Africa's Development in Historical Perspective

This edited volume addresses the root causes of Africa's persistent poverty through an investigation of its longue durée history.

Emmanuel Akyeampong (Edited by), Robert H. Bates (Edited by), Nathan Nunn (Edited by), James Robinson (Edited by)

9781107691209, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 11 August 2014

539 pages, 9 b/w illus. 6 maps 40 tables
22.9 x 15.3 x 2.9 cm, 0.7 kg

'This volume provides plenty of food for thought … and it is to be hoped that it is not the last of its kind.' Felicitas Becker, Comparativ

This edited volume addresses the root causes of Africa's persistent poverty through an investigation of its longue durée history. It interrogates the African past through disease and demography, institutions and governance, African economies and the impact of the export slave trade, colonialism, Africa in the world economy, and culture's influence on accumulation and investment. Several of the chapters take a comparative perspective, placing Africa's developments aside other global patterns. The readership for this book spans from the informed lay reader with an interest in Africa, academics and undergraduate and graduate students, policy makers, and those in the development world.

Part I. Introduction: La Longue Durée: 1. Africa in history Christopher Ehret
2. Reversal of fortune and socioeconomic development in the Atlantic world: a comparative examination of West Africa and the Americas, 1400–1850 Joseph Inikori
3. The impact of malaria on African development over the longue durée David N. Weil
4. African population, 1650–2000: comparisons and implications of new estimates Patrick Manning
Part II. Culture, Entrepreneurialism, and Development: 5. Redistributive pressures in sub-Saharan Africa: causes, consequences, and coping strategies Jean-Philippe Platteau
6. Accumulation and conspicuous consumption: the poverty of entrepreneurship in Western Nigeria, ca.1850–1930 Ayodeji Olukoju
7. Changing dynamics of entrepreneurship in nineteenth-century Africa Emmanuel Akyeampong
8. The textile industry of Eastern Africa in the longue durée William Gervase Clarence-Smith
9. Explaining and evaluating the cash crop revolution in the 'peasant' colonies of tropical Africa, c.1890–c.1930: beyond 'vent-for-surplus' Gareth Austin
10. Re-inventing the wheel: the economic benefits of wheeled transportation in early colonial British West Africa Isaias Chaves, Stanley L. Engerman and James A. Robinson
11. Mbanza Kongo/São Salvador: culture and the transformation of an African city, 1491 to 1670s Linda Heywood
Part III. Institutions: 12. The fragile revolution: rethinking war and development in Africa's violent nineteenth century Richard Reid
13. The imperial peace Robert Bates
Part IV. External Forces: 14. Dahomey in the world: Dahomean rulers and European demands, 1726–1894 John Thornton
15. The transatlantic slave trade and the evolution of political authority in West Africa Warren C. Whatley
16. Gender and missionary influence in colonial Africa Nathan Nunn.

Subject Areas: Development economics & emerging economies [KCM], Economics [KC], Sociology [JHB], African history [HBJH]