflects nationalist orientations or the pressures of French publishing houses which have discovered a new market.

^{Page 430 note 1} French colonial authorities accorded to civil servants employed in African capital cities a salary superior to that of their counterparts in the hinterland. The argument invoked in France was that the cost of living was higher in Paris than in the provinces. This argument is invalid in Africa, since imported items usually enter or pass through capital cities, where they are therefore less expensive than in the smaller urban centres. This generalisation of metropolitan norms to the African context proves to be dysfunctional.

^{Page 430 note 2} For a general review of British educational policy, see Foster, P., Social Change and Educalion in Ghana (Chicago, 1965)Google Scholar, and Clignet and Foster, ‘French and British Colonial Education’, loc. cit.

^{Page 430 note 3} The assimilation of African students to lower classes of the metropole was not, however, exclusive to the English missions. There are parallels between the French eighteenth-century philosophers' notions of the type of education most appropriate to the lower classes, and the negative stance taken by many pamphieteers towards educational developments in Africa. ‘The lower classes should be guided, not educated’ (Voltaire, quoted by P. H. Aries, op. cit.) corresponds to: ‘The more we educate the natives, the more they will hate us’ (H. Tricon, written in Tunis at the turn of the century).

^{Page 431 note 1} Foster, op. cit.

^{Page 431 note 2} For a full discussion of the development of these schools, see R. Heyman, ‘The Initial Years of the Jeanes Schools in Kenya: 1924–1931’ (mimeo., n.d.). The assimilation of black Africans to the American Negroes of the South has been a theme recurrent in the educational preoccupations of the British colonial administration.

^{Page 432 note 1} It is quite clear that the efforts of British authorities both to standardise and to upgrade African secondary education result at least partly from the pressures exerted by the emerging elites. For a discussion of this, see Forster, op. cit., and Ajayi, J. F. Ade, ‘The Development of Secondary Grammar Schools in Nigeria’, in Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria (Ibadan), II, 1964, pp. 517–35Google Scholar. These pressures led to the establishment of institutional ties between British and African schools. For example, as early as 1876 Fourah Bay College was granting degrees under the supervision of Durham University. The concern of British authorities with the participation of various ethnic groups in educational institutions is more recent. See, for example, Foster, op. cit.

^{Page 432 note 2} The aims and organisation of educational facilities in Belgium and the Congo followed similar patterns to those described here. In both places, stress has long been placed upon the vocational and religious functions of education. In both places, development has depended on the efforts of the Catholic Church with the help of the Government. The preferential treatment given to the Catholic Church after 1925 was parallel to its treatment in metropolitan Belgium; in both places it was associated with the development of tensions between the Flemish and Walloon peoples, which superseded the strains between the worlds of politics and of business. For a full description, see Yates, B., ‘The Missionary Factor in African Educational Policies: the Belgian case’, in Formation of Educational Policies: a comparative analysis (Papers from the 1968 conference of the Comparative Education Society, State University of New York at Albany, 1969), pp. 253–61.Google Scholar

^{Page 433 note 1} L'Ecole normale superienre, L'Ecole nationale d'adminietration, and L'Ecole polytechnique have produced the overwhelming majority of the French élite. See Bourdieu, P. and Passeron, J. C., ‘L'Examen d'une illusion’, in Revuefrançaise de sociologie (Paris), IX, 1968, pp. 227–53Google Scholar. At lower levels there are also close links between the training programmes in agriculture, public work, teaching, etc. and the corresponding labour markets.

^{Page 433 note 2} For an examination of the French data, see Girard, A., ‘Enquête nationale sur l'entrée en 6éme’, in Population (Paris), XVIII, 1963, p. 29Google Scholar. On the Ivory Coast and Ghana, see Clignet, R. and Foster, P., ‘Potential Elites in Ghana and the Ivory Coast’, in American Journal of Sociology (Chicago), LXX, 3, 1964, pp. 349–62Google Scholar. A comparison between the number of individuals in the secondary school age group and of students effectively enrolled in such institutions, in towns of differing sizes, shows that the ratio is lower for Abidjan than for Bouake, Daloa, or Gagnoa.

^{Page 435 note 1} See Foster, op. cit.

^{Page 436 note 1} See Bouche, op. cit. The conffict often resulted from the fact that missions were primarily concerned with the schooling of the lower classes, whereas many colonial administrators were keen to distinguish between the education given to the sons of the local élite on the one hand and to the offspring of slaves on the other. It would be interesting to determine whether the tensions between district officers and missionaries were related to their respective backgrounds and whether they transferred to Africa the conflicts between their respective social classes in metropolitan France.

^{Page 436 note 2} See Clignet and Foster, The Fortunate Few, ch. a. These gardens helped nationalist leaders to mobilise African public opinion against the shortcomings of colonial education, and it is only recently that the idea of school gardens has been re-examined by African governments.

^{Page 436 note 3} See Thornley, J., The Planning of Primary Education in Northern Nigeria, U.N.E.S.C.O. International Institute for Educational Planning, African Research Monograph 2 (Paris, 1966).Google Scholar

^{Page 437 note 1} On the hesitations of French authorities concerning language, see Bouche, op. cit.

^{Page 437 note 2} ‘In Bandiagara the District Officer gave fifty cents to the pupils able to recite the lesson of the day without making mistakes’–Bouche, op. cit.

^{Page 438 note 1} The Belgian authorities also stressed the need for accommodation. The introduction to the 1925 Plan put it plainly: ‘in Belgium, the primary function of the school is to instruct; in the Congo, its purpose must be essentially to educate… it would be pointless to transfer the Belgian school system to Africa.’ See Yates, loc. cit.

^{Page 438 note 2} See Piaget, ‘Pensée égocentrique’, loc. cit. The same point is made by Park, R.: ‘We can only know the minds of peoples in so far as we are able recreate in our own minds the experiences which have made them what they are.’ Race and Culture (Glencoe, 1950), p. 30Google Scholar. It is easy enough to give examples of sociocentric definitions of assimilation. For instance, Lt. Cob. Humbert, quoted by Bouche, op. cit. p. 320, writes: ‘The moral and material assimilation [of Africans] info our culture relies almost entirely upon the formal schooling and the education that we will be able to give to new generations.’ It seems in fact that the author means ‘The moral and material assimilation of our culture by Africans.’ The choice of prepositions does not seem to be the result of pure chance. Africans are cast in a passive role, which dooms the ‘assimilationist’ purpose of the colonial teacher to failure. The same ‘passive’ definition of assimilation is frequent enough among American sociologists, whoview assimilation as ‘the fact of being absorbed into a new culture or group’.

^{Page 439 note 1} Cf. Thomas, W. in Old World Traits Transplanted (New York, 1921), pp. 259–308Google Scholar: ‘Reminders are precisely what the individual uses in making constructive changes in his life.’

^{Page 439 note 2} For a general discussion of cognitive assimilation, see Barbichon, J., ‘The Diffusion of Scientific and Technical Knowledge’, in Journal of Social Issues (Ann Arbor), xxxv, 1968, pp. 135–56Google Scholar. For a discussion of more specifically African examples, see Gay, J. and Cole, J., Old Culture and New Mathematics: a study of the learning of mathematics among the Kpelle of Liberia (New York, 1967).Google Scholar

^{Page 440 note 1} See Clignet, R., ‘Réflexions sur la psychologie en Afrique’, in Bulletin de l'Institut national d'orientation professionnelle (Paris), XVIII, 1962, pp. 95–102Google Scholar. For opposite evidence, see Greenfield, P.et al., ‘On Culture and Equivalence’, in Bruner, J.et al. (eds.), Studies in Cognitive Growth (New York, 1968).Google Scholar

^{Page 440 note 2} To be sure, this particular type of motivation explains only partially the nature of African occupational aspirations. See Bastide, R., Religions africaines au Brésil (Paris, 1960), pp. 94–5.Google Scholar

^{Page 440 note 3} For a demonstration of this point, see R. Clignet and J. Sween, ‘Urbanisation and Family Style in Africa’ (forthcoming).

^{Page 440 note 4} See Clignet, and Foster, , The Fortunate Few, pp. 116 ffGoogle Scholar. The very fact that education is associated with the persistence or reinforcement of ethnic cleavages is a good indication of the lack of accommodation of Ivory Coast students. To quote W. I. Thomas, ‘[These students] accord a meaning to their learning experience only in so far as it is identified with a previous experience.’

^{Page 441 note 1} See Clignet, ‘Le Bilan de l'orientation des élèves de 5ème en Collège d'orientation de Côte d'Ivoire’ (Abidjan, 1959, mimeo.). From a more general viewpoint, a cross-cultural survey has shown that heterogeneity in the classroom enhances general levels of performance in mathematics; this confirms the positive effects of accommodation on performance. Indeed, heterogeneity in the attitudes, orientations, and abilities of students leads them to accommodate more than to assimilate. See Husen, T. (ed.), International Study of Achievement in Mathematics: a comparison of twelve countries (Stockholm, 1967).Google Scholar

^{Page 442 note 1} For a description of these changes, see Clignet, ‘Le Bilan de l'orientation’, loc. cit., Clignet and Foster, The Fortunate Few, ch. VI, and Clignet, R., ‘Education et aspirations professionelles’, in Tiers-Monde (Paris), V, 1964, pp. 61–82.Google Scholar

^{Page 443 note 1} For the view that ‘assimilationist practices’ reflect African demands, see Memmi, A.Portrait du colonisé (Paris, 1966)Google Scholar, ‘Les deux réponses du colonisé’. See also Park, R., quoting an informant of Wissler (in Rate and Culture, p. 6)Google Scholar: ‘If you tell a native to do a thing in as native a manner as possible he will do it in his best imitation of a European way. To him all that is European represents civilisation and if you want him to follow his own custom then you must try… to keep him a serf race.’

^{Page 443 note 2} On the negative effects of assimilationist practices, see A. Memmi, op. cit. On the negative aspects of accommodative practices, see many observations comparing the products of French and British colonial schools. Many observers argue that French-speaking Africans are more fluent in French than their counterparts in English, and that this difference reflects the fact that the first academic experiences of African students in English-speaking areas are acquired in their mother tongue, and that the resulting delay in their exposure to European norms prevents them from accommodating substantially to the cognitive style which is expected from them.