French West Africa with the exception of the Senegalese Communes, the administrative structure of French rule at the lower levels remained constant, based upon the Cercle system. This was the smallest unit of French political administration in French colonial Africa that was headed by a European officer. They might range in size, but French Sudan (modern Mali) consisted of less than a dozen Cercles for most of its existence. Thus, a Cercle Commander might be the absolute authority over hundreds of thousands of Africans. A Cercle consisted of several cantons, each of which in turn consisted of several villages, and was almost universal
French Sudan remain in servitude if they received control over their family life and some land to pass to their children. In addition, the French administration actively worked to end slave raiding and the most clear manifestations of the slave trade, greatly reducing those means of acquiring slaves. However, for many decades after the 1905 abolition of slavery, the practice continued in much of French Sudan. Following the passage of the Loi Cadre by the French National Assembly in 1956, many of the colonies in French West African began to hold elections to increase the self-determination of their territories. In the first