20

The social history of city planning in the 60s and early 70s shows the important role played by high-ranking officials in the colonial administration of French black African territories. On return, these administrators of French overseas territories and colonial civil engineers were appointed to newly created peripheral structures, called “mission” bodies, in charge of designing and implementing the modernisation of national structures. These agents’careers seem to suggest that the experience of the colonial bush is part of a professional mission or “action” culture, considered “anti-office”, and characterised by a refusal of the traditional forms of administrative action.