Building and Caretaking: Economic Policy in British Tropical Africa, 1890-1960.

This article presents information on the economic policy practiced in colonial Africa. The purpose of this article is to illustrate certain crucial but neglected features of British policy by focusing upon the local administrators, their attitudes and beliefs, and the institutions through which they worked. The concept of an open economy can have several implications, but for present purposes it will be sufficient to remember two, economic growth was envisaged essentially in terms of the promotion of a narrow range of export staples, while imports mainly took the form of consumer goods which were taxed for revenue, rather than for the promotion of infant industries. Within this broad classification a variety of patterns emerged. White settlers or exploitable mineral deposits, for example, could significantly influence economic structure and policy. But all African economies, planter, peasant, or mining, were subject to the exigencies of world markets for primary products which, over a comparatively short period, were buffeted by two major wars and a great depression.