LECTURE 11-12: POLITICAL LEGACY OF COLONISATION Flashcards
roots of Africas underdevelopment
what matters for economic growth were the pre-existing settings of the content
external causes
- dependency theory: development of west came at expense of undervelopemtn of the rest
- slavery and extractive institutions: colonisers had incentives to extract resources without implementing inclusive institutions that could have fostered economic growth
doesn’t account for fact that institutions were already there
internal causes
natural or social characteristics of resources
- factors of production: land abundant and labor scarce + land resistant to development of intensive agriculture = inferior technological and institutional choices that had negative consequences in long run. develop slavery system to exploit lack of people
- local political institutions and bad incentives constrained economic growth: goody bates
local political institutions and bad incentives constrained economic growth
- lack of governance ability: kinship system and common land tenure
- goody: lack of writing system limited improvement and transmission of knowledge and skills
- bates
traditional view of imperialism
imperialism was beneficial to africa because it brought peace in a situation where states were Waging war against each other
bates disagrees
imperialism changed incentives, making states less development and more extractive
power can be used to secure wealth
- goal of protecting ways in which wealth is created = power promotes growth
- with the goal of seizing wealth = power only affects redistirbution of wealth not its creation
before emergence of states: kinship
until 15th, many small kinship groups engaging in war
- no formal institutions, support order and cooperation through reputation and retaliation
- peace supported by: repeated interaction and credible punishment strategies
- fragile equilibrium
- underdeveloped
- high insecurity: limited potential for growth
rise of states due to
16th: increase in number of states due to:
- warfare and need of security: increase size to have more resources to win wars
- initial interaction with colonial powers (need slaves), increase resource pool
process is rooted in the opportunity derived from new sources of wealth and economic opportunities
trend of states
until 1750: more created than destroyed
after 1750: more states destroyed than created
reason: strongest/more centralised survive and incorporate more states (process of selection), only the ones that performed better in the production of wealth survived
warfare pushed
these political entities to compete for the provision of economic security and increase in size
states were developmental
in the sense that power was used to secure the means for the production of wealth
- search for security and political order coincided with search of economic wealth
- state of warfare was beneficial because it led states to develop means to guarantee economic security in hostile environment = political institutions
- political order positively associated with formal political institutions
- FPI more likely to promote and secure growth-enhancing institutions (markets, trade)
- institutions reacted to the 2 motivations by developing better institutions to spread wealth creation and foster security (solve cooperation problems + exploit new economic resources)
political power => security => economic development
features of centralised polities
- higher level of political order
- better economic institutions
- public good provision
- violent but developmental
imperialism changes
imperial peace hindered impulse for development that arose from search of security in hostile environment
conqueror
they were few with limited state capacity, and had to rely on indirect rule to control colonies. African elites had same set of preferences as before: power and wealth but they could now acquire these by just providing political service to conquerors
- no more incentives to protect economic development
- ceased to be developmental: power now used to seize wealth (extractive) instead of protecting it.
