Table Of ContentPALGRAVE STUDIES IN ECONOMIC HISTORY
Capital and Colonialism
The Return on British
Investments in Africa
1869–1969
Klas Rönnbäck
Oskar Broberg
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Klas Rönnbäck • Oskar Broberg
Capital and
Colonialism
The Return on British Investments in
Africa 1869–1969
Klas Rönnbäck Oskar Broberg
Department of Economy and Society Department of Economy and Society
University of Gothenburg University of Gothenburg
Gothenburg, Sweden Gothenburg, Sweden
Palgrave Studies in Economic History
ISBN 978-3-030-19710-0 ISBN 978-3-030-19711-7 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-19711-7
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Acknowledgements
The research underlying this book would not have been possible without
the economic support from Jan Wallanders och Tom Hedelius Stiftelse,
Stiftelsen för Ekonomisk Forskning i Västsverige and strategic funding
from the School of Business, Economics and Law at Gothenburg
University.
The research would likewise not have been possible without access to
primary sources in the archives. We would therefore like to thank all the
staff at the London Guildhall Archive, as well as Julia Woolcott, archivists
at the Barloworld Limited company archive.
A couple of research assistants have furthermore been most helpful for
different parts of this research project: Jens Boberg (Chap. 5), Young Jang
(Chap. 8), Stefan Hagberg (Chap. 12), Laura Phillips (Chap. 12),
Dimitrios Theodoridis (Chap. 14) and Stefania Galli (Chap. 14). We
thank you all for your assistance to this work.
A number of scholars that we have been in contact with over the years
have generously shared their respective expertise with us, providing us
crucial feedback on sources, the methods employed or the results we
arrived at. We would therefore like to thank Johan Fourie, Jeremy Mouat,
Arn Keeling, Mark Hendrickson, Fredric Quivik, Kip Curtis and John
Turner for their help as well as participants in the audience at several
conferences where parts of this research have been presented, including
conferences organized by the African Economic History Network,
v
vi Acknowledgements
European Business History Conference, the European Historical
Economics Society, Ekonomisk-Historiska Mötet and the LEAP-seminar
at Stellenbosch University. We would also like to thank Moritz Schularick
who generously shared data from his research with us.
Most importantly, we would like to extend our deepest gratitude to a
number of scholars who generously shared their expertise with us by
reading selected draft chapters of this book and providing much valuable
feedback. This helped us develop these chapters substantially. Thank you
to Tinashe Nyamunda, Robert L. Tignor, Charles Harvey, Gareth Austin,
Sarah Stockwell, Mariusz Lukasiewicz, Ed Kerby, Grietjie Verhoef, Staffan
Granér, Birgit Karlsson and Susanna Fellman. All remaining errors are,
naturally, our responsibility.
Contents
1 Introduction 3
Part I Research Design 15
2 Historical Context 17
3 Capital and Colonialism in Theory 39
4 Previous Empirical Research 55
5 D ata and Methods 69
Part II A ggregate Results 99
6 Th e Rate of Return on Investment in Africa 101
7 R isk and Return 125
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viii Contents
Part III Regional Studies 147
8 North Africa 149
9 West Africa 175
10 Central/Southern Africa 209
11 South Africa 235
Part IV Thematical Studies 281
12 On the Ground Floor: The Corner House Group 283
13 Imperial Profit 311
14 African Mining in Global Comparison 339
15 Conclusions 381
Index 393
List of Figures
Fig. 2.1 British investments in mining by region, 1865–1914 (per-
centage of total capital called). Source: Stone (1999, table 57) 29
Fig. 2.2 Capital exports from the United Kingdom to the British
Empire and to countries outside the British Empire, by year,
1865–1914 (£000 sterling, current prices). Source: Stone
(1999, table 33–34) 31
Fig. 5.1 Number of companies in the African Colonial Equities
Database, by year, 1869–1969. Source: African Colonial
Equities Database (ACED) 82
Fig. 6.1 Market capitalization in the African Colonial Equities
Database, by year and region, 1869–1969 (£ million, constant
1868 prices). Source: African Colonial Equities Database
(ACED). Note: market capitalization calculated for the month
of December every year of observation. East African invest-
ments are too small to be clearly discernible in the figure 102
Fig. 6.2 Three-firm concentration ratio of the market capitalization in
the African Colonial Equities Database, by year and region,
1869–1969 (per cent, nine- year moving averages). Source:
African Colonial Equities Database (ACED) 105
Fig. 6.3 Histogram of the nominal average return on investment in
individual companies in Africa, 1869–1969 (geometric mean
per year). Source: African Colonial Equities Database (ACED) 108
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