Ecology, trade and states in pre-colonial Africa

Fenske, James (2010): Ecology, trade and states in pre-colonial Africa.

Abstract

I test Bates' view that trade across ecological divides promoted the development of states in pre-colonial Africa. My main result is that sub-Saharan societies in ecologically diverse environments had more centralized pre-colonial states. I use spatial variation in rainfall to control for possible endogeneity. I construct artificial societies and present narrative evidence to show the results are not due to conquest of trading regions. I also test mechanisms by which trade may have caused states, and find that trade supported class stratification between rulers and ruled.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Africa, ecology, states, trade
• Subjects: N - Economic History > N5 - Agriculture, Natural Resources, Environment, and Extractive Industries > N57 - Africa ; Oceania; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O1 - Economic Development > O10 - General

References

Adjuik, M., Bagayoko, M., Binka, F., Coetzee, M., Cox, J., Craig, M., Deichman, U., Don deSavigny, F., Fraser, C., Gouws, E., et al. (1998). Towards an atlas of malaria risk in Africa. First technical report of the Mapping Malaria Risk in Africa/Atlas du Risque de laMalaria en Afrique (MARA/ARMA) collaboration. Durban, MARA/ARMA.

Austin, G. (2008a). Resources, Techniques, and Strategies South of the Sahara: Revising the Factor Endowments Perspective on African Economic Development, 1500-2000. Economic history review, 61(3):587–624.

Austin, G. (2008b). The reversal of fortunethesis and the compression of history: perspectives from African and comparative economic history. Journal of international development, 20(8):996–1027.

Banerjee, A. and Iyer, L. (2005). History, institutions, and economic performance: the legacy of colonial land tenure systems in India. The American economic review, 95(4):1190–1213.

Bates, R. (1983). Essays on the political economy of rural Africa. University of California Press.

Berry, S. (1992). Hegemony on a shoestring: indirect rule and access to agricultural land. Africa, pages 327–355.

Bhalotra, S. and Cochrane, T. (2010). Where have all the young girls gone? On the rising trend in sex selection in India. Working Paper.

Birmingham, D. (1976). The Forest and Savanna of Central Africa.

Bisson, M. (1982). Trade and Tribute. Archaeological Evidence for the Origin of States in South Central Africa (Commerce et tribut. Documents arch´eologiques sur l’origine des ´Etats du sud de l’Afrique centrale). Cahiers d’´etudes africaines, 22(87):343–361.

Bockstette, V., Chanda, A., and Putterman, L. (2002). States and markets: The advantage of an early start. Journal of Economic Growth, 7(4):347–369.

Bolt, J. and Smits, J. P. (2010). Can the nature of pre-colonial institutions explain governance quality in Africa? Working Paper.

Bovill, E. (1995). The golden trade of theMoors: West African kingdoms in the fourteenth century. MarkusWiener Pub.

Chanda, A. and Putterman, L. (2007). Early Starts, Reversals and Catch-up in the Process of Economic Development. Scandinavian Journal of Economics, 109(2):387–413.

Englebert, P. (2000). Solving the Mystery of the AFRICA Dummy. World development, 28(10):1821–1835.

Fischer, G., Shah, M., van Velthuizen, H., and Nachtergaele, F. (2001). Global agroecological assessment for agriculture in the 21st century. IIASA.

Flint, E. (1970). Trade and politics in Barotseland during the Kololo period. Journal of African History, 11(1):71–86.

Frankel, J. and Romer, D. (1999). Does trade cause growth? American Economic Review, 89(3):379–399.

Gennaioli, N. and Rainer, I. (2007). The modern impact of precolonial centralization in Africa. Journal of Economic Growth, 12(3):185–234.

Gluckman, M. (1941). Economy of the central Barotse plain. Rhodes-Livingstone Institute.

Good, C. (1972). Salt, trade, and disease: Aspects of development in Africa’s northern Great Lakes Region. International Journal of African Historical Studies, 5(4):543–586.

Herbst, J. (2000). States and power in Africa: comparative lessons in authority and control. Princeton Univ Pr.

Huillery, E. (2008). The Impact of European Settlement within French West Africa. Did pre-colonial prosperous areas fall behind? Mimeogr., Paris Sch. Econ.

Ingham, K. (1975). The kingdom of Toro in Uganda. Methuen; New York: distributed by Harper & Row, Barnes & Noble Import Division.

Iyer, L. (2007). Direct versus indirect colonial rule in India: Long-term consequences. Mimeogr., Harvard Bus. Sch.

Kopytoff, I. (1964). Family and Lineage among the Suku of the Congo. The family estate in Africa: studies in the role of property in family structure and lineage continuity, pages 83–116.

Kopytoff, I. (1965). The Suku of Southwestern Congo. Peoples of Africa, pages 441–80.

Kopytoff, I. (1967). Labor allocation among the Suku. Paper presented at conference on competing demands for the time of labor in traditional African societies.

Law, R. (1977). The Oyo empire: c. 1600-c. 1836: a west African imperialism in the era of the Atlantic slave trade. Clarendon press.

Levzion, N. (1975). TheWesternMaghrib and Sudan. In Gray, R., editor, The Cambridge history of Africa: from c. 1600 to c. 1790, pages 331–462. Cambridge University Press.

Lovejoy, P. (1978). The role of the Wangara in the economic transformation of the central sudan in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The Journal of African History, 19(02):173–193.

Maddala, G. (1986). Limited-dependent and qualitative variables in econometrics. Cambridge Univ Pr.

Mamdani, M. (1996). Citizen and subject: Contemporary Africa and the legacy of late colonialism. Princeton Univ Pr.

McCann, J. (1999). Green land, brown land, black land: an environmental history of Africa, 1800-1990. James Currey.

Michalopoulos, S. (2008). The Origins of Ethnic Diversity. Working Paper.

Michalopoulos, S. and Papaioannou, E. (2010). ‘Divide and Rule’ or the Rule of the Divided? Evidence from Africa. Working Paper.

Morton-Williams, P. (1969). The influence of habitat and trade on the polities of Oyo and Ashanti. InMan in Africa, pages 79–98. Tavistock Publications.

Murdock, G. (1959). Its Peoples and Their Culture History. Nueva York.

Murdock, G. (1967). Ethnographic atlas. University of Pittsburgh Press.

Neumark, S. (1977). Trans-Saharan Trade in the Middle Ages. The pre-colonial period, page 127.

Nunn, N. (2008). The Long-Term Effects of Africa’s Slave Trades. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 123(1):139–176.

Nunn, N. and Puga, D. (2009). Ruggedness: The blessing of bad geography in Africa. NBERWorking Paper.

Oliver, R. and Fage, J. (1962). A short History of Africa. Harmondsworth: Penguin.

Robinson, J. (2002). States and Power in Africa by Jeffrey I. Herbst: A review essay. Journal of Economic Literature, 40(2):510–519.

Rodney,W. (1972). How Europe Underdeveloped Africa. Beyond borders: Thinking critically about global issues, pages 107–125.

Sappington, J., Longshore, K., and Thompson, D. (2007). Quantifying landscape ruggedness for animal habitat analysis: a case study using bighorn sheep in the Mojave Desert. Journal ofWildlifeManagement, 71(5):1419–1426.

Shillington, K. (1989). History of Africa. Bedford Books.

Taylor, B. (1962). The western lacustrine Bantu. London: International African Institute.

Tilly, C. and Ardant, G. (1975). The formation of national states in Western Europe. Princeton Univ Pr.

Vansina, J. (1966). Kingdoms of the Savanna. University ofWisconsin Press London.

White, F. (1983). The vegetation of Africa: a descriptive memoir to accompany the UNESCO/ AETFAT/UNSO vegetation map of Africa. Natural resources research, 20:1–356.

Wilson, A. (1972). Long distance trade and the Luba Lomami Empire. The Journal of African History, 13(04):575–589.

Wint, W. and Rogers, D. (2000). Predicted distributions of tsetse in Africa. Report and database prepared by Environmental Research Group Oxford Ltd and TALA Research Group.

Wooldridge, J. (2002). Econometric analysis of cross section and panel data. The MIT press.