Veni grant awarded to Michiel de Haas

A good crisis gone to waste? The 1930s Great Depression and primary export dependence in Africa

African economies are vulnerable to unpredictable global demand for agricultural and mineral commodities. This causes boom-bust cycles en complicates poverty reduction. Studying historical crises and their consequences can improve our understanding of this persistent pattern. The 1930s Great Depression signifies the deepest global economic crisis since the Industrial Revolution. Prices for Africa’s export commodities collapsed. Why did Africa’s dependency on such exports increase nonetheless? Using colonial archives, newspapers, and historical statistics, I study the reactions of colonial administrators, farmers and workers in Central and East Africa to explain the impact of the Depression and its consequences for development.