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Tuesday 20th February, 5.15pm, Room H0.60, Humanities

Caribbean Seminar series: Michael Joseph (PhD, University of Oxford)

Veteran Politics and Veterans’ Politics: Ex-Servicemen and the State in the British and French Caribbean, 1919-1939

As demobilisation gathered pace in 1919, the colonies of the British and French Caribbean alike were confronted with the problem of reintegrating thousands of returning ex-servicemen. By 1939, the situation had diverged: former members of the British West Indies Regiment and West India Regiment were restive, dissatisfied, and troublesome, while their French counterparts were, if far from apolitical, at least relatively settled. In short, veteran politics influenced veterans’ politics, with lasting effects for the region. This paper compares the approaches of the British and French colonial authorities to the veteran question, asking how and why veterans across the region took such different paths, and what conclusions we can draw about the links between military service and citizenship.