Striking pondichéry: Religious disputes and french authority in an Indian colony of the Ancien régime

Abstract

The French colony of Pondichéry, India, was roiled by religious struggles in the eighteenth century. In 1701-15 colonial French officials repeatedly attempted to restrict the practice of local religion in the town. Local laborers, artisans, and merchants responded with four different work stoppages and threats of abandoning the colony. Again and again local residents emerged from these conflicts with the upper hand, as the strikes resulted in near-complete French capitulation and a removal of the religious restrictions. This study explains these events by demonstrating that the administrators of the French trading company, the Compagnie des Indes, and French Jesuit missionaries could not agree on how to address the workers' demands to practice their religion in the Catholic-ruled town. Fundamental conflicts between company officials and missionaries about the priorities of colonial rule, coupled with a mobile local labor system, allowed native actors a surprising measure of control over the development of this Indian Ocean colony and posed a significant challenge to French authority. Copyright 2014 by Society for French Historical Studies.