N97

Regional and Urban History: Africa; Oceania

The spatial persistence of population and wealth during apartheid: comparing the 1911 and 2011 censuses

This article examines the spatial distribution of people and wealth in South Africa over the period 1911 to 2011. Economic development is typically characterised by agglomeration, but Apartheid policies tried to separate people and disperse economic activity. Zipf’s Law is used to examine the balance of these forces. The results show that Apartheid’s interventions could not stop agglomeration, which seems to have continued to the point of over-concentration today. Wealth has become increasingly concentrated in places of initial white settlement and the large urban agglomerations.

The Impact of the Slave Trade on Literacy in Africa: Evidence from the Colonial Era

Recent studies have highlighted the importance of Africa's history of slave exporting to its current economic development. In this paper 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 1950's with data on slave exports of different ethnic groups.

Pearls worth Rds4000 or less: Reinterpreting eighteenth century sumptuary laws at the Cape

Governor Ryk Tulbagh promulgated sumptuary laws at the Cape in 1755. Umbrellas could no longer be carried freely by all classes, silk dresses of a certain length could not be worn by ladies without regard to rank, and the value of pearl necklaces was strictly limited. These laws have often been interpreted as an attempt to maintain a social hierarchy (e.g. Ross 1990), a “defence against emulation” in the words of De Vries (2008).

“Global since Gold” The Globalisation of Conglomerates: Explaining the Experience from South Africa, 1990 - 2009

The internationalisation of enterprises is one of the essential ways to strengthen the competitiveness of firms from developing countries (UNCTAD, 2005c: 3). Strong growth in outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) from developing countries has become the distinguishing feature of the twenty-first century. This OFDI flows from state-owned enterprises, sovereign wealth funds (SWF) as well as private enterprises operating as multinational companies from a home base or as free-standing companies.

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