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Bibliographic Citation
Jason Yackee, Expelling the “Sinister Vilgrain”: Nationalization, Diplomacy, and Sugar in Congo-Brazzaville, 1970–1978, 44 Fr. Hist. Stud. 119 (2021).
Abstract
This article tells the story of the Congo-Brazzaville’s nationalization in 1970 of
the Société Industrielle et Agricole du Niari (SIAN) and its affiliate Société Sucrière du Niari. At the time of independence, the company, controlled by France’s Vilgrain family, was the Congo’s largest private employer. The SIAN episode is fertile ground for exploring the theme of postcolonial entanglements from a political-economic perspective. It especially illustrates how those entanglements created both obstacles to and opportunities for neo-imperial influence, just as they did for acts of sovereign independence. The article suggests that the complex, multifaceted interdependencies among France, the Congo, and the Vilgrain family insulated the effects of nationalization on the larger Franco-Congolese relationship while eventually providing a measure of compensation for the despoiled investors.
