Rural Capitalists and Development in Colonial Africa: A Comparative Analysis

ABSTRACT This paper explores the emergence and role of rural capitalists in colonial Sub‐Saharan Africa by comparing three peasant‐based economies: Bechuanaland, the Gold Coast and Tanganyika. Using social tables, we estimate the population and income shares of better earning agricultural producers and assess their impact on rural inequality and development. We find that rural capitalists in each colony adapted their economic strategies to local ecological, economic and institutional contexts, leading to varied outcomes in terms of economic development and income differentiation. In Bechuanaland, capital‐intensive cattle production fuelled exclusionary growth and deepening polarization. In the Gold Coast, early inclusive gains from cocoa cultivation gave way to rising inequality. In Tanganyika, smallholder expansion in coffee production yielded more broadly shared benefits. By shifting attention from aggregate commercialization to the distributional dynamics among farmers, the paper shows how different forms of accumulation shape rural development outcomes and the limits of market‐led transformation in Sub‐Saharan Africa.