The Consequences of Colonialism

1
The Consequences of Colonialism

• The Impact on Land and Land Use

2
Ethnic Composition

• Large parts of Africa were wrecked and
  depopulated by slavery. The Slaves moved to the
  Caribbean and South America. (Corn moved to
  Africa to feed them.)
• There were other large movements of people
  European Settlers, Indentured labor (Indians in
  East Africa, in the Fiji Islands), Depopulation
  (Caribbean and Latin America).

3
The Commoditization of Agriculture

• Because of taxes, or the law, people had to grow
  new crops that were entirely for export.
• At the same time, they had to grow their own food
  too, so they were between two worlds.
• Very little of the value of this extra labor went
  to the grower. In some places, farmers became
  laborers.

4
Indoctrination of New Values

• The old ideas were discredited as tradition,
  folklore, primitive etc.
• The local people associated the new ideas with a
  stronger, superior culture, and so they lost
  their traditions, their religions and their
  identity.

5
Neglect of Food Crops
Famine

• Unless the local food crops had some commercial
  value, which was not often, then all the
  attention of the Europeans went into commercial
  crops.
• These were mainly luxuries with almost no food
  value, such as tea, coffee, vanilla, cotton,
  peanuts, cocoa, rubber and tropical oils.
• This neglect of subsistence crops, particularly
  in Africa, was going to create huge problems
  later.

6
The Nature of Trade

• Tropical exports mostly unprocessed natural
  products.
• Imports mostly high-value manufactured goods and
  services, as well as entertainment and fuel.
• Terms of Trade have worked against the Tropics
  in general. Much of Development has a large
  import component.

7
The Low Profile of Agriculture

• Agricultural exports were the cash cow of
  poor-country governments
• The benefits of this trade flowed back mostly
  into the elites and the cities, leaving
  agriculture under-capitalized, without
  incentives, and neglected.
• This encouraged a flood of people from the land
  into the cities, where there was no work

8
The Divided World

• The process of the Colonial economy, over such a
  long period of time, built up huge advantages for
  the European countries. This created the Rich
  and Poor world.
• These advantages tend to perpetuate themselves
  structurally and institutionally.

Russias position changed
The Poor World