Historical Legacies: A Model Linking Africa's Past to its Current Underdevelopment

Nathan Nunn

Development and Comp Systems from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: Recent studies have found evidence linking Africa’s current underdevelopment to colonial rule and the slave trade. Given that these events ended long ago, why do they continue to matter today? I develop a model, exhibiting path dependence, that explains how these past events could have lasting impacts. The model has multiple equilibria: one equilibrium with secure property rights and a high level of production and others with insecure property rights and low levels of production. I show that external extraction, when severe enough, causes a society initially in the high production equilibrium to move to a low production equilibrium. Because of the stability of low production equilibria, the society remains trapped in this suboptimal equilibrium even after the period of external extraction ends. The model provides one explanation why Africa’s past events continue to matter today.

JEL-codes: O P (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 37 pages
Date: 2005-08-22
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-afr, nep-dev, nep-his and nep-int
Note: Type of Document - pdf; pages: 37
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (13)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Historical legacies: A model linking Africa's past to its current underdevelopment (2007)
Working Paper: Historical legacies: A model linking Africa's past to its current underdevelopment (2007)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wpa:wuwpdc:0508008

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