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This article contributes to the growing literature on colonial legacies influencing long‐term development. It focuses on Botswana, a case where the post‐independence diamond‐led economy has been considered an economic success story, despite its high levels of inequality. Here it is argued that this pathway of rapid resource‐driven growth combined with increasing socio‐economic inequality had already started during the time of the colonial cattle economy, and that this older case is equally relevant for understanding long‐term growth‐inequality trends in Botswana and other natural‐resource‐dependent economies. Six social tables, covering the period 1921 to 1974, are constructed using colonial archives, government statistics, and anthropological records. Based on the social tables, income inequality is estimated in the colonial and early post‐independence eras, capturing both the formal and informal sectors of the economy. The article demonstrates how the creation of a cattle export sector in the 1930s brought new opportunities to access export incomes, and how this led to a polarization in cattle holdings and increasing income inequalities. Further, with the expansion of colonial administration, government wages forged ahead, increasing income inequality and causing a growing income divide between public and private formal employment.

While Botswana since independence has experienced impressive economic growth and development this progress has not been accompanied by economic diversification and endogenous growth. In this article we focus on the colonial period and investigate to what extent the formal sector of Bechuanaland Protectorate (colonial Botswana) had the potential to constitute the basis for a diversification of the dominating cattle economy away from its dependency on exporting a single natural resource good – beef. We base our study on colonial archive sources and anthropological evidence which we use to: examine labour market structures; estimate welfare ratios and surplus; and discuss government spending. We find that the demand for skilled labour and human capital development was low throughout the colonial period and that the private sector generally lacked the economic strength and dynamics to develop alternative and/or complementary sectors. Further, we find no evidence of demand driven diversification, neither stemming from private sector consumption and investments, nor from government spending on economic activities outside the cattle sector, infrastructure and human capital development.

In this paper we estimate the level and inequality of income for Bechuanaland Protectorate by constructing four social tables between 1936 to 1964 using colonial archives and anthropological records. We present a working hypothesis that there is need to further analyze Botswana's colonial era if we are to understand several aspects of contemporary economic structures. Our focus is on identifying the roots of post-independence high levels of inequality. We find that first of all that migrant labour to neighbouring South Africa earned well relative to domestic labour in the Protectorate, both in the formal and traditional sectors. Remittances their families back home and became an important strategy for the poorer segments of society to stay at or above subsistence. Second, the creation of a beef export sector in the 1930s brought with it new opportunities to access export incomes and starting in the 1940s this led to increasing income inequalities and a polarization in cattle holdings. Third, wages for government officials were forging ahead creating an increasing income divide between public and private formal employment. In conclusion we infer that Botswana's contemporary institutional inequality has far reaching historical roots.

In this paper we estimate the level and inequality of income for Bechuanaland Protectorate by constructing four social tables between 1936 to 1964 using colonial archives and anthropological records. We present a working hypothesis that there is need to further analyze Botswana's colonial era if we are to understand several aspects of contemporary economic structures. Our focus is on identifying the roots of post-independence high levels of inequality. We find that first of all that migrant labour to neighbouring South Africa earned well relative to domestic labour in the Protectorate, both in the formal and traditional sectors. Remittances their families back home and became an important strategy for the poorer segments of society to stay at or above subsistence. Second, the creation of a beef export sector in the 1930s brought with it new opportunities to access export incomes and starting in the 1940s this led to increasing income inequalities and a polarization in cattle holdings. Third, wages for government officials were forging ahead creating an increasing income divide between public and private formal employment. In conclusion we infer that Botswana's contemporary institutional inequality has far reaching historical roots.

Many Sub-Saharan African countries are unable to generate sufficient tax revenues for public purposes. While it is widely accepted that governments' ability to tax is shaped by politics, the precise mechanisms through which this relationship takes place in practice remain elusive. Based on a historical analysis of four major tax reforms in Ghana from the 1850s to the late 1990s, this article captures the various ways in which taxpayers negotiate with the state in an attempt to limit the extent of taxation, especially in cases where state reciprocity falls short of what people expect. Our evidence suggests that, far from being a recent development, effective taxation in Ghana has long depended on the ability of the state to convince taxpayers that tax revenues will be used for the public benefit. A history of misappropriation of tax revenues, overt corruption, and profligacy diminished taxpayers' support for governments' tax efforts. More generally, the article points to the importance of understanding how tax bargaining works in practice and people's perceptions of their governments over the long term to overcome resistance to tax reforms.

ABSTRACTThis paper comments on studies that aim to quantify the long-term economic effects of historical European settlement across the globe. We argue for the need to properly conceptualise «colonial settlement» as an endogenous development process shaped by the interaction between prospective settlers and indigenous peoples. We conduct three comparative case studies in West, East and Southern Africa, showing that the «success» or «failure» of colonial settlement critically depended on colonial government policies arranging European farmer's access to local land, but above all, local labour resources. These policies were shaped by the clashing interests of African farmers and European planters, in which colonial governments did not necessarily, and certainly not consistently, abide to settler demands, as is often assumed.

This paper comments on studies that aim to quantify the long-term economic effects of historical European settlement across the globe. We argue for the need to properly conceptualise «colonial settlement» as an endogenous development process shaped by the interaction between prospective settlers and indigenous peoples. We conduct three comparative case studies in West, East and Southern Africa, showing that the «success» or «failure» of colonial settlement critically depended on colonial government policies arranging European farmer's access to local land, but above all, local labour resources. These policies were shaped by the clashing interests of African farmers and European planters, in which colonial governments did not necessarily, and certainly not consistently, abide to settler demands, as is often assumed. ; Este trabajo hace un balance de los estudios que tienen por objeto cuantificar los efectos económicos a largo plazo de la colonización europea histórica en el mundo. Se defiende la necesidad de conceptualizar adecuadamente «asentamiento colonial» como un proceso de desarrollo endógeno determinado por la interacción entre los potenciales colonos y los pueblos indígenas. Se llevan a cabo tres estudios comparativos de caso en el oeste, el este y el sur de África, mostrando que el «éxito» o «fracaso» del asentamiento colonial dependía fundamentalmente de las políticas que el gobierno colonial organizase para el acceso del agricultor europeo a la tierra local, pero sobre todo, a los recursos de mano de obra local. Estas políticas se determinaron por los intereses en conflicto de los agricultores africanos y los granjeros europeos, y los gobiernos coloniales, en contra de lo que frecuentemente se supone, no acataron necesariamente (y desde luego no de manera consistente) las demandas de los colonos europeos.

This paper ties into a new literature that aims to quantify the long-term economic effects of historical European settlement, arguing for the need to properly address the role of indigenous agency in path-dependent settlement processes. We conduct three comparative case studies in West, East and Southern Africa, showing that the successes of European settler farming were often of a temporary nature and that they critically depended on colonial government policies arranging access to local land and labour resources. Further, we argue that these policies were shaped by the clashing interests of African smallholders and European planters, in which colonial governments did not necessarily abide to settler demands, as is often assumed.