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| 2. |
- Links, Calumet, et al.
(författare)
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The substitutability of slaves : Evidence from the Eastern frontier of the Cape Colony
- 2020
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Ingår i: Economic History of Developing Regions. - : Informa UK Limited. - 2078-0397 .- 2078-0389. ; 35:2, s. 98-122
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The substitutability of the economic institution of slave labour is oftenassumed as a given. Apart from some capital investment to retrain slaves for a different task,essentially their labour could be substituted for any other form of labour. This paper questions that assumption by using a longitudinal study of the Graaff-Reinet district on the eastern frontier of South Africa’s Cape Colony. We calculate the Hicksian elasticity of complementarity coefficients for each year of a 22-year combination of cross-sectional tax datasets (1805–1828) to test whether slave labour was substitutable for other forms of labour. We find that slave labour, indigenous labour and settler family labour are not substitutable over the period of the study. This lends credence to the finding that slave and family labour were two different inputs in agricultural production. Indigenous labour and slave labour remain complements throughout the period of the study even when indigenous labour becomes scarce after the frontier conflicts. We argue that the non-substitutability of slave labour was due to the settlers’ need to acquire labourers with location-specific skills such as the indigenous khoe, and that slaves may have served another purpose, such as for artisan skills or for collateral.
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| 3. |
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| 4. |
- Andersson, Martin, et al.
(författare)
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Development under the surface– unintended consequences of settler institutions in Southern Rhodesia, 1896-1962
- 2013
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Annan publikation (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- According to the debate on the long-term impact of colonialism, the central concern is the institutions the colonial powers imposed on the colonies. The main line of argument in this paradigm is that such institutions, once jelled, persisted and provide explanations to current-day development success or failure. While this ‘from above’ perspective might be natural and reflect the fact that colonial powers indeed are alien rulers declaring supremacy imposing a layer of arrangements for governing the society, the analysis is nevertheless often partial. What this debate misses is that institutions might create a multitude of social forces, some of them perhaps in opposing directions and development dynamics might come about in an unexpected manner. The aim of this paper is to take the case of Southern Rhodesia (c. 1900-1962) – a typical African settler economy - to further add to this discussion by shedding light on a largely discounted economic phenomenon taking place in the rural economy, namely the rise of commercially oriented Africans, in the study epitomized by the Native Purchase Area farmers, that expanded their market activities by intensified use of land and labour. We argue that the relative success of this group largely could be understood as an unintended consequence of settler-oriented colonial institutions
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| 5. |
- Bolt, Jutta, et al.
(författare)
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Was the wage burden too heavy? : Profitability and wage shares of settler agriculture in colonial Malawi, c 1900-1960
- 2014
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Annan publikation (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The historical role of European farming in southern and central Africa is a delicate matter that has received a great deal of attention among scholars over the years. Going through this vast literature a striking consensus emerges: success or failure of European farming in southern Africa was to a large extent depending on their access and control over labour. These propositions have so far never been systematically and empirically tested. This paper is an attempt to do that by analyzing the ‘wage-burden’ European settler farmers faced. The wage-burden is identified by measuring wage shares (total amount paid in the form of wages as a share of total profits) on European farms in colonial Africa. Based on archival documents we construct time-series for value of output, transportation costs, investments and wage shares for European tobacco and tea farms in colonial Malawi. Our estimates show that the wage burden decreased significantly after 1930s, i.e. the European farmers were able to capture a larger part of the rent over time. We argue that the developments cannot be explained by domestic colonial policies, but changes in regional migration patterns, which had a significant impact on the supply of farm labour.
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| 6. |
- Bolt, Jutta, et al.
(författare)
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Was the wage burden too heavy? - Settler farming, profitability, and wage shares of settler agriculture in Nyasaland, c. 1900-60
- 2015
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Ingår i: Journal of African History. - 0021-8537. ; 56:2, s. 217-238
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The historical role of European farming in southern and central Africa has received a great deal of attention among scholars over the years. Going through this vast literature, a striking consensus emerges: the success or failure of European farming in southern Africa was to a large extent dependent upon the colonisers’ access to and control over cheap labour, which they in turn could only access through strong support of the colonial state. Yet, these propositions have so far never been systematically and empirically tested. This paper is a first attempt to do that by analysing the ‘wage-burden’ European settler farmers faced. The wage-burden is identified by measuring wage shares (total amount paid in the form of wages as a share of total profits) on European farms in colonial Africa. Based on archival documents, we construct time-series for value of output, transportation costs, investments in agriculture, and wages paid for the European tobacco and tea sector in colonial Malawi. Our results contradict both with previous research on settler colonialism in Africa and the historiography of Nyasaland. Our estimates show that settler farming did not collapse in the 1930s as commonly assumed. On the contrary, the value of production on both tobacco and tea farms increased significantly. And so did the settler farmers capacity to capture the profits, manifesting itself by a declining wage share over time. In contrast with previous research we argue that the developments cannot be explained by domestic colonial policies but rather through changes in regional migration patterns, and global commodity markets. Migrations patterns had a significant impact on the supply of farm labour and global commodity markets influenced value of production. Market forces rather than colonial policies shaped the development trajectory of settler farming in Nyasaland.
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| 7. |
- Cilliers, Jeanne, et al.
(författare)
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Did it pay to be a pioneer? Wealth accumulation in a newly settled frontier society
- 2022
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Annan publikation (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- While wealth-holding patterns in rural areas have been well studied, the link between initial conditions, prospects for wealth accumulation, and the persistence of inequality at an agricultural frontier is less clear. On the one hand, the frontier is thought to have had a levelling effect, with the availability of cheap land acting as an equalizer. On the other hand, land rents, accumulated during the settlement process, are thought to have the opposite effect. In this paper, we contribute to the debate on inequality in pre-industrial societies using a unique dataset that allows us to identify different wealth-accumulation strategies in an agrarian frontier society: the Graaff-Reinet district in South Africa’s Cape Colony between 1786-1850.
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| 8. |
- Cilliers, Jeanne, et al.
(författare)
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Did it pay to be a pioneer? Wealth accumulation in a newly settled frontier society
- 2023
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Ingår i: Economic History Review. - : Wiley. - 1468-0289 .- 0013-0117. ; 76:1, s. 257-282
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- European settler colonies are often thought to have been characterized by a continued expansion of the landed frontier, which impacted the distribution of wealth across their settler populations. Hampered by a lack of data, few studies have been able to study this in-depth. How does settlement timing affect wealth and wealth accumulation when frontier expansion is not a smooth continuous process? Was it the case that pioneers reaped greater economic benefits from locating their farms on superior land, or would they be disadvantaged compared to later arrivals due to limited infrastructure or greater risk of conflict with indigenous populations? In this paper, we use a unique dataset that allows us to analyse the link between time of arrival and wealth accumulation in a colonial agrarian frontier society: the Graaff-Reinet district in South Africa’s Cape Colony between 1786-1850. We find that those who arrived early located their farms in the more climatologically suitable areas of the district and utilized their superior lands to accumulate wealth more quickly than latecomers. However, due to institutional changes that favoured later British arrivals we also show that the existence of an early arrival premium did not mean persistence in land ownership.
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| 9. |
- Cilliers, Jeanne, et al.
(författare)
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The Land-Labour Hypothesis in a Settler Economy : Wealth, Labour and Household Composition on the South African Frontier
- 2018
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Ingår i: International Review of Social History. - 1469-512X. ; 63:2, s. 239-271
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Traditional frontier literature identifies a positive correlation between land availability and fertility. A common explanation is that the demand for children as labour is higher in newly established frontier regions compared to older and more densely populated farming regions. In this paper we contribute to the debate by analysing the relationship between household composition and land availability in a closing frontier region, i.e. the Graaff-Reinet district in South Africa’s Cape Colony from 1800-28. We show that the number of children in farming households increased with frontier closure, while the presence of non-family labourers decreased over time. Contrasting with the classic interpretation, we explain this by acknowledging that the demand for family labour was not a function of its marginal productivity and that farmers reacted differently to diminishing land availability depending on their wealth. Poorer households, which made up the majority of this frontier population, responded to shrinking land availability by employing relatively more family labour, while the wealthiest group invested in strengthening market access.
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| 10. |
- Fibaek, Maria, et al.
(författare)
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Labour Control and the Establishment of Profitable Settler Agriculture in Colonial Kenya, 1920-45
- 2019
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Ingår i: Economic History of Developing Regions. - : Informa UK Limited. - 2078-0397 .- 2078-0389. ; 34
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This article contributes to the growing literature on the impact of colonial legacies on long-run development. We focus on Kenya, where it is previously argued that land tenure and taxation policies created an impoverished class of wage workers leading to lower living standards, high inequality, and stunted economic development. We take issue with this interpretation. Using archival sources, we map the rise of profitable settler agriculture. Next, we correlate settler profitability with taxation and the development of African agriculture. Contrary to previous studies, we find that labour came from areas that became increasingly more commercialized. Thus, a decline in African livelihoods was not a necessary pre-condition for the establishment of successful European settler agriculture. Instead a restructuring of the settler agricultural sector coinciding with tightened labour control policies can explain the increased profitability. An increased cultivation of high-value crops raised the value of labour. Reductions of African mobility lowered both the wage and transaction costs of finding and retraining workers enabling the settlers to raise their profit share. Our finding calls for a revision of the colonial legacy of European settler agriculture for long-term economic and social development in Kenya.
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