Leigh Gardner is a Professor in Economic History at LSE. Her work focuses on the economic and financial history of Africa during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, which an emphasis on Africa’s connections to the global economy.
One of the earliest contributions to African economic history by an African scholar, this book by Nigerian historian Kenneth Dike remains a classic treatment of the interaction between shifting trade patterns and political change during a pivotal century in the region's economic history.
This paper by Egyptian economist and world-systems theorist Samir Amin remains influential for its typology of colonial economies based on the structure of export production and its implications for labour markets and standards of living.
Before the recent rise of the "history of capitalism" literature, traditional histories of the industrial revolution said little about the contributions of Africans. This now-classic work by Nigerian historian Joseph Inikori argued for the centrality of Atlantic commerce - and particularly African consumption and labour - in the process of British industrialisation.
This paper, the outcome of a years-long project led by Beninese economist Leonard Wantchekon, offers an innovative approach to understanding the legacies of colonial education provision. Interviews with the descendants of the first students to attend mission schools in Benin shows how exposure to education affected social and occupational mobility across generations.
This paper by Ghanaian historian Emmanuel Akyeampong provides an innovative comparative view of the diverse economic policies adopted by post-independence leaders in Africa.