Report on Citizenship Law: Mali were French ‘citizens’ (or were recognized with another European nationality). French subjects were governed by the Code de l’indigénat (‘code for natives’), codified from 1881, and had few rights. Persons under this system had no political rights and were subjected to forced labour, arbitrary imprisonment and special courts. They also had no rights or obligations under the French Civil Code. The vast majority of people in the AOF lived under this system, with the exception of a small group of so-called évolués who became French citizens and were governed under the French Civil Code.18 In May 1946, all inhabitants of the AOF were declared to be citizens of France.19 In October, 1946, following the end of World War II, the new French Constitution created the French Union, with expanded rights for persons living in the colonies, their symbolic representation in the French General Assembly, and the repeal of the Code de l’indigénat.20 In 1956, the Loi Cadre Defferre gave limited voting rights, in theory, to the inhabitants of France's overseas colonies.21 Registration of civil status, the état civil, was extremely incomplete in much of the AOF, including Soudan Français, particularly in rural areas.22 Events such as births and marriages were recorded only for persons who had adopted the French Civil Code, and the vast majority of marriages were celebrated according to Islamic or customary law. As a result, few persons could prove their place of birth, descent, or residence under French law. While the government pushed to expand voter registration, with separate lists for those with full French civil status and for those without, this was done separately from other forms of civil registration.23 Voter registration favoured urban, educated persons, reflected in the election to the National Assembly of writer and influential politician Fily Dabo Sissoko and his Parti Progressiste Soudanais (PSP) on a traditional, conservative and pro-French platform. Improvements in registration greatly expanded the electorate following the Loi Cadre, but voting rates remained lower in rural areas. A broader African electorate brought a new group of more radical African politicians to the National Assembly, like Soudanese socialist Modibo Keïta.24 The French Union failed to provide solutions to the problems of belonging and political representation in the French Empire. In 1958, a new Constitution created the French word ‘subject’ in French law should not be confused with its use in the term ‘British subject’, which was the highest nationality status under British law. 18 Bakari Kamian, « La dynamique des intégrations, de la période coloniale à nos jours » in Lydie Moudileno « Les États-nations face à l'intégration régionale en Afrique de l'Ouest - Le cas du Mali » (Karthala 2007). This system of laws was different for the Originaires of the quatre communes of Senegal. For an explantation of nationality in the quatre communes, see Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch, « Nationalité et Citoyenneté en Afrique Occidentale Français : Originaires et Citoyens Dans Le Sénégal Colonial » 42 Journal of African History 285 (2001). 19 Loi n° 46-940 du 7 mai 1946, tendant à proclamer citoyens tous les ressortissants des territoires d'outre-mer. 20 Frederick Cooper, Nationality between Empire and Nation, Remaking France and French Africa 1945-1960 (Princeton UP 2014). 21 Loi Cadre Defferre, Loi n. 56-619 du 23 juin 1956. 22 Ruth Dickens, Defining French Citizenship Policy in West Africa (doctoral thesis, Emory U. 2001). 23 Some French administrators proposed that voting itself should be used as proof of nationality, but this approach was not employed on the ground. Cooper 155. 24 In the first election of 1946, 800,000 people registered out of an approximate population of 15 million. In 1951, 3 million had registered, and by 1956, 6 million had registered. Following the Loi Cadre in 1956, ten million people registered to vote in the AOF, over half the population. Actual voting also increased. In the January 1956 elections for the Assembly National, before the Loi Cadre, 3.3 million people in West Africa voted out of the 6 million who were registered. In the first elections after the Loi Cadre passed, for territorial assemblies in March 1957, 4.8 million voted out of the ten million who registered. These statistics are taken from Cooper 61-62. 4 RSCAS/GLOBALCIT-CR 2020/11- © 2020 Author(s)