I'm not an expert on these matters but I know that the British built a strong educational system and cultural infrastructure in their colonies that was a unifiying factor in the colonies, which garnered some allegiance, as an economic and cultural springboard for some. I don't think the same holds true for the French in their colonies.This hearkens me back to the Franz Fanon and the Negritude movement. I saw an excellent, thought-provoking film a few years ago, "Chocolat," not the Johnny Depp and Juliette Binoche one, but a 1988 French one about the tensions in the household of a colonial adminstrator in French Cameroon concerning racial/colonial issues raised in this thread.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chocolat_%281988_film%29
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