The Amba Uprising: Beyond France's Plantation Economy

This article explores the roots of the current conflict between the French neocolonial regime in Cameroon and the English-speaking minority in southern Cameroons, or Ambazonia. It proposes the use of the Gramscian concept of hegemony as the best frame for understanding the specific forms of submission and dominance that are driving this conflict. It analyzes the geopolitical motives that have empowered and continue to enable French hegemony, comparing them to the motives that empowered and enabled the plantation economy in the U.S. South prior to the U.S. Civil War. It explores the range of forms of cultural rebellion taking place against this imposed hegemony, especially in the realms of education and language, including and beyond the Amba uprising.