President Emmanuel Macron has said the “immense” issue of reparations for France’s role in the transatlantic slave trade must be addressed, while warning against “false promises”, as demand grows for formal discussion on addressing the legacies of enslavement.
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In 2001, France became the first country in the world to recognise slavery and the slave trade as “crimes against humanity”, via the Taubira Law, but stopped short of any reparations.
Celebrating the 25th anniversary of that landmark legislation at the Elysée presidential palace on Thursday, Macron said the “immense question” of reparations should be addressed.
“How to repair … is a question that must not be refused,” Macron said in a speech on the legacies of slavery. “It’s also a question on which we must not make false promises.”
Between 1551 and 1875, more than 1,38 millon African people were transported to the Americas and the French Caribbean on ships flying the French flag. That represents 11 percent of the transatlantic slave trade, which in total affected more than 12.5 million men, women, and children, according to France’s national library (BnF).
“We must have the honesty to say that we can never fully repair this crime, because it’s impossible. You will never be able to put a number on it, or find words that would bring this history to a close,” Macron said.
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Joint Ghana project
Macron also announced an international research project with Ghana to study the long-term effects of slavery and provide “solid recommendations” to policymakers. “We must engage with honesty in dialogue and work to continue this path”, he noted.
In March, Ghana brought a resolution at the United Nations to describe the transatlantic slave trade as the “gravest crime against humanity” and call for reparations as “a concrete step towards remedying historical wrongs”.
France’s decision to abstain drew criticism from elected officials in its overseas territories, especially in the Caribbean, where the legacy of slavery remains deeply embedded.
In an open letter to Macron, Guadeloupean senator and former minister for overseas territories Victorien Lurel called France’s abstention “a moral, historic, diplomatic and political mistake”. He argued it tarnished France’s image and undermined efforts at reconciliation between Western countries and their former colonies.
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Code Noir to be repealed
France abolished slavery in 1848 but royal decrees from the 17th and 18th centuries that established the legal status of enslaved people in its colonies were never formally overturned.
Macron said the continued existence such royal decrees – known as the Code Noir – was a “form of offence” and “a betrayal of what the Republic stands for”.
“That’s why I am asking the government to take up the bill aimed at repealing the Code Noir,” Macron said.
On Wednesday, lawmakers on the National Assembly’s law committee backed the bill, which now needs to go to a vote in both houses.
The French leader also recalled that the Elysée Palace – the presidential home and workplace – was built in the 18th century with money from the Crozat family, whose fortune came from the slave trade.
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Breaking the taboo
Former French presidents, notably François Hollande and Jacques Chirac, denounced the harms of enslavement and advanced work on slavery and colonial memory.
In 2001, Chirac declared 10 May a national day of remembrance for the victims of slavery; in 2015, Hollande inaugurated the largest slavery memorial in the world on the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe.
But Macron is the first president to break a historic taboo on publicly discussing the issue of reparations at the highest level of the state.
The French president, whose second and final five-year term ends next year, is facing growing pressure from activists and lawmakers to address racism and inequalities linked to the country’s colonial past.
There are calls for formal dialogue on how France should respond to the enduring legacies of enslavement and the issue of reparations.
In his speech, Macron did not define the exact form of any potential reparations or reparatory justice, or offer a clear framework or timeline for embarking on more national dialogue.
The French were the third largest slave traders in Europe, after the British and the Portuguese.
France abolished slavery in 1794 under the French Revolution, but Napoleon Bonaparte ordered troops to be sent to Guadeloupe in 1802 to restore the practice there.
France’s first abolition of slavery
Slavery was finally abolished in 1848, and compensation given to the owners of enslaved people.
