Colonial Education, Political Elites, and Regional Political Inequality in Africa

Abstract

Political elites tend to favor their home region when distributing resources. But what explains how political power is distributed across a country’s regions to begin with? Explanations of cabinet formation focus on short-term strategic bargaining and some emphasize that ministries are allocated equitably to minimize conflict. Using new data on the cabinet members (1960–2010) of 16 former British and French African colonies, I find that some regions have been systematically much more represented than others. Combining novel historical and geospatial records, I show that this regional political inequality derives not from colonial-era development in general but from colonial-era education in particular. I argue that post-colonial ministers are partly a byproduct of civil service recruitment practices among European administrators that focused on levels of literacy. Regional political inequality is an understudied pathway through which colonial legacies impact distributive politics and unequal development in Africa today. JEL: F54, I26, N37, N47

The role of secondary school teachers in shaping a political culture of ethnicity and ethnic favouritism: the case of Kenya

“…Rapid educational attainment across, and convergence among, all larger ethnic groups, they contend, overshadows any marginal advantage of having a coethnic president: rather than conclusive evidence of ethnic favouritism, the slow-down of the rate of Kikuyu compared with Kalenjin attainment under Moi's presidency, for instance, is due to the former reaching the ceiling of primary education earlier. And, the head start of Kikuyu children would be a legacy of the colonial period more than the result of disproportionate spending in Kikuyu regions under Kenyatta (Simson & Green 2020; see also Ricart-Huguet 2021); more generally, there is an important effect of intergenerational transmission of educational attainment, as children of parents with higher levels of education are more likely to attain higher levels too (Simson 2021).…”

“…Berman et al 2009; Li 2018; Simson & Green 2020), but also because of the long-term and often persistent benefits that accrue to unfairly favoured ethnic groups. Indeed, unfair advantage with respect to the allocation of educational resources (both in terms of infrastructure and availability of qualified teachers) may lead to substantial differences between different ethnic groups’ returns to education and consequently their future economic opportunities and status in society (Brown 2011; Kramon & Posner 2016; Simson 2021; see also Ricart-Huguet 2021).…”

Trusting without a Safety Net: The Peril of Trust in Base of the Pyramid Economies

“…As a consequence, we argue that entrepreneurs who generate a greater amount of income from alternative business activities are likely to experience a more negative trust‐operating performance relationship. Second, while education is a ‘nearly uncontested development strategy’ for BOP contexts (Datzberger, 2018, p. 124), access to education remains rare in the BOP and its positive effects tend to benefit a privileged minority (Ricart‐Huget, 2021). Entrepreneurs who have acquired greater education, therefore, may derive unique benefits unavailable to others, which can reduce the harm of partners' opportunism, weakening the negative relationship between trust and operating performance.…”

The colonial struggle over polygamy: Consequences for educational expansion in sub-Saharan Africa

“…This further emphasizes the need to study pre-colonial conditions, which are often sidelined in work on long-run consequences of colonialism (Haas and Frankema 2018 ; Meier zu Selhausen 2019 ; Michalopoulos and Papaioannou 2013 ). More specifically, the paper joins a growing number of studies that analyse consequences of missionary activity on a wide range of economic, political and social outcomes (Cagé and Rueda 2020 ; Nunn 2014 ; Okoye 2021 ; Ricart-Huguet 2021 ; Woodberry 2012 ). By exploring the long-term consequences of early polygamous practices, the paper directly complements several works on the origins of contemporary polygamy (André and Dupraz 2019 ; Fenske 2015 ; Kudo 2017 ).…”