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Editor's choice The Impact of the Slave Trade on Literacy in West Africa: Evidence from the Colonial Era

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  • Nonso Obikili

Abstract

Recent studies have highlighted the importance of Africa's history of slave exporting to its current economic development. In this article, I show that differences in investment in education may be one of the channels through which that history has affected current development. I combine data on literacy rates of administrative districts from the colonial censuses of Nigeria and Ghana from the 1950s with data on slave exports of different ethnic groups. I find a negative and significant relationship between slave export intensity before the colonial era and literacy rates during the colonial era. I also use contemporary data on literacy rates to show that this negative relationship is still present and significant. Thus, I show the effect of the slave trades on development outcomes predates modern independent African countries and still persists.

Suggested Citation

  • Nonso Obikili, 2016. "Editor's choice The Impact of the Slave Trade on Literacy in West Africa: Evidence from the Colonial Era," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies, vol. 25(1), pages 1-27.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:jafrec:v:25:y:2016:i:1:p:1-27.
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/jae/ejv018
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    Cited by:

    1. Leoné Walters & Carolyn Chisadza & Matthew Clance, 2024. "Slave trades, kinship structures and women's political participation in Africa," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 77(3), pages 734-758, August.
    2. Remi Jedwab & Felix Meier zu Selhausen & Alexander Moradi, 2022. "The economics of missionary expansion: evidence from Africa and implications for development," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 27(2), pages 149-192, June.
    3. Christoph Scherrer, 2018. "The Disrupted Passage from an Agrarian Rural to an Industrial Urban Workforce in Most Countries in the Global South," Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy, Centre for Agrarian Research and Education for South, vol. 7(3), pages 301-319, December.
    4. Stelios Michalopoulos & Elias Papaioannou, 2020. "Historical Legacies and African Development," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 58(1), pages 53-128, March.
    5. Gershman, Boris, 2020. "Witchcraft beliefs as a cultural legacy of the Atlantic slave trade: Evidence from two continents," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).

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