Read excerpts from How Europe Underdeveloped Africa by Walter Rodney with me! This book was written in 1972 so the facts, figures, and nomenclature reflect that time. Sadly, Rodney’s powerful ideas caused him to be assassinated in 1980. His works are still extremely resonant today, as the international landscape continues to evolve.
This is the first episode of The Archive, a show where we talk about history, politics, and books.
Why is Africa underdeveloped how is it that a continent rich in natural resources Geographic diversity and history which was once the cradle of civilization has now come to be associated with poverty disease and instability that is the question that Walter Rodney was trying to answer in his book how Europe underdeveloped
Africa first let’s set the parameters today in order to answer this question we’re going to go as far back as the 15th century all the way to the end of the colonial period the question as to who and what is responsible for African underdevelopment can be answered at two
Levels firstly the answer is that the operation of the imperialist system Bears major responsibility for African economic retardation by draining African wealth and by making it impossible possible to develop more rapidly the resources of the continent secondly one has to deal with those who manipulated the system and those who are either
Agents or unwitting accomplices of the said system the capitalists of Western Europe were the ones who actively extended their exploitation from inside Europe to cover the whole of Africa in recent times they were joined and to some extent replaced by the capitalists from the United States and
For many years now even the workers of those Metropolitan countries have benefited from the exploitation and underdevelopment of Africa none of these remarks are intended to remove the ultimate responsibility for development from the shoulders of Africans not only are there African accompli inside the imperialist system but every African has a
Responsibility to understand the system and work for its overthrow chapter 1 some questions on development what is development development at the level of the individual implies increased skill and capacity greater Freedom creativity self-discipline responsibility and material well-being development at the level of social groups implies an increasing capacity to regulate both internal and
External relationships more often than not the term development is used in an exclusive economic sense the justification being that the type of economy is itself an index of other social features what then is economic development a society develops economically as its members increase jointly their capacity for dealing with the environment but
Development cannot be seen purely as an economic Affair but rather as an overall social process which is dependent upon the outcome of man’s efforts to deal with his natural environment in human society it has always been the case that the expansion of the economy leads eventually to a change in the form of
Social relations Carl Marx identified several stages of development within European history and alongside them a changing in Social relations the first major stage after hunter gatherers was communalism where property was collectively owned work was done in common and goods were shared equally the second was slavery caused by the extension of domineering elements
Within the family and by some groups being physically overwhelmed by others slaves did a variety of tasks but their main job was to produce food the following stage was feudalism where agriculture remained the principal means of making a livelihood but the land which was necessary for that purpose was
In the hands of the few and they took took the Lion’s Share of the wealth the workers on the land now called surfs were no longer the personal property of the Masters but were tied to the land of a particular manner or estate when the manner changed hands the Surfs had to
Remain there and provide Goods for the landlord just keeping enough to feed themselves just as the child of a slave was a slave so the child of surfs were also surfs then came capitalism under which the Great wealth in the society was produced not in agriculture but by
Machines in factories and in mines like the preceding phase of feudalism capitalism was characterized by the concentration in a few hands of ownership of the means of producing wealth and by unequal distribution of the products of human labor the few who dominated were the Bourgeois who had originated in the merchants and
Craftsmen of the feudal Epoch and who Rose to be Industrial ists and financiers meanwhile the Surfs were declared legally free to leave the land and go in search of employment in capitalist Industries their labor therefore became a commodity something to be bought and sold in those three respective epochs
Hunting band feudalism capitalism the quality of life improved it became less hazardous and less uncertain and members of society potentially had greater Choice over for their Destinies all of that is involved when the word development is used while all societies have experienced development it is equally true that the rate of
Development differed from continent to continent and within each continent different parts increased their command over nature at different rates inside of Africa Egyptians were capable of producing wealth in abundance 25 centuries ago because of Mastery of many scientific natural laws and their invention of technology to irrigate grow
Food and extract minerals from the subsoil at that time hunting with bows and even wooden clubs was what people depended on for survival in most parts of the African continent one of the most difficult questions to answer is exactly why different peoples developed at different rates when left on their own
Part of the answer lies in the environment in which human groups evolved and part of it lies in the super structure of human society that is to say as human beings battled with the material environment they created forms of social relations forms of government patterns of behavior and systems of
Belief which together constituted the superstructure which was never the same in any two societies each element in the super structure interacted with other elements in the super structure as well as the material base it could be offered as a generalization that all phases of development are temporary or transi
Again and are destined sooner or later to give way to something else it is particularly important to stress this with reference to capitalism because the capitalist Epoch is not quite over and those who live at a particular point in time often fail to see that their way of
Life is in the process of transformation and elimination uneven development has always ensured that societies have come into contact when they were at different levels for example one that was communal and one that was capitalist two general rules can be observed to apply in such cases first the weaker of the two
Societies the one with less economic capacity is bound to be adversely affected and the bigger the gap between the two societies concerned the more detrimental are the consequences second assuming that the weaker Society does survive then It ultimately can resume its own independent development only if
It proceeds to a level higher than that of the economy which had previously dominated it imperialism is itself a phase of capitalist development in which Western European capitalist countries the United States and Japan established political economic military and cultural hegemony over other parts of the world which were initially at a lower level
And therefore could not resist domination imperialism was in effect the extended capitalist system which for many years embraced the whole world one one part being the exploiters and the other the exploited one part being dominated and the other acting as overlords one part making policy and the other part being dependent what is
Underdevelopment obviously underdevelopment is not the absence of development because every people have developed in one way or another to a greater or lesser extent underdevelopment makes sense only as a means of comparing levels of development vment it is very much tied to the fact that Human Social Development has been
Uneven and from a strictly economic Viewpoint some human groups have advanced further by producing more and becoming more wealthy the moment that one group appears to be wealthier than others some inquiry is bound to take place as to the reason for the difference after Britain had begun to
Move ahead of the rest of Europe in the 18th century the famous British Economist Adam Smith felt it necessary to look into the causes Behind The Wealth of Nations at the same time many Russians were very concerned about the fact that their country was backward in comparison
With England France and Germany in the 18th century and subsequently in the 19th century today our main preoccupation is with the differences in wealth between on one hand Europe and North America and on the other hand Africa Asia and Latin America in comparison with the first the second
Group can be said to be backward or underdeveloped at all times therefore one of the ideas behind underdevelopment is a comparative one a second and even more indispensable component of modern underdevelopment is that it expresses a particular relationship of exploitation namely the exploitation of one country
By another all of the countries named as underdeveloped in the world are exploited by others and the underdevelopment with which the world is now preoccupied is a product of capitalist imperialist and colonialist exploitation African and Asian societies were developing independently until they were taken over directly or indirectly
By the capitalist Powers when that happened exploitation increased and the exploit of surplus ensued depriving the societies of the benefit of their natural resources and labor in some quarters it has often been thought wise to substitute the term developing for underdeveloped one of the reasons for doing so is to avoid any unpleasantness
Which may be attached to the second term which might be interpreted as underdeveloped mentally physically morally or in any other respect actually if underdevelopment were related to anything other than comparing economies then the most underdeveloped country in the world would be the United states which practices external oppression on a
Massive scale while internally there is a blend of exploitation brutality and psychiatric disorder however on the economic level it is best to remain with the word underdeveloped rather than developing because the latter creates the impression that all the countries of Africa and Asia and Latin America are escaping from a state of economic
Backwardness relative to the industrial nations of the world and that they are emancipating themselves from the relationship of exploitation that certainly is not true and many underdeveloped countries in Africa and elsewhere are becoming more underdeveloped in comparison with the world’s great Powers because their exploitation by the metropoles is being
Intensified in new ways economic comparisons can be made by looking at statistical tables or indices of what goods and services are produced and used in the societies under discussion professional economists speak of the national income of countries and the national income per capita the national income is a measurement of the total
Wealth of the country while the per capita income is a figure obtained by dividing the national income by the number of inhabitants in order to get an idea of the average wealth of each inhabitant this average can be misleading where there are great extremes of wealth a young Ugandan put
It in a very personal form when he said that the per capita income of his country camouflaged the Fantastic difference between what was earned by his poor peasant father and what was earned by the biggest local capitalist mad havy developed economies have certain characteristics which contrast with underdeveloped ones the developed
Countries are all industrialized that is to say the greater part of their working population is engaged in Industry rather than agriculture and most of their wealth comes out of Mines factories and other Industries they have a high output of labor per man in Industry because of their advanced
Technology and skills this is well known but it is also striking that the developed countries have a much more advanced agriculture than the rest of the world their agriculture has already become an industry and the agricultural part of the economy produces more even though it is small the countries of
Africa Asia and Latin America are called agricultural companies because they rely on agriculture and have little or no industry but their agriculture is unscientific and the yields are far less than those of the developed countries an even more gloomy set of Statistics relates to basic food requirements each
Individual needs a certain quantity of food per day measured in calories the desirable amount is 3,000 calories per day but no African country comes anywhere near that figure algerians consume on average only 1,870 calories per day while Ivory Coast can consider itself very well off within an African context with
2,290 calories as the national average furthermore one also has to judge the protein content of the food and many parts of Africa suffer from protein famine which means that even when calories are available from starchy Foods little protein is to be found persons in developed capitalist countries consume twice as much protein
Food as those in underdeveloped countries such differences help to make it clear which countries are developed and which are underdeveloped the social services provided by a country are of importance equal to that of its material production in bringing about human well-being and happiness it is universally accepted
That the state has the responsibility to establish schools and hospitals but whether these are provided by the government or by private agencies their numbers can be established in relation to the size of a population the extent to which basic goods and social services are available in a country can also be measured
Indirectly by looking at the life expectancy the frequency of deaths among children the amount of malnutrition the occurrence of diseases which could be prevented by inoculation in public Public Health Services and the proportion of illiterates in all these respects the comparison between the developed and underdeveloped countries shows huge and even frightening
Differences for every a thousand children who are born alive in Cameroon a hundred never lived to see their first birthday and out of every a thousand African children born alive in rural Sierra Leon 160 die before reaching one year yet the comparable figures for the United Kingdom and Holland are only 12
And 18 respectively besides many more African children die before they reach the age of five lack of doctors is a major drawback in Italy there is one doctor for every 580 Italians and in Czechoslovakia there is one doctor for every 510 citizens in Niger one doctor must do for
56,0 people in Tunisia one doctor for every 8,320 tunisians and in Chad one doctor for 73,4 60 people it takes a large number of skilled people to make an industrial economy function while the countries of Africa have a woefully insufficient number of Highly qualified Personnel the figures on doctors just given confirm
This and the same problem exists with Engineers technicians agriculturalists and even administrators and lawy in some places middle level skills in fields such as welding are also lacking to make matters worse there is at present a brain drain from Africa Asia and Latin America to Western Europe and the United
States this is to say professionals technicians highlevel administrators and skilled workers immigrate from their homes and the small number of skilled people available to the underdeveloped world is further depleted by the lur of better pay and opportunities in the developed world the United Nations survey of economic conditions in Africa
Up to 1964 had this to say about the continent’s natural resources Africa is well-endowed with mineral and primary energy resources with an estimated 9% of the world’s population the region accounts for approximately 28% of the total value of world mineral production and 6% of its crude petroleum output in recent years
Its share of the latter is increasing of 16 important metallic and non-metallic minerals the share of Africa in 10 varies from 22 to 95% of the world production the situation is that Africa has not yet come anywhere close to making the most of its natural wealth and most of the wealth now being
Produced is not being retained within Africa for the benefit of Africa Africans Zambia and Congo produce vast quantities of copper but that is for the benefit of Europe North America and Japan even the goods and services which are produced inside of Africa and which remain in Africa nevertheless fall into the hands of
Non-africans thus South Africa boasts of having the highest per capita income in Africa but as an indication of how this is shared out one should note that while the apartheid regime name assures that only 24 white babies die out of every a thousand live births they are quite
Happy to allow 128 African babies to die out of every a thousand live births in order to understand present economic conditions in Africa one needs to know why it is that Africa has realized so little of its natural potential and one also needs to know why so much of its
Present wealth goes to non-africans who reside for the most part outside of the the continent when the so-called experts from capitalist countries do not give a racist explanation they nevertheless confuse the issue by giving as causes of underdevelopment the things which are really consequences for example they
Would argue that Africa is in a state of backwardness as a result of lacking skilled Personnel to develop it is true that because of lack of Engineers Africa cannot on its own build more roads Bridges and hydroelectric stations but that is not a cause of underdevelopment except in the sense that causes and
Effects comes together and reinforce each other the fact of the matter is that the most profound reasons for the economic backwardness of a given African nation are not to be found inside that Nation all that we can find inside are the symptoms of underdevelopment and the secondary factors that make for poverty
So what is responsible for Afric Africa’s under development the exploitation of nation by Nation one of the common means by which one nation exploits another and one that is relevant to Africa’s external relations Is exploitation through trade when the terms of trade are set by one country in a manner entirely
Advantageous to itself then the trade is usually detrimental to the trading partner to be specific one can take the export of agricultural produce from from Africa and the import of manufactured goods into Africa from Europe North America and Japan the big Nations establish the price of the agricultural
Products and subject these prices to frequent reductions at the same time the price of manufactured goods is also set by them along with the Fright rates necessary for trade in the ships of those Nations the minerals of Africa also fall into the same C category as agricultural
Produce as far as pricing is concerned the whole import export relationship between Africa and its trading partners is one of unequal exchange and exploitation more far-reaching than just trade is the actual ownership of the means of production in one country by the citizens of another when citizens of
Europe own the land and the mins of Africa this is the most direct way of sucking the African continent under colonialism the ownership was complete and backed by military domination today in many African countries the foreign ownership is still present although the armies and flags of foreign powers have
Been removed so long as foreigners own land mines factories Banks insurance companies means of transportation newspapers power stations then for so long will the wealth of Africa flow outwards and into the hands of those elements in other words in the absence of direct political control foreign investment ensures that the natural
Resources and the labor of Africa produce economic value which is lost to the continent the things which bring Africa into the capitalist market system are trade Colonial domination and capitalist investment trade has existed for several centuries colonial rule began in the late 19th century and has almost disapp appeared and the
Investment in the African economy has been increasing steadily in the present Century throughout the period that Africa has participated in the capitalist economy two factors have brought about underdevelopment in the first place the wealth created by African labor and from African resources was grabbed by the capitalist countries of Europe and in
The second place restrictions were placed upon African capacity to make the maximum use of its economic potential which is what Del development is all about those two processes represent the answer to the two questions raised above as to why Africa has realized so little of its potential and why so much of its
Present wealth goes outside of the continent African economies are integrated into the very structure of the developed capitalist economies and they are integrated in a manner that is unfavorable to Africa and ensures that Africa is dependent on the big capitalist countries indeed structural dependence is one of the characteristics of
Underdevelopment it is also true that metropoles are dependent on the wealth of the exploited portions of the world this is a source of their strength and a potential weakness within the capitalist imperialist System since the peasants and the workers of the dependencies are Awakening to a realization that it is
Possible to cut the tentacles which imperialism has extended into their countries however there is a substantial difference between the dependence of the metropoles on the the colonies and the subjugation of the colonies under a foreign capitalist Yoke the capitalist countries are technologically more advanced and are therefore the sector of
The imperialist system which determine the direction of change a striking example of this effect is the fact that synthetic fabrics manufactured in the capitalist metropoles have begun to replace Fabrics made from raw material grown in the colonies in other words with within certain limits it is the technologically advanced metropoles who
Can decide when to end their dependence on the colonies in a particular sphere when that happens it is the colony or the neoc colony which goes begging cap in hand for a reprieve and a new quota it is for this reason that a formly colonized nation has no hope of
Developing Until It Breaks effectively with the Vicious Cycle of dependence and exploitation which characterizes imperialism at the social social and cultural level there are many features which Aid in keeping underdeveloped countries integrated into the capitalist system and at the same time hanging on to the Apron Strings of the metropoles
The Christian church has always been a major instrument for cultural penetration and cultural dominance in spite of the fact that in many instances Africans sought to set up independent churches equally important has been the role of Education in producing Africans to service the capitalist system and subscribe to its values recently the
Imperialists have beg using new universities in Africa to keep themselves entrenched at the highest academic level during the colonial period the forms of political subordination in Africa were obvious there were Governors Colonial officials and police in politically independent African States the Metropolitan capitalists have to ensure favorable political Decisions by remote control so
They set up their political puppets in many parts of Africa who shamelessly agreed to compromise with the vicious apartheid regime of South Africa when their masters tell them to do so the Revolutionary writer France Fannon has dealt scorchingly and at length with the question of the minority in Africa which
Serves as the transmission line between the Metropolitan capitalists and the dependencies in Africa the importance of this group cannot be underestimated the presence ofp group of African sellouts is part of the definition of underdevelopment any diagnosis of underdevelopment in Africa will reveal not just low per capita income and
Protein deficiencies but also the gentlemen who dance in aija Acra and kinasa when music is played in Paris London and New York how Africans developed before the coming of Europeans up until the 15th century here here we’ll enumerate some examples given in how Europe underdeveloped Africa in regards to pre-colonial African
Society there was trade between African groups the vast majority of African communities fulfilled at least a few of their needs by trade Africa was a continent of innumerable trade routes some extended for long distances like the roots across the Sahara or the roots connected with katanga copper but in the
Main it was trade between neighboring or not too far distant communities such trade was always a function of production various communities were producing surplus of given Commodities which could be exchanged for items which they lacked in that way the salt industry of one locality would be stimulated while the
Iron industry would be encouraged in another in a coastal lake or river area dried fish could become profitable while yams and Millet would be grown grown in abundance elsewhere to provide a basis for exchange the trade so readily distinguishable in every part of the continent between the 10th and 15th
Centuries was an excellent indicator of economic expansion and other forms of development which accompanied increasing Mastery over the environment pre-colonial Africa had a multitude of currencies for example salt cloth iron hose and cowy shells were po popular forms of money in Africa apart from gold and copper which were much
Rarer and therefore restricted to measuring things of Great Value in a few places such as North Africa Ethiopia and the Congo the monetary systems were quite sophisticated indicating that the economy was far removed from simple barter and subsistence from a political perspective the period of transition from communalism to feudalism in Africa was
One of State formation at the beginning and for many centuries the state remained weak and immature it acquired definite territorial boundaries but inside those boundaries subjects lived in their own communities with scarcely any contact with the ruling class until the time came to pay an annual tax or
Tribute only when a group within the state refused to pay the tribute did the early African States mobilize their repressive Machinery in the form of an army to demand what it considered as its rights from subjects slowly various States acquired greater power over their many communities of citizens they
Exacted corv labor they enlisted soldiers and they appointed regular tax collectors and local administrators the areas of Africa in which labor relations were breaking out of communal restrictions corresponded to areas in which sophisticated political states were emerging the rise of States itself was a form of development which
Increased the scale of African politics and merged small ethnic groups into wider identities suggested of nations in some ways too much importance is attached to the growth of political States it was in Europe that the nation state reached an advanced age and Europeans tended to use the presence or
Absence of well organized polities as a measure of civilization that is not entirely Justified because in Africa there were small political units which had relatively Advanced material and non-material cultures again it must be emphasized that a survey of the scene in Africa before the coming of Europeans would reveal considerable unevenness of
Development there were social formations representing hunting bands communalism feudalism and many positions intermediate between the last two let’s discuss some concrete examples Western Sudan which is now known as West Africa to the Arabs the whole of Africa south of the Sahara was the bad a sudan the
Land of the blacks the name survives today only in the Republic of Sudan on the Nile but references to the Western Sudan in Early Times concern The Zone presently occupied by Sagal Mali Upper Volta now known as Burkina Faso Niger plus parts of morania guina and Nigeria the Western sudanic empires of
Ghana Mali and Sanai have become bywords in the struggle to illustrate the achievements of the African past the origins of the empire of Ghana for example go back to the 5th Century ad but it reached its peak between the 9th and 11th centuries Molly had its prime
In the 13th and 14th centuries and Sanai in the two subsequent centuries the three were not exactly in the same location and the ethnic origin of the three ruling classes was different but they should be regarded as successor States following essentially the same line of evolution and growth they have
Been called trading States so often that it is almost forgotten that the principal activity of the population was agriculture it was a Zone in which several species of milet were domesticated along with a species of rice several other food plants and at least one type of cotton it was a Zone
Which saw the relatively early introduction of iron in the Millennium before the birth of Christ and iron tools exercise their attendant benefits on agriculture the open Savannah Country of the Western Sudan also favored livestock some groups such as the fani were exclusively pastoralist but livestock was to be found in varying
Degrees throughout the huge region cattle were the most significant domesticated animals followed by goats the rearing of horses mules and donkeys was also carried on to add further variety The Great Niger River allowed for the rise of specialist fishermen population the indispensable factor of production could only have
Reached the density which it did because of increasing Food Supplies while handicraft industry and trade sprang primarily from the products of Agriculture cotton cultivation led to the making of cotton cloth with such a variety of specialization that there was internal trade in particular cotton cloths such as the unbleached fabric of
The futa jalon and the blue cloth of Jen pastoralism provided a variety of products for manufacturer notably cattle hides and goat skins which went into the making of sandals leather jackets for military use leather pouches for amulets and so on horses served as a means of
Transport to the ruling class and made a major contribution to Warfare and the side of the state for the purpose of interbreeding some horses were imported from North Africa where the Arab blood stock was of the finest quality for pack transport the donkey was of course better fitted and the msai kingdom of
Bina Faso for a long time specialized in breeding those pack animals which were associated with longdistance trade within the vast region on the edge of the Sahara the camel took over another technological as said introduced from the north the two most important articles of long-distance trade were salt and gold both obtained principally
By mining the expertise of the mandinga in measuring gold and in other forms of Commerce was largely due to the fact that within that ethnic group there was a core of professional Traders commonly referred to as the jolas they were not very wealthy but were distinguished by their willingness to travel thousands of
Miles from one end of the Western Sudan to another they also reach the coast or very near to the coast of Gambia Sierra Leon Liberia Ivory Coast and Ghana the jolas handled a long list of African Products Salt from the Atlantic coast and the Sahara Cola nuts from The Forest
Of Liberia and Ivory Coast gold from aan country in modern Ghana leather from House of land dried fish from the coast cotton cloth from many districts and especially from from the central area of Western Sudan iron from futa Jalan in modern Guin shea butter from the upper Gambia
And a host of other local articles longdistance trade across the Sahara had special characteristics some Scholars have spoken of the camel as the ship of the Sahara and the towns which the camel Caravans entered on either side of the desert were called ports in practice the
Transh herin trade was as great of an achievement as Crossing an ocean much more than local Trade It stimulated the famous cities of the region such as waata Timbuktu GA and Jen and it brought in the literate Islamic culture longdistance trade strengthened state power which meant in effect the power of
The lineages who transformed themselves into a permanent aristocracy however it is a gross oversimplification of cause and effect to say that it was the transar trade which built the Western sudanic Empires Ghana Mali and Sanai grew out of their environment and out of the efforts of their own populations and it was only
After they had a certain status that their ruling classes could express an interest in long-distance trade and could provide the security that permitted that trade to flourish apart from Ghana Mali Sanai and koru there were outstanding Kingdoms in hosand in MOSI in Sagal in the futa Jon mountains
Of Guin and in the Basin of the benu tributary of the river Niger in the 15th century a Dutch traveler visited the great Bena City located in modernday Nigeria in Ido State this is what he had to say the town seems to be very great
When you enter into it you go into a great Broad Street not paav which seems to be seven or eight times broader than the waros street in Amsterdam the king’s Palace is a collection of buildings which occupy as much space as the town of Harlem and which is enclosed
With walls there are numerous apartments for the prince’s ministers and fine galleries most of which are as big as those on the exchange at Amsterdam they are supported by wooden pillars encased with copper where their victories are depicted and which are very carefully kept clean the town is composed of 30
Main streets very straight and 12 20 ft wide apart from an Infinity of small intersecting streets the houses are close to one another arranged in good order these people are in no way inferior to the Dutch as regards cleanliness they wash and scrub their houses so well they are polished and
Shining like a Looking Glass so we’ve established that African states were on a trajectory of development these Empires demonstrate political administrative and Military greatness long before the arrival of the Europeans they had increasingly sophisticated and complex political structures division of labor and specialization and even greater socioeconomic stratification which came
Along with the statehood Africans in the mreb were bathing in public baths when some Europeans still thought that the act of washing was dangerous so what happened in Africa societies were still emerging from different stages of communalism and feudalism in Europe a fledgling capitalist Society was emerging Africa’s contribution to European capitalist
Development the pre-colonial period Malachi postol Wyatt was a British Economist famous for his publication of the universal dictionary of trade and commerce he wrote several Works defending the slave trade and advocating for its expansion he asserted that the slave trade was Central to British Empire’s economic interests in reaction to those who
Denounce the slave trade he answered many are prepossessed against this trade thinking it a barbarus inhuman and unlawful traffic for a Christian country to trade in Blacks but Africans would be better off to live in a civilized Christian country than among Savages he also wrote British trade is a magnificent superstructure of American
Commerce and Naval power on an African Foundation now that we have an English perspective let us turn to the French perspective Bishop Mory of France in his argument against ending the slave trade and giving freedom to the slave colonies presented in the French National Assembly in
1791 spoke if you were to lose each year more than 200 million L that you now get from your colonies if if you had not the exclusive trade with your colonies to feed your manufacturers to maintain your Navy to keep your agriculture going to repay your Imports to provide for your
Luxury needs to advantageously balance your trade with Europe and Asia then I say it clearly the kingdom would be irretrievably lost because of the superficiality of many of the approaches to underdevelopment and because of resulting misconceptions it is necessary to re-emphasize that development and underdevelopment are not only
Comparative terms but that they also have a dialectical relationship one to the other that is to say the two help produce each other by interaction Western Europe and Africa had a relationship which ensured the transfer of wealth from Africa to Europe the transfer was only possible after trade became truly International and that
Takes one back to the late 15th century when Africa and Europe were drawn into common relations for the first time along with Asia and the Americas the developed and underdeveloped parts of the present capitalist section of the world have been in continuous contact for 4 and a half centuries the
Contention here is that over that period Africa helped to develop Western Europe in the same proportion as Western Europe helped to underdeveloped in the 15th century was that Europeans took the initiative and went to other parts of the world no Chinese boats reached Europe and if any African canoes reach the Americas they
Did not establish two-way links what was called International Trade was nothing but the extension overseas of European interests Europeans used the superiority of their ships and Cannon to gain control of all of the world’s waterways therefore by control of the Seas Europe took the first step towards transforming
The several parts of Africa and Asia into economic satellites when the Portuguese and the Spanish were still in command of a major sector of World Trade in the first half of the 17th century they engaged in buying cotton cloth in India to exchange for slaves in Africa
To mine gold in Central and South America part of the gold and the Americas would then be used to purchase spices and silks from the Far East the concept of Metropole and dependency automatically came into existence when parts of Africa were caught up in the web of international Commerce on the
Other hand there were the European countries who decided on the role to be played by the African economy and on the other hand Africa formed an extension to the European capitalist Market as far as foreign trade was concerned Africa was dependent on what Europeans were prepared to buy and sell the ships of
The Portuguese gave the search for gold the highest priority partly on the basis of well-known information that West African gold reached Europe across the Sahara and partly on the basis of guesswork the Portuguese were successful in obtaining gold in parts of West Africa and in eastern central Africa and
It was the Gold Coast which attracted the greatest attention from Europeans in the 16th and 17th centuries the number of forts built there was proof to that effect and the Nations involved included the Scandinavians and the prussians Germans apart from other Colonial stalwarts like the British Dutch and Portuguese Europeans were anxious to
Acquire gold in Africa because there was a pressing need for gold coin growing within the capitalist money economy since gold was limited to very small areas of Africa as far as Europeans were then aware the principal export was human beings when Europeans reached the Americas they recognized its enormous
Potential in gold and silver and tropical produce but that potential could not be made a reality without adequate labor supplies the indigenous Indian population could not withstand new European diseases such as small poox nor could they bear the organized toil of slave plantations and slave mines having barely emerged from the hunting
Stage that is why in islands like Cuba and Hispanola the local Indian population was virtually wiped out by the white Invaders at the same time Europe itself had a very small population and could not afford to release the labor required to tap the wealth of the Americas therefore they turned to the nearest
Continent after Africa which incidentally had a population accustomed to settled Agriculture and disciplined labor in many spheres those were the objective conditions lying behind the start of the European slave trade and those are the reasons why the capitalist class in Europe used their control of international trade to ensure that
Africa specialized in exporting captives obviously if Europe could tell Africans what to export that is an expression of European power however it would be a mistake to believe that it was an overwhelming military power Europeans found it impossible to conquer Africans during the early centuries of trade except in isolated spots on the
Coast Europe’s power resided in their system of production which was at a somewhat higher level than Africa’s at that time European Society was leaving feudalism and moving towards capitalism African society was then entering into a phase comparable to feudalism the fact that Europe was the first part of of the
World to move from feudalism towards capitalism gave Europeans a head start over Humanity elsewhere in the scientific understanding of the universe the making of tools and the efficient organization of Labor European technical superiority did not apply to all aspects of production but the advantage which they possessed in a few key areas proved
Decisive for example African canoes on the River Nile and the Sagal Coast were of a high standard but the relevant sphere of operations was the ocean where European ships could take command West Africans had developed metal casting to a fine artistic perfection in many parts of Nigeria but when it came to meeting
With Europe beautiful bronzes were far less relevant than the crudest cannon African wooden utensils were sometimes works of great Beauty but Europe produced pots and pans that had many practical advantages literacy organizational experience and the capacity to produce on an ever expanding scale also counted in the European favor
Some African rulers found European Goods sufficiently desirable to hand over captives which they had taken in Warfare soon War began to be fought between one community and another for the sole purpose of getting prisoners for sale to Europeans and even inside a given Community a ruler might be tempted to
Exploit his own subjects and capture them for sale a chain reaction was started by European demand for slaves and only slaves and by their offer of consumer goods this process being connected with divisions within African society it is often said for the colonial period that vertical political divisions in Africa made Conquest easy
This is even truer of the way that Africa succumbed to the slave trade National unification was a product of mature feudalism and of capitalism inside Europe there were far fewer political divisions than in Africa where communalism meant political fragmentation with the family as the nucleus and there were only a few States
That had real territorial solidity furthermore when one European nation challenged another to obtain captives from an African ruler Europe benefited from whichever of the two Nations won the conflict any European traiter could arrive on the coast of West Africa and exploit the political differences which he found there for example in the small
Territory that the Portuguese later claimed as Gina bisu there were more than a dozen ethnic groups it was so easy to set one off against another that the Europeans called it a slave Traders Paradise in effect particular aspects of African society became weaknesses when the Europeans arrived as representatives
Of a different phase of development and yet the subjugation of the African economy through slave trade was a slow process on the outset and in some instances African opposition or disinterest had to be overcome in the Congo for example the slave trade did not get underway without grave doubts
And oppositions from the king of the state of Congo at the beginning of the 16th century he asked for Masons priests clerks Physicians but instead he was overwhelmed by slave ships sent from Portugal and a vicious trade was opened up by playing off one part of the Congo
Kingdom against another the king of the Congo had conceived of possibilities of mutually beneficial interchange between his people and the European state but the Europeans forced him to specialize in the export of human cargo it is also interesting to note that while the Oba king of Bena was willing to sell a few
Female captives it took a great deal of persuasion and pressure from the Europeans to get him to sell male African prisoners of War who would have otherwise been brought into the ranks of Bena Society once trade in slaves had started in any given part of Africa it
Soon became clear that it was beyond the capacity of any single African state to change the situation in Angola the Portuguese employed an unusual number of their own troops and tried to seize political power from the Africans the Angola state of matamba on the river quango was founded around 1630
As a direct reaction against the Portuguese with Queen inzinga at its head matamba tried to coordinate resistance against the Portuguese in Angola however Portugal gained the upper hand in 1648 and this left matamba isolated matamba could not forever stand aside so long as it opposed trade with
The Portuguese it was an object of hostility from neighbor African states which had compromised with Europeans and slave trading so in 1656 Queen inzinga resumed business with the Portuguese a major concession to the decision-making role of the Europeans within the angolan economy another example of African resistance during the course of the
Slave trade comes from the Baga people in what is now the Republic of Guin the Baga lived in small states and in about 1720 one of their leaders called TBA aimed at securing an alliance to stop the slave traffic he was defeated by local European resident Traders mulad
And other slave trading Africans it is not difficult to understand why Europeans should have taken immediate steps to see that TBA and his Baga followers did not opt out of the role allocated to them by Europe a parallel which presents itself is the manner in which Europeans got together to waged
The Opium War against China in the 19th century to ensure that Western capitalist would make a profit while the Chinese were turned into dope addicts of course it is only as a last resort that the capitalist metropoles need to use Armed Force to ensure the pursuit of favorable policies in the dependent
Areas normally economic weapons are sufficient in the 1720s dome opposed the European slave Traders and was deprived of European Imports some of which have become necessary by that time aaja Trudeau dome’s greatest King realized that European demand for slaves and the pursuit of slaving in and around Dome
Was in conflict with dome’s development between 1724 and 1726 he looted and burned European Forts and slave camps and he reduced the trade from the slave Coast to a mere trickle by blocking the paths leading to sources of Supply in the interior European slave dealers were very bitter and they tried
To sponsor some African collaborators against aaja Trudeau they failed to unseat him or to crush the dooman state but in turn agaja failed to persuade them to develop new lines of economic activity such as local Plantation Agriculture and being anxious to acquire firearms and calry through the Europeans
He had to agree to the resumption of slave trading in 1730 after 1730 the homean slave trading was placed under under Royal control and was much more restricted than previously yet the failure of this determined effort demonstrated that a single African State at that time could not emancipate itself
From European control the small size of African States and the numerous political divisions made it so much easier for Europe to make the decisions as to Africa’s role in world production and trade Europe became the center of a worldwide system and it was European capitalism which set slavery and the
Atlantic slave trade in motion the trade in human beings from Africa was a response to external factors at first the labor was needed in Portugal Spain and in Atlantic Islands such as saome Cape ver day and the canaries then came the period when the greater anes and the Spanish American
Mainland needed replacements for the Indians who were victims of genocide and then the demands of Caribbean and Mainland imp Plantation societies had to be met the records show direct connections between levels of exports from Africa and European demand for slave labor in some part of the American plantation economy some attempts have
Been made to quantify the actual monetary profits made by Europeans from engaging in the slave trade the actual dimensions are not easy to fix but the profits were fabulous John Hawkins made three trips to West Africa in the 1560s and stole Africans whom he sold to the Spanish in America on returning to
England after the first trip his profit was so handsome that Queen Elizabeth the became interested in directly participating in his next venture and she provided that purpose a ship named the Jesus or the Jesus Hawkins left with the Jesus to steal some more Africans and he returned to England with such
Dividends that Queen Elizabeth made him a knight Hawkins chose as his his code of arms the representation of an African in Chains Central and South American Gold and Silver mined by Africans played a crucial role in meeting the need for coin in the expanding capitalist money economy of Western Europe while African
Gold helped the Portuguese to finance further navigations around the Cape of Good Hope and into Asia from the 15th century on African gold was also the main source for the mintage of Dutch gold coin in the 17th century helping Amsterdam to become the financial capital of Europe in that period and
Further it was no coincidence that when the English struck a new gold coin in 1663 they called it the guina the encyclopedia britanica explains that the Guin was a gold coin at one time current in the United Kingdom it was first coined in 1663 in the reign of Charles
II from gold imported from the guina coast of West Africa by a company of merchants trading under Charter from the British crown hence the name throughout the 17th and 18th centuries and for the most part of the 19th century the exploitation of Africa and African labor continued to be a source for the
Accumulation of capital to be reinvested in Western Europe the African contribution to European capitalist growth extended over such vital sectors as shipping Insurance the formation of companies capitalist agriculture techn techology and the manufactur of Machinery the effects were so wide ranging that many are seldom brought to
The notice of the reading public for instance the French St Malo fishing industry was revived by the opening up of markets in the French slave plantations while the Portuguese in Europe depended heavily on dyes like Indigo camwood and Brazil wood brought from Africa and the Americas gum from
Africa also played a part in the textile industry which is ackn knowledged as having been one of the most powerful engines in the growth within the European economy then there was the export of ivory from Africa enriching many merchants in London’s mincing Lane and providing the raw material for
Industries in England France Germany Switzerland and North America producing items ranging from knife handles to piano keys Africa’s being drawn into the orbit of Western Europe speeded up the latter’s technological development for example the evolution of European ship building from the 16th century to the 19th century was a logical
Consequence of their Monopoly of sea Commerce in that period where the original European Advantage was not sufficient to assure Supremacy they deliberately undermined other people’s efforts the Indian Navy for instance suffered from the rigid enforcement of the English navigation laws yet the expenses involved in building new and
Better European ships were met from the profit profits of overseas trade with India and Africa the Dutch were Pioneers in improving upon the caravel which took the Spanish and Portuguese out across the Atlantic and the successive Dutch trading companies operating in Asia Africa and America were the ones responsible for
Experimentation by the 18th century the British were using Dutch knowhow as a basis for surpassing the Dutch themselves and the Atlantic was their laboratory it used to be said that the slave trade was a train ground for British seamen it is probably more significant to note that the Atlantic
Trade was the stimulator of consistent advances in Naval technology the most spectacular feature in Europe which was connected with African trade was the rise of Seaport towns notably Bristol Liverpool KN Bordeaux and Seville directly or indirectly connected to those ports there often emerged the manufacturing centers which gave rise to the Industrial Revolution
In England it was the county of Lancashire which was the first center of the Industrial Revolution and the economic advance in Lancashire depended first of all on the growth of the port of Liverpool through slave trading the connections between slavery and capitalism in the growth of England is adequately documented by Eric Williams
In his well-known book capitalism and slavery Williams gives a clear picture of the numerous benefits which England derived from Trading and exploiting slaves and he identified by name several of the personalities and capitalist firms who were the beneficiaries outstanding examples are provided in the persons of David and Alexander barlay
Who were engaging in slave trade in 1756 and who later used the loot to set up Barclay’s Bank there was a similar progression in the case of Lloyds from being a small London coffee house to being one of the world’s largest Banking and insurance houses after dipping into
Profits from slave trade and slavery then there was James Watt expressing Eternal gratitude to the West Indian slave owners who directly financed his famous steam engine and took it from the drawing board to the factory a similar picture would emerge from any detailed study of French capitalism and slavery
Given the fact that during the 18th century the West Indies accounted for 20% of France’s external trade much more than the whole of Africa in the present Century of course benefits were not always directly proportionate to the amount of involvement of a given European state in the Atlantic trade the
Enormous profits of Portuguese overseas Enterprise passed rapidly out of the Portuguese economy into the hands of the more developed Western European capitalist Nations who supplied Portugal with capital ships and trade goods Germany was included in this category along with England Holland and France Commerce deriving from Africa helped a
Great deal to strengthen transnational links within the Western European economy bearing in mind that American produce was the consequence of African labor Brazilian dwoods for example were re-exported from Portugal into the Mediterranean the North Sea and the Baltic and passed into the Continental cloth industry of the 17th century sugar
From the Caribbean was re-exported from England and France to other parts of Europe to such an extent that Hamburg in Germany was the biggest sugar refining Center in Europe in the first half of the 18th century Germany supplied manufacturers to Scandinavia Holland England France and Portugal for resale
In Africa England France and Holland found it necessary to exchange various classes of goods to better deal with Africans for gold slaves and ivory the financier and Merchants of Genoa were the powers behind the markets of Lisbon and sevil while Dutch Bankers played a similar role with respects to Scandinavia and
England Western Europe was that part of Europe in which by the 15th century the trend was most visible that feudalism was giving way to capitalism in Eastern Europe feudalism was still strong in the 19th century The Peasants were being driven off the land in England and agriculture was becoming more
Technologically advanced producing food and fibers to support a larger population and to provide a more effective basis for the Woolen and linen Industries in particular the technological base of Industry as well as its social and economic organization was being transformed African trade speeded up several aspects including the
Integration of Western Europe as noted above that is why the African connection contributed not merely to economic growth but also to real development in the sense of increased capacity for further growth and Independence in speaking of the European slave trade ition must be made of the United States
Not only because its dominant population was European but also because Europe transferred its capitalist institutions more completely to North America than to any other part of the globe and established a powerful form of capitalism after eliminating the indigenous inhabitants and exploiting the labor of millions of Africans like
Other parts of the new world the American colonies of the British crown were used as a means of accumulating primary capital for reexport to Europe but the northern colonies also had Direct access to benefits from slavery in the American South in the British and French waste Indies as in Europe the
Profits made from slavery and the slave trade went firstly to commercial ports and industrial areas which meant mainly the northeastern Seaboard District known as New England and the state of New York the pan-africanist we duo in a study of the American slave trade quoted a report
Of 1862 as follows the number of persons engaged in the slave trade and the amount of capital embarked in it exceeds our power of calculation the city of New York has been until of late the principal Port of the world for this Infamous Commerce although the cities of
Portland and Boston are only second to her in that distribution American Economic Development up till the mid 19th century rested squarely on foreign Commerce of which slavery was a pivot in the 1830s slave grown cotton accounted for about half of the value of all exports from the United States since
Capitalism like any other mode of production is a total system which involves an ideological aspect it is also necessary to focus on the effects of the ties with Africa on the development of ideas within the superstructure of European capitalist Society in that sphere the most striking feature is undoubtedly the rise of
Racism as a wise widespread and deeply rooted element in European thought the simple fact is that no people can enslave another for centuries without coming out with a notion of superiority and when the color and other physical traits of those people were quite different it is inevitable that the
Preist should take a racist form within Africa itself the same can be said for the situation in the cape province of South Africa where white men have been establishing military and social superiority over non-whites since 16 1950 it would be too much of a sweeping statement to say that all the racial and
Color Prejudice in Europe derived from the enslavement of Africans and the exploitation of non-white people in the early centuries of international trade there was also anti-Semitism at an even earlier date inside of Europe and there is always an element of Suspicion and incomprehension when people of different
Cultures come together however it can be affirmed without reservations that the white racism which came to to pervade the world was an integral part of the capitalist mode of production nor was it merely a question of how the individual white person treated a black person the racism of Europe was a set of
Generalizations and assumptions which had no scientific basis but were rationalized in every sphere from theology to biology occasionally it is mistakenly held that Europeans enslaved Africans for racist reasons European Planters and miners enslaved AF Africans for economic reasons so that their labor power could be exploited indeed it would
Have been impossible to open up the new world and to use it as a constant generator of wealth had it not been for African labor there were no other Alternatives the American Indian population was virtually wiped out and Europe’s population was too small for a settlement overseas at that time then
Having become utterly dependent on African labor Europeans at home and abroad found it necessary to rationalize that exploitation in racist terms as well oppression follows logically from exploitation so as to guarantee the latter oppression of African people on Purely racial grounds accompanied strengthened and became indistinguishable from oppression for
Economic reasons CLR James the noted pan-africanist and Marxist once remarked that the race question is subsidiary to the class question in politics and to think of imperialism in terms of race is disastrous but to neglect the racial Factor as merely incidental is an error only less grave than to make it
Fundamental it can further be argued that by the 19th century white racism had become so institutionalized in the capitalist world and notably in the United States that it sometimes ranked above the maximization of profit as a motive for oppressing black people in the short short run European
Racism seemed to have done Europeans no harm and they used those erinus ideas to justify their further domination of non-european people in the colonial era but the international proliferation of bigoted and unscientific racist ideas was bound to have some negative consequences in the long run when Europeans put millions of their brothers
The Jewish people into ovens under the Nazis the chickens were coming home to roost such Behavior havior inside of democratic Europe was not as strange as it is sometimes made out to be there was always a contradiction between the elaboration of democratic ideals held inside Europe and the elaboration of
Authoritarian and thuggish practices by Europeans with respect to Africans when the French Revolution was made in the name of Liberty equality and fraternity it did not extend to Black Africans who were enslaved by France in the West Indies and Indian Ocean indeed France fought against the efforts of those
People to emancipate themselves and the leaders of their Bourgeois Revolution said plainly that they did not make it on behalf of black Humanity it is not even true to say that capitalism developed democracy at home in Europe and not abroad at home it was responsible for a talk or a certain
Rhetoric of freedom but it was never extended from the Bourgeois to the oppressed workers and the treatment of Africans must surely have made such hypocrisy a habit of European life especially within the ruling class how else can one explain the fact that the Christian Church participated fully in
The maintenance of slavery and still talked about saving Souls the first martyr in the American national war of Liberation against the British colonialist in the 18th century was an African descendant Crispus addex and both slave and free Africans played a key role in Washington’s armies and yet the American Constitution sanctioned the
Continu enslavement of Africans in recent times it has become an object of concern to some liberals that the United States is capable of war crimes of the order of myi in Vietnam but the fact of the matter is that the myi began with the enslavement of Africans and American
Indians racism violence and brutality were the concomitants of the capitalist system when it extended itself abroad in the early centuries of international trade the European slave trade as a basic factor in African underdevelopment 1445 to 1870 Ahmed sekut Tor the first president of Guin wrote the relation between the
Degree of destitution of peoples of Africa and the length and nature of the exploitation they had to endure is evident Africa remains marked by the crimes of the slave Traders up to now her potentialities are restricted by underpopulation to discuss trade between Africans and Europeans in the four centuries before
Colonial rule is virtually to discuss slave trade the Atlantic Crossing or Middle Passage as it was called by European slavers was Notorious for the number of deaths incurred averaging in the vicinity of 15 to 20% the massive loss to the African labor force was made more critical because it was composed of able-bodied
Young men and young women slave buyers preferred their victims between the ages of 15 and 35 and preferably in their early 20s the sex ratio being about two men to one woman an emphasis on population loss as such is highly relevant to the question of socioeconomic development population
Growth played a major role in European development in providing labor markets and the pressures which led to further Advance Japanese population growth had similar positive effects effects and in other parts of Asia which remained pre- capitalist the size of the population led to a much more intensive
Exploitation of the land than has ever been the case in what is still a sparsely peopled African continent the outflow of population was disastrous for African societies African economic activity was affected both directly and indirectly by population laws both openly and by implication all the European powers in the 19 Century
Indicated their awareness of the fact that the activities connected with producing captives were inconsistent with other economic Pursuits that was the time when Britain in particular wanted Africans to collect Palm produce and rubber and to grow agricultural crops for export in place of slaves and it was clear that slave rating was
Violently conflicting with that objective in western eastern and central Africa long before that date Europeans accepted that fact when their self-interest was involved for example in the 17th century the Portuguese and Dutch actually discouraged slave trade on the Gold Coast for they recognized that it would be incompatible with the
Trade of gold technical stagnation and Distortion of the African economy in the pre-colonial era it has already been indicated that in the 15th century European technology was not totally Superior to that of other parts of the world there were certain specific features which were highly advantageous
To Europe such as shipping and to a lesser extent guns Europeans trading to Africa had to make use of Asian and African consumer goods showing that their system of production was not absolutely Superior it is particularly striking that in the early centuries of trade Europeans relied heavily on Indian
Cloths for resale in Africa and they also purchased cloths on several parts of the West African Coast for resale elsewhere Morocco morania sambia Ivory Coast Bena yubal land and loango were all exporters to other parts of Africa through European middleman yet by the time that Africa entered the colonial
Era it was concentrating almost entirely on the export of raw cotton and the import of manufactured cotton cloth this remarkable reversal is tied to technological advance in Europe and led to stagnation of technology in Africa owing to the very trade with Europe cloth manufacturer in the world went
Through a stage of hand looms and smallscale craft production up to the 16th century that was the General pattern in Africa Asia and Europe with Asian cloth makers being the most skilled in the world India is the classic example where the British used every means at their disposal to kill
The cloth industry so that British cloth could be marketed everywhere including inside India itself in Africa the situation was not so clear-cut nor did it require so much conscious effort by Europeans to destroy African cloth manufacturer but the trend was the same Europe benefited technologically from its external trade contacts while Africa
Either failed to benefit or actually lost vital inventions and Innovations appeared in England in the late 18th century after profits from external trade had been reinvested indeed the new Machinery represented the investment of primary Capital accumulated from Trading and From Slavery African and Indian trade strengthened British industry which in
Turn crushed whatever industry existed in what is now called the underdeveloped countries from the European perspective there was no room for technological exchange or exchange of information and skill several African leaders petitioned the Europeans for Aid in industry but they were systematically ignored for example a Portuguese Embassy reached the Ethiopian Court in
1520 having examined Portuguese swords muskets clothes books and other objects the emperor lebna dle felt the need to introduce European technical knowledge into Ethiopia correspondence exists between the emperor and European rulers such as kings Manuel I and John the thir of Portugal as well as Pope Leo in which
Requests were made for European assistance to Ethiopian industry until late in the 19th century Ethiopian petitions to that effect were being repeated with little to no success in the first half of the 18th century there were two further examples of African rulers appreciating European technology and stating their preference for skills
And not slave ships when agaja Trudeau of Dome saw sought to stop the trade in captives he made an appeal to European Craftsmen and he sent an ambassador to London for that purpose one European who stayed at the court of dome in the late 1720s told his countrymen that quote if
Any Taylor Carpenter Smith or any sort of other white man that is free be willing to come here he will find very good encouragement end quote the European slave trade and overseas trade in general had what are known as multiplier effects on Europe’s development in a very positive sense
This means that the benefits of foreign contacts extended to many areas of European life not directly connected with foreign trade and the whole society was better equipped for its internal development the opposite was true of Africa not only in The crucial sphere of Technology but also with regard to the
Size and purpose of each economy in Africa under the normal processes of evolution an economy grows steadily larger so that after a while two neighboring economies merge into one that was precisely how National economies were created in the states of Western Europe through the gradual combination of what were once several
Provincial economies trade with Africa actually helped Europe to weld together more closely the different National economies but in Africa there was disruption and disintegration at the local level at the same time each local economy ceased to be directed exclusively or even primarily towards the satisfaction of the wants of its inhabitants and
Their economic effort served external interests and made them dependent on those external forces based in Western Europe in this way the African economy taken as a whole was diverted away from its previous line of development and became distorted it has now become common knowledge that that one of the principal reasons why genuine
Industrialization cannot easily be realized in Africa today is that the market for manufactured goods in any single African country is too small and there is no integration of the markets across large areas of Africa the kind of relationship which Africa has had with Europe from the very beginning has
Worked in a direction opposite to integration of local economies certain interterritorial links established on the cont continent were broken down after the 15th century because of European trade several examples arose on the West African Coast down Angola because in those parts European trade was most voluminous and the surviving
Written record is also more extensive for example it needs to be recalled that the Western Sudan had links within the West African coast and with North Africa long before the European arrival horses were moving from North Africa to be interbred with local West African stock long before the European arrival the
Arabs and mortanian traveled to the river Seno and farther north to meet the mandinga Jola Traders and hand over to them products such as beads and cloth spun from the wool of North African sheep with the advantage of the rapidness of Transport by sea as opposed to Overland across the desert the
Portuguese were in effect breaking up the economic integration of the region after the Portuguese became middlemen they had the opportunity of developing a new trade pattern by which both northwest Africa and West Africa looked to Europe and forgot about each other the Portuguese also took over the
Trade in cowries and the Congo and its offshore Islands the trade in salt along the angolan coasts and the trade in high quality Palm cloth between northern and southern Angola in some instances they achieved dominance not just because of their ships and Commercial skills but also by the use of force provided they
Were operating on the coast and could bring their cannon into use in East Africa for instance the Portuguese used violence to capture trade from the Arabs and the Swahili the disruption of African commerce between the Ivory Coast and the Gold Coast followed that pattern a strong Coastal canoe trade existed
Between these two regions with the people of Cape Lao modern Ivory Coast sailing past Cape three points to sell their cloth as far east as Acra the Portuguese set up a fort at axom near Cape three points to serve as gold trade with the hinterland and one of its
Functions was to chop the East West Coastal African trade they banned axom residents from going to Cape Lao and they stopped canoes from Ivory Coast from traveling East beyond axom the purpose was obviously to make both areas separate economic entities excl exclusively tied to Europe continuing politic military developments in Africa 1500 to
1855 the truth is that a developing Africa went into slave trading and European commercial relations as into a galeforce wind which Shipwrecked a few societies set many others off course and generally slowed down the rate of Advance the coming of imperialism and colonialism in the centuries before Colonial rule
Europe increased its economic capacity by Leaps and Bounds while Africa appeared to have been almost static Africa in the late 19th century could still be described as part communal and part feudal although Western Europe had moved completely from feudalism to capitalism to elucidate the main thesis of this study it’s necessary to follow
Not only the development of Europe and the underdevelopment of Africa but also to understand how those two combined in a single system that of capitalist imperialism European Monopoly firms operated by constantly fighting to gain control over raw materials markets and means of communications they also fought
To be the first to invest in new profitable undertakings related to their line of business whether it be inside or outside their countries indeed after the scope for expansion became limited inside their National economies their main attention was turned to those countries whose economies were less developed and who would therefore offer
Little or no opposition to the penetration of foreign capitalism that penetration of foreign capitalism on a world wide scale from the late 19th century onwards is what we call imperialism imperialism meant capitalist expansion it meant that European and North American and Japanese capitalists were forced by the internal logic of
Their competitive system to seek abroad in less developed countries opportunities to control raw material supplies to find markets and to find profitable fields of investment the centuries of trade with Africa contributed greatly to that State of Affairs where European capitalists were faced with the necessity to expand in a
Big way outside their National economies in the period of the notorious Scramble for Africa European hands made a grab for whatever they thought spelled profits in Africa and they even consciously acquired many areas not for immediate exploitation but with an eye to the Future each European nation that had these short-term and long-term
Economic interest ran up its own flag in different parts of Africa and established colonial rule the Gap that had Arisen During the period of pre-colonial trade gave Europe the power to impose political domination on Africa curiously Europeans often derived the moral justification for imperialism and colonialism from features of the
International trade as conducted up to the eve of colonial rule in Africa the British were the chief spokesmen for the view that the desire to colonize was largely based on their good intentions in wanting to put a stop to the slave trade true enough the British in the
19th century were as opposed to slave trading as there were once in favor of it many changes inside of Britain had transformed the 17th century necessity for slaves into the 19th century necessity to clear the remnants of slaving from Africa so as to organize the local exploitation of land and labor
Therefore slaving was rejected in so far as it had become a Fetter on further capitalist development and that was particularly true of East Africa where Arab slave trading persisted until the late 19th century the British took special self-righteous Delight in putting an end to Arab slave trading and
In deposing rulers on the grounds that they were slave Traders however in those very years the British were crushing political leaders in Nigeria like Jaa and Nana who by then ceased the export of slaves and were concentrating instead on products like palm oil and rubber similarly the Germans in East Africa
Made a pretense of being most opposed to rulers like bushiri who were engaged in slave trading but the Germans were equally hostile to African rulers with little interest in slaving the common Factor underlying the overthrow of African rulers in East West Central North and South Africa was that they
Stood in the way of Europe’s Imperial needs it was the only factor that mattered with anti-slavery crisy King Leopold II of Belgium also used the anti-slavery excuse to introduce into Congo forced labor and modern slavery besides all Europeans had derived ideas of racial and cultural superiority between the 15th and 19th
Centuries while engaged in genocide and the enslavement of non-white people Europeans were also racially motivated to seek political domination over Africa the 19th century was one in which white racism was most violently and openly expressed in capitalist societies with the United States as a focal point and
With Brit taking the lead among the Western European capitalist Nations Britain accepted granting Dom status to its old colonies of white settlers in Canada Australia and New Zealand but it withdrew self-government from the West Indies when the white Planters were ousted from the legislative assemblies by black and brown
People as far as Africa is concerned English men violently opposed black self-government such as the fante Confederation on the Gold Coast in the 1860s they also tried to erode the authority of black crays in Sierra Leon in 1874 when fora Bay College sought and obtained affiliation with Durham University the Times newspaper declared
That Durham should next affiliate with the London Zoo pervasive and vicious racism was present in imperialism as a VAR and independent of the economic rationality that initially gave birth to racism it was economics that determined that Europe should invest in Africa and control the continent’s raw materials
And labor it was racism which confirmed the decision that the form of control should be direct Colonial rule Africa’s contribution to the capitalist development of Europe the colonial period the colonies have been created for the Metropole by the Metropole expatriation of African Surplus under colonialism wages paid to workers in
Europe and North America America were much higher than wages paid to African workers in comparable categories the Nigerian coal miner at anugu earned one shilling per day for working underground and 9 Pence per day for jobs on the surface such a miserable wage would be beyond the comprehension of a Scottish
Or German coal miner who could virtually earn in an hour what the enugu miner was paid for a Six-Day week the same disparity existed with Port workers the records of the large American shipping company feral lines show that in 1955 of the total amount spent on loading and discharging cargo moving between Africa
And America 5 sixths went to American workers and only one sixth to Africans yet it was the same amount of cargo loaded and unloaded at both ends the wages paid to the American stevor and the European coal miners were still such as to ensure that the capital made a
Profit the point here is merely to illustrate how much greater was the rate of exploitation of African workers when discrepancies such as the above were pointed out during the colonial period and subsequently those who Justified colonialism were quick to reply that the standard and cost of living was higher
In capitalist countries the fact is that the higher standard was made possible by the exploitation of the colonies and there was no justification for keeping African living standards so depressed in an age where better was possible and in a situation where a higher standard was possible because of the work output of
Africans themselves the kind of living standard supportable by African labor within the continent is readily illustrated by the salaries and the lifestyle of the whites inside of Africa the rhodesians offered a miniature version of South Africa’s apartheid system which oppressed the largest industrial working class on the
Continent in the union of South Africa African laborers worked deep underground under inhumane conditions which would not have been tolerated by minors in Europe consequently black South African workers recovered gold from deposits which elsewhere would be regarded as non-commercial and yet it is the white section of the working class which
Received whatever benefits were available in terms of wages and salaries officials have admitted that the mining companies could pay whites higher than miners in any other part of the world because of the super profits made by playing Black workers a mere pittance in the final analysis the shareholders of
The mining companies were the ones who benefited most of all they remained in Europe and North America and collected fabulous dividends every year from all the gold diamonds manganese uranium Etc which were brought out of the South African sub sub soil by African labor for years the capitalist press itself
Praised southern Africa as an investment Outlet returning super profits on Capital invested from the very beginning of the Scramble for Africa huge fortunes were made from gold and diamonds in southern Africa by people like Cecil roads in the present Century both the investment and the outflow of surplus have increased investment was mainly
Concentrated in mining and finance where the profits were greatest in the mid 1950s British investments in South Africa were estimated at 860 million pounds and yielded a stable profit of 15% or 129 million pounds every year the complex of Southern African mining concerns operated not just in South
Africa itself but also in Southwest Africa Angola mosambique northern rodesia southern rodesia and the Congo Congo was consistently a source of immense wealth for Europe because from the time of colonization until 1906 King Leopold II of Belgium made at least $20 million from rubber and ivory in North Africa foreign Capital exploited natural
Resources of phosphates oil lead zinc manganese and iron ore in guina Siera Leon and Liberia there were important workings of gold diamonds iron ore and boxy to All That should be added the tin of Nigeria the gold and manganes of Ghana the gold and diamonds of tangena the
Copper of Uganda and Congo brazaville in each case an understanding of the situation must begin with an inquiry into the degree of exploitation of African resources and labor and then must proceed to follow the Surplus to its destination outside of Africa and into the bank accounts of the capitalists who control the majority
Shares in the huge multinational mining combines during the Colonial area Liberia was supposedly independent but to all intents and purposes it was a colony of the United States in 1926 the Firestone Rubber Company of the United States was able to acquire 1 million Acres of forest land in Liberia
At a cost of 6 cents per acre and 1% of the value of exported rubber because of the demand for and the Strategic importance of rubber firestones profits from Liberia’s land and labor carried them to 25th position among the giant companies of the United States the colonial Administration as economic
Exploiter in addition to private companies the colonial state also engaged directly in the economic exploitation and impoverishment of Africa the equivalent to the Colonial office in each colonizing country worked handin hand with their governors in Africa to carry out a number of functions the principal ones being to protect national interests against
Competition from other capitalists to arbitrate the conflicts between their own capitalists and to guarantee Optimum conditions under which private companies could exploit Africans the last mentioned objective was the most crucial that is why colonial governments were repeatedly speaking about the maintenance of Law and Order by which they meant the maintenance of conditions
Most favorable to the expansion of capitalism and the plunder of Africa the Portuguese and Belgian Colonial regimes were the most Brazen in directly rounding up Africans to go and work for private capitalists under conditions equivalent to slavery in Congo brutal and extensive forced labor started under King Leopold II in the
Last century so many congales were killed and maimed by Leopold’s officials and police that this earned even European disapproval when leapold handed over the Congo free state to the Belgian government in 1908 he had already made huge fortune and the Belgian government hardly relaxed the intensity of the exploitation in
Congo the strengthening of the technological and Military aspects of capitalism a preliminary examination of the non-monetary benefits of colonialism to Europe it would be extremely simple-minded to say that colonialism in Africa or anywhere else caused Europe to develop its Science and Technology the tendency towards technological innovation and renovation was inherent
In capitalism itself because of the drive for profits however it would be entirely accurate to say that the colonization of Africa and other parts of the world formed an indispensable Link in a chain of events which made possible the technological transformation of the base of European capitalism without that link European
Capitalism would not have been producing goods and services at the level attained in 1960 in other words our very yard sticks for measuring developed and underdeveloped nations would have been different for example in the sphere of shipping it can be readily realized that certain technological modifications and Innovations would be connected with the
Fact that such a high proportion of shipping was used used to tie together colonies and metropoles ships had to be refrigerated to carry perishable Goods they had to make special holds for bulky or Liquid Cargo such as palm oil and the transport of petroleum from the Middle
East North Africa and other parts of the world led to oil tankers as a special class of ships the design of the ships and the nature of their caros in turn affected the kind of Port installations in the metropoles ever since the 15th century Europe was in strategic command
Of World Trade and of the legal and organizational aspects of the movement of goods between continents Europe’s power increased with imperialism because imperialism meant Investments and Investments with or without colonial rule gave European capitalists control over production within each continent the amount of benefits to capitalism increased accordingly since
Europe could determine the quantity and quality of different raw material inputs which would need to be brought together in the interest of capitalism as a whole and the Bourgeois class in particular for instance sugar production in the West Indies was joined in the colonial period by cocoa production within Africa
So that both merged into the chocolate industry of Europe and North America in the metallurgical field iron ore from Sweden Brazil or Sierra Leon could be turned into different types of Steel with the addition of manganes from the Gold Coast or Chrome from Southern Ria such examples could be
Multiplied almost indefinitely to cover the whole range of capitalist production in the colonial period copper too fell neatly into the category under discussion unskilled production by Africans was required to get the ore for export followed by a refinement in a European capitalist plant copper was Africa’s Chief mineral
Export being an excellent conductor of electricity it became an indispensable part of the capitalist electrical industry it is an essential component of generators motors electric locomotives telephones telegraphs light and power lines Motor Cars buildings ammunition radios refrigerators and a host of other things a technological era tends to be
Defined by the principal source of power today we speak of a nuclear age since the potential of nuclear power is shown to be immense the industrial revolution in Europe during the 18th and 19th centuries was the age of steam in a parallel manner the colonial era was the age of
Electricity therefore the vital copper exports from Congo Northern Ria and other parts of Africa were contributing to the leading sector of European technology from that strategic position its multiplier effects were innumerable and were of incalculable benefit to capitalist development in the context of a discussion of raw materials special
Reference must again be made to the military African minerals played a decisive role both with regard to Conventional Weapons and with regard to the Breakthrough of atomic and nuclear weapons it was from the Belgian Congo during the second world war that the US began getting the uranium that was a
Prerequisite to the making of the first atomic bomb in any case by the end of the colonial period industry and the war machine in the colonizing Nation had become so intertwined and Inseparable that any contribution to one was a contribution to the other therefore Africa’s massive contribution to what
Initially appeared as peaceful Pursuits such as the making of copper wire and steel Alloys ultimately took the shape of explosive devices aircraft carriers and so on in the capitalist struggle to keep off the challenge of socialism as a competing mode of production and way of Life Africa played at least two key
Roles one being to provide bases for the capitalist militarists and the other being to provide a wide range of raw materials essential for modern Armament Industries the most vital of these raw materials were uranium and other radioactive substances for Atomic and later nuclear weapons including the hydrogen bomb almost rivaling uranium in
Importance were certain rare materials like lithium from Ria needed for the special steals that went into new aircraft Rockets tanks guns and bombs Africa’s contribution to the capitalist development of Europe the colonial period the supposed benefits of colonialism to Africa what did colonial governments do in the interest of
Africans supposedly they built railroads schools hospitals and the like the sum total of these Services was amazingly small in predominantly black countries it was also true that the bulk of the social services went to whites the southern part of Nigeria was one of the colonial areas that was supposed to have
Received the most from a benevolent mother country iidon one of the most heavily populated cities in Africa had only about 50 Europeans before the last war for those Chosen Few the British colonial government maintained a segregated Hospital service of 11 beds in well furnished surroundings there
Were 34 beds for the half million blacks this situation was repeated in other areas so that altogether the 4,000 Europeans in the country in the 1930s had 12 modern hospitals while the African population of at least 40 million had 52 hospitals the combination of being oppressed being exploited and being
Disregarded is best illustrated by the pattern of the economic infrastructure of African colonies notably their roads and Railways these had a clear geographical distribution according to the extent to which particular regions needed to be opened up to import export activities where exports were not available roads and Railways had no place the only
Slight exception is that certain roads and Railways were built to move troops and make conquest and oppression easier apologists for colonialism are quick to say that the money for SCH schools hospitals and such services in Africa was provided by the British French or Belgian taxpayer as the case may have
Been it defies logic to admit that profits from a given colony in a given year total several million dollar and to affirm nevertheless that the few thousand dollar allocated to Social Services in that colony was the money of European taxpayers the true situation can be accurately presented in the following
Terms a Aman workers and peasants produced for European capitalism goods and services of a certain value a small proportion of the fruits of their efforts was retained by them in the form of wages cash payments and extremely limited Social Services which were essential to the maintenance of
Colonialism the rest went to the various beneficiaries of the colonial system the negative character of the social political and economic consequences to be specific it must be noted that colonialism crushed by force the surviving feudal states of North Africa that the French wiped out the large Muslim states of the West Sudan as
Well as the home and kingdoms of Madagascar that the British eliminated Egypt the M Sudan Asante Bena the Yura kingdoms swasiland maab land the LOI and the East African lake kingdoms as great States it should further be noted that a multiplicity of smaller and growing states were removed from the face of
Africa by the belgians Portuguese British French Germans Spaniards and Italians pre-colonial trade had started the trend of the disintegration of African economies and their technological impoverishment colonial rule speeded up that Trend the story is often told that in order to make a phone call from Acra in the British colony of
The Gold Coast to aijan in the adjacent French colony of the Ivory Coast it was necessary to First be connected with an operator in London and then with an operator in Paris who could offer a line to aan that was one reflection of the fact that the Gold Coast Economy was
Integrated into the British economy and the Ivory Coast Economy was integrated into the French economy while the neighboring African colonies had little or no effective economic relations the following conclusion reached by the United Nations economic Commission for Africa in 1959 goes directly to the point the most outstanding characteristic of the transportation
Systems in Africa is the comparative isolation in which they have developed within the confines of individual countries and territories this is reflected in the lack of links between countries and territories within the same geographical sub region it is also worth noting that Africa was denied the opportunity of developing healthy trade l
With parts of the world other than Europe and North America some trade persisted across the Indian Ocean but on the whole it is fair to say that the roads in Africa led to the Sea ports and the Sea Lanes of Western Europe and North America that kind of lopsidedness
Today is part of the pattern of underdevelopment and dependence in recent times economists have been recognizing in colonial and postcolonial Africa a pattern that has been termed growth without development that phrase has now appeared as the title of books on Liberia and Ivory Coast it means that goods and services
Of a certain type are on the increase there may be more rubber and coffee exported there may be more cars imported with the proceeds and there may be more gasoline stations built to service the cars but the profit goes abroad and the economy becomes more and more a
Dependency of the metropoles in no African economy was there economic integration or any provision for making the economy self-sustained and geared towards its own local goals therefore there was growth of the so-called Enclave import export sector but the only things which developed were dependency and underdevelopment a further revelation of
Growth without development under colonialism was the over dependence on one or two exports the term monoculture is used to describe those Colonial economies which were centered around a single crop Liberia in the Agricultural Center was a monoculture depending on rubber Gold Coast on Coco Dome and Southeast Nigeria
On Palm produce Sudan on Cotton tanganika On cisal and Uganda on Cotton in Sagal and Gambia ground nuts accounted for 85 to 90% of money earnings in effect two African countries were told to grow nothing but peanuts the factor of depend pendy made its impact felt in every aspect of life
On the colonies and it can be regarded as the crowning Vice among the negative social political and economic consequences of colonialism in Africa being primarily responsible for the perpetuation of the colonial relationship into the era that is now called neocolonialism education for underdevelopment the colonizers did not introduce education into Africa they
Introduced produced a new set of formal educational institutions which partly supplemented and partly replaced those which were there before the Colonial system also stimulated values and practices which amounted to new informal education the main purpose of the colonial school system was to train Africans to help man the local
Administration at the lowest ranks and to staff the private capitalist firms own by Europeans in effect that meant selecting a few Africans to participate in the domination and exploitation of the continent as a whole ever since the period of the imperialist Scramble for Africa French leaders realized that it
Was imperative to start some schools in the parts of Africa claimed by France so that the French language and culture might be accepted by some Africans who would then identify with France rather than with Britain or Portugal or some other European rival this was particularly true in disputed Frontier
Zones oen a French minister at the start of the colonial era stated that the extension of the French language was necessary as quote a measure of National Defense as early as 1884 there was the aliance Franz as an instrument of educational and cultural imperialism recognized and supported by the French
Government the reports of the aliance Fran show clearly that they thought of themselves as an arm of French imperialism fighting so that France could further entrench itself for example the adance fres wrote a French schools in Upper Guin in the late 19th century quote they have to combat the
Redoutable influence of English schools of Sierra Leon in this region the struggle between the two languages becomes more intense as one moves to the South invaded by English Natives and by their Methodist pastors end quote after the second world war it became obvious that colonial rule could not forever be
M maintained in the same form in Africa Asia having already broken loose and Africa being Restless when the awareness that the end was in sight became generalized the Metropolitan Powers turned to their colonial Cad and handed to them the Reigns of policy in politically independent Africa it should
Be emphasized that the choice that Africa should be free was not made by the colonial Powers but by the people of Africa [Applause] Foree