This means that land possession was not the defining characteristic of power in western Africa –– villages often relocated due to poor soil, making it easier to understand African empires and kingdoms as groups of people under the control of a single emperor or king.

At the time, European powers were competing for control of African territories (see Atlantic Charter), driven by economic interests in resources –– particularly gold, diamonds, and copper in Mali –– as well as the desire to spread their political and cultural influence.

Other but less notable motivations included the pretense of a "civilizing mission" and France's desire to exert political and military control over the region.

France established a network of military bases throughout Mali, and used its colonial authority to suppress resistance movements and maintain control over the local population.

Nevertheless, in the 1930s, the colonial government established the Office du Niger, which implemented a scheme of compulsory labor and levies that forced Malian farmers to engage in cotton cultivation for overseas trade.

[7] The colonization of Mali was part of a larger scramble for Africa, where European powers sought to expand their influence and control over the continent.

This system is often criticized for having led to over-centralization, thus a lack of administrative independence which heavily impeded the political institutions of sovereign Mali.

French colonial rule as well as altering the political economy of the region, it also caused vast agricultural development projects and the introduction of legal codes and state administration that endure to this day.

Duties within the inter-territory government were split between the Premier, Modibo Keïta, and the Vice-Premier and Ministere De La Defense, Mamadou Dia.

This divide was only compounded by the character differences between Keïta, a puritanical aristocrat and Senghor a theoretician more comfortable with the idiosyncrasies of French society.

[14]Though Keïta's rule enjoyed its successes in cultivating relationships with the Eastern Bloc and nationalizing certain aspects of the Malian economy, his emblematic personality that popularized at home centralized power to him and his entourage.

Following the coup of 1968, moderates within the Malian bureaucracy and military favored free-market economies as opposed to Keïta's more radical and internationally independent form of government.

[24] It was considered a successful military intervention; Malian activism groups, government officials, as well as French scholars have reflected positively on the operation.

Mathieu Guidère, a scholar of Islam and the Arab world at the University of Toulouse, said in an interview published in the newsmagazine Jeune Afrique, that without the French military intervention the state of Mali would have fallen.

As a result of the 2021 Malian Coup, French President Emmanuel Macron announced the end of the operation and his intentions to remove troops incrementally.

[29] The Friedrich Ebert Foundation conducted the "Mali-Meter" survey in Mali to assess the level of contentment among the populace with Operation Barkhane.

[30] According to Tobie, these results are best explained by the geographical differences within the Malian population; "People in contact with the forces of Barkhane in the North of the country approve of it much more because they see changes in their daily lives.

Conversely, people interviewed in Southern Mali, who are generally higher educated but also further away from the conflict zone, are much more critical of the French presence.

The protests have been triggered by a series of factors, including allegations of civilian casualties and human rights violations by French troops, as well as the failure of the operation to bring about sustained peace and stability in the country.

[32] Though France insists that all the victims were armed jihadists, an investigation by MINUSMA revealed in March 2021 that,  “the group affected by the strike was overwhelmingly composed of civilians who are persons protected against attacks under international law.”[33] The incident fueled long-standing grievances against the French military presence in Mali and the perceived lack of accountability for the actions of French operations.

[21] This is compounded by the fact that the security situation has not improved since Operation Barkhane; jihadism has grown, as has the rise of communal militias that challenge the authority of local governments.