René Victor Marie Barthes (1894–1965) is a colonial administrator, governor general of French West Africa.
[1] Born on October 8, 1894, in Carpentras, he was first professor of philosophy, then director of staff at the Ministry of the colonies in 1937.
He was appointed Governor General of French West Africa in May 1946.
His chief of staff was Alioune Diop, who is founding the Pan-African magazine Présence africaine1.
[2] in the 1950s, along with Lucie Aubrac, he was a member of the governing body of Human Rights League (France), which developed in the context of resistance to the Algerian war.