TY  - BOOK
AU  - Osafo-Kwaako,Philip
AU  - Robinson,James A.
ED  - National Bureau of Economic Research.
TI  - Political Centralization in Pre-Colonial Africa
T2  - NBER working paper series
PY  - 2013///
CY  - Cambridge, Mass.
PB  - National Bureau of Economic Research
N1  - February 2013; Hardcopy version available to institutional subscribers
N2  - In this paper we investigate the empirical correlates of political centralization using data from the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample. We specifically investigate the explanatory power of the standard models of Eurasian state formation which emphasize the importance of high population density, inter-state warfare and trade as factors leading to political centralization. We find that while in the whole world sample these factors are indeed positively correlated with political centralization, this is not so in the African sub-sample. Indeed, none of the variables are statistically related to political centralization. We also provide evidence that political centralization, where it took place, was indeed associated with better public goods and development outcomes. We conclude that the evidence is quite consistent with the intellectual tradition initiated in social anthropology by Evans-Pritchard and Fortes in the 1940s which denied the utility of Eurasian models in explaining patterns of political centralization in Africa
UR  - https://www.nber.org/papers/w18770
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.3386/w18770
ER  -