Likeliest African countries to begin industrializing in the 19th century?

CaliGuy

Banned
Which African countries would have been the likeliest--had things been luckier/a bit more fortunate for them--to begin industrializing in the 19th century?

Indeed, which African countries would have been most likely to become for Africa what Meiji Japan was for Asia?

Any thoughts on this?
 

CaliGuy

Banned
Also, for reference, on the left is a map of Africa in 1880:

1280px-Scramble-for-Africa-1880-1913.png
 
Egypt, I guess, if only due to its proximity to the European powers to be affected by the waves of innovation coming from there. After all, Muhammad Ali Pasha did for it some of what Peter the Great did for Russia, attempting to modernize the country. Now, in a TL where the Ottoman Empire successfully industrializes, I can see Egypt, and perhaps even Persia affected by these developments.

Other countries, I don't know. Even larger and more sophisticated polities (i.e. non tribal and non-nomadic) such as Congo, Ethiopia and Madagascar lacked a pre-existing infrastructure base that Japan had IOTL before the Meiji Era, and had no economic development to foster an industrial revolution, unless its directly jumpstarted by an European power like France or Britain (who, in all likelyhood, won't have interest in doing it, even more if the scramble for Africa happens like OTL). All of them were still on a feudal level of social structures, with a basically illiterate population, and the plenty availability of cheap labor could perhaps be counterproductive to inspire an industrial advance (there are no capitalists interested in paying wages, but feudal lords demanding labor from serfs or slaves).

They might experience minor levels of technological modernization by importing machinery to invest in the extraction of raw goods (such as wood, metals, and so forth) to export to European markets, and its likely the feudalized militaries might see some measure of westernization, like it happened in India and China (with more modern weaponry, standing armies, and so forth), but I hardly expect a Japan-like surge in industrial production and innovation.

I'm not sure about the Boer Republics. They were agrarian societies, and possibly lacked incentive to industrialize due to the greater interest in mining, but the Dutch or British influence could at least introduce an infant level of industrial development in more urban areas, even more if we avoid the Boer Wars.
 
Which African countries would have been the likeliest--had things been luckier/a bit more fortunate for them--to begin industrializing in the 19th century?

Indeed, which African countries would have been most likely to become for Africa what Meiji Japan was for Asia?

Any thoughts on this?

Abyssinia could industrialize with outside help, they began to modernize under Menelik II., who had to unite the decentralized feudal country first.Maybe an earlier push towards a more centralized country could be crucial for such a developement. There needs to be a strong and skillfull Emperor like Menelik, but earlier.
 
I have always thought Morocco was an option. Either a stronger Spain or an earlier Germany could lead to a potential ruler playing one off against France and modernising the county with loans at a good rate without it being corrupted away.

Then an alliance with Europe to take France out of the Maghreb at the turn of the 20th century and then ultimately a Kingdom of the Maghreb from Arguin to El Alamein. Firmly within the European framework despite being in Africa.
 
Ethiopia, Morocco, and MAYBE Liberia.

If Japan is more adamant to align with Ethiopia early in the Meiji rather than later I could see it happen. No other power would allow an African kingdom to compete. Support with Cossacks interested within the Imperial Court could also facilitate the shift.

Liberia would be a no unless they can tell the Colonization society to fuck off and they move inland to trade and align with Mande. If they did that they'd have access to numerous markets through them.

Morocco is pretty self explanatory, mostly gonna be because of proximity.
 

Deleted member 67076

Off the top of my head I can make a case for Madagascar, Egypt, Sokoto, Ethiopia, Morocco, and a hypothetical Zanzibari sultanate that takes most of the Swahili cultural area and manages to digest its holdings enough for proto industry to begin. I also want to say perhaps a Ouattara Empire that isn't brutally ransacked by Samouri but given their decentralization and lack of people and manufacturing that's really unlikely.

Definitely not Congo or any of the states there, sorry guys. Too rugged, too big, too little economic production, too widespread of a population except in Bas-Congo but that region suffers the problem of horrific terrain, low literacy, disease and limited agricultural output.

As for Liberia, too few people to be able to pull of industrialization. Most of its capital clustered around a tiny elite and chronic fiscal instability are also negative marks on it.
 

missouribob

Banned
Easiest would be Liberia. Post-the ACW have Lincoln not get shot. He continues to support the colonization of Liberia in exchange for Blacks in the United States becoming second class citizens and Liberia enters the United States as a territory, much like Puerto Rico. As U.S. territory Liberia industrializes along with the rest of the United States and becomes America's frontier in Africa.

You don't even need much larger flows of African-American immigration TO Liberia, you just need the United States to annex the place.
 

Deleted member 67076

Easiest would be Liberia. Post-the ACW have Lincoln not get shot. He continues to support the colonization of Liberia in exchange for Blacks in the United States becoming second class citizens and Liberia enters the United States as a territory, much like Puerto Rico. As U.S. territory Liberia industrializes along with the rest of the United States and becomes America's frontier in Africa.

You don't even need much larger flows of African-American immigration TO Liberia, you just need the United States to annex the place.
I don't see how US annexation would equal to inevitable industrialization in the 19th century. Liberia would suit itself to an extraction based economy and have little incentive to industrialize if its got a metropole where it can import manufactured goods from cheaply. At the same time, it still has the problems of a very limited population base and the various political machines enforcing forced labor and limited power sharing arrangements.
 
Probably none.

Egypt tried to industrialize, but failed because it did not have any native sources of coal. You can only industrialize so much based on human and animal labor. Hydropower wouldn't be a real option at this point. That would have been your best bet. If Egypt didn't borrow so much money and squandered it trying to expand, they'd do better economically but they have limited prospects until they can find something that meets their energy needs.

The next tier would be countries that at least had some kind of real administration and incentive to oversee a state lead industrialization. Morocco, Ethiopia, and Tunisia would be next. But they suffer the same lack of resources that Egypt did. Morocco and Tunisia were already under the thumb of European powers who likely would not wish to see those countries develop their own manufacturing. Ethiopia escaped that, but has its own financial and technical constraints. So nothing here either.

There is no polity in sub-Saharan Africa that is capable to achieving industrialization in the 19th century. Even Liberia isn't well placed - the factors that lead to some economic development in the 20th century didn't exist in the 19th (the US won't fund rubber plantations because there is no car industry that requires rubber for tires). Only South Africa could do it if the gold and diamonds were found earlier which could provide the capital needed to develop its mineral resources and heavy industry. Probably beyond the capacity of the Boers at the time, so it would be the British who would develop the colony.
 

missouribob

Banned
I don't see how US annexation would equal to inevitable industrialization in the 19th century. Liberia would suit itself to an extraction based economy and have little incentive to industrialize if its got a metropole where it can import manufactured goods from cheaply. At the same time, it still has the problems of a very limited population base and the various political machines enforcing forced labor and limited power sharing arrangements.
Well the OP said, "begin" industrialising. I don't think Liberia is going to have much in the way of industry, maybe a textile mill or two or something REALLY small scale and unimpressive, but it would be the first steps, which from what I know of Liberian history is more than they had before 1900 in OTL. Basically with more capital from the United States towards Liberia that funds infrastructure to extract resources and more foreign direct investment the chance that a least one or two very small factories crop up is higher than OTL I think.
 

Deleted member 67076

The next tier would be countries that at least had some kind of real administration and incentive to oversee a state lead industrialization. Morocco, Ethiopia, and Tunisia would be next. But they suffer the same lack of resources that Egypt did. Morocco and Tunisia were already under the thumb of European powers who likely would not wish to see those countries develop their own manufacturing. Ethiopia escaped that, but has its own financial and technical constraints. So nothing here either.

There is no polity in sub-Saharan Africa that is capable to achieving industrialization in the 19th century.
You're ignoring Sokoto. It had good administrative capacity (one that was rapidly increasing in efficiency as the decades passed), a class of commercial elites, good cottage industries (they could already mass produce their own rifles; most of West Africa could at this time) and financial backers, and access to coal in Northern Nigeria (alongside in Igboland). Additionally, leaders were well aware of the threat of the British and French, preferring to deal with with them diplomatically rather than with with aggression.

Give it stability, a population boom, good leadership, delay or abort the scramble, and you'll see the beginnings of a military industrial complex and light manufacturing in the Sahel similar to that of Meiji Japan.
Well the OP said, "begin" industrialising. I don't think Liberia is going to have much in the way of industry, maybe a textile mill or two or something REALLY small scale and unimpressive, but it would be the first steps, which from what I know of Liberian history is more than they had before 1900 in OTL. Basically with more capital from the United States towards Liberia that funds infrastructure to extract resources and more foreign direct investment the chance that a least one or two very small factories crop up is higher than OTL I think.
Eh, even then I don't think there'd be much money poured into Liberia until the early 1900s at the very least. Its a poor, marginal, unpopulated territory filled with people the US doesn't like.
 
You're ignoring Sokoto. It had good administrative capacity (one that was rapidly increasing in efficiency as the decades passed), a class of commercial elites, good cottage industries (they could already mass produce their own rifles; most of West Africa could at this time) and financial backers, and access to coal in Northern Nigeria (alongside in Igboland). Additionally, leaders were well aware of the threat of the British and French, preferring to deal with with them diplomatically rather than with with aggression.

Give it stability, a population boom, good leadership, delay or abort the scramble, and you'll see the beginnings of a military industrial complex and light manufacturing in the Sahel similar to that of Meiji Japan.

I will admit I lack expertise on the Sokoto Caliphate, but I remain highly skeptical of your claims. Meiji Japan was an extremely advanced society. There was widespread literacy in Japan with rates similar to Europe at the time. Literacy in the Sokoto Caliphate was among a very narrow elite and along Islamic theology and jurisprudence, not science and engineering. Japan also had an extremely highly skilled workforce that could make almost everything the country needed, and its workforce could transfer their skills to value added industrial work. In Japan there were specialized work forces dedicated to producing one type of goods, not just peasants who crafted items in their homes when they were not planting or harvesting, or just in a few special arsenals producing items solely for government use. The small cottage industries in Africa were nowhere near that level of skill or size relative to the population. Edo period Japan had major highways, bridges, a postal service, lighthouses, civil engineering, and other advanced public infrastructure and services. It had banks and a financial industry that could capitalize investment. I am not aware of anything similar in the Sokoto Caliphate. It simply lacks enough skilled people, knowledge, and capital to industrialize.

Japan was a much more urbanized country - Edo had a population of a million people (making it the biggest city in the world for a time), four more that were in the hundreds of thousands, and several dozens with populations over 10,000. How large were the major urban centers of the Sokoto Caliphate? I know this region of Africa was relatively more urbanized than the rest of Africa, but the urban population was still low. The explorer Heinrich Barth estimated that the city of Sokoto itself around 1853 only had around 20,000 people and that was the capital! That's only about the number thirty on the list of populated urban centers in Japan at the time. So while Sokoto had a total population of about one-third of Japan (ten million to thirty million), its urban population was dramatically lower indicating a far lower sophistication in economy, administration, and technology.

So no, the Sokoto Caliphate was nowhere near being similar to Meiji Japan. The Caliphate was relatively more advanced than much of sub-Saharan Africa, but even compared to North Africa (which failed to industrialize) it was backwards.

If you can provide more specifics, I am willing to re-evaluate my opinion.
 

CaliGuy

Banned
I will admit I lack expertise on the Sokoto Caliphate, but I remain highly skeptical of your claims. Meiji Japan was an extremely advanced society. There was widespread literacy in Japan with rates similar to Europe at the time. Literacy in the Sokoto Caliphate was among a very narrow elite and along Islamic theology and jurisprudence, not science and engineering. Japan also had an extremely highly skilled workforce that could make almost everything the country needed, and its workforce could transfer their skills to value added industrial work. In Japan there were specialized work forces dedicated to producing one type of goods, not just peasants who crafted items in their homes when they were not planting or harvesting, or just in a few special arsenals producing items solely for government use. The small cottage industries in Africa were nowhere near that level of skill or size relative to the population. Edo period Japan had major highways, bridges, a postal service, lighthouses, civil engineering, and other advanced public infrastructure and services. It had banks and a financial industry that could capitalize investment. I am not aware of anything similar in the Sokoto Caliphate. It simply lacks enough skilled people, knowledge, and capital to industrialize.

Japan was a much more urbanized country - Edo had a population of a million people (making it the biggest city in the world for a time), four more that were in the hundreds of thousands, and several dozens with populations over 10,000. How large were the major urban centers of the Sokoto Caliphate? I know this region of Africa was relatively more urbanized than the rest of Africa, but the urban population was still low. The explorer Heinrich Barth estimated that the city of Sokoto itself around 1853 only had around 20,000 people and that was the capital! That's only about the number thirty on the list of populated urban centers in Japan at the time. So while Sokoto had a total population of about one-third of Japan (ten million to thirty million), its urban population was dramatically lower indicating a far lower sophistication in economy, administration, and technology.

So no, the Sokoto Caliphate was nowhere near being similar to Meiji Japan. The Caliphate was relatively more advanced than much of sub-Saharan Africa, but even compared to North Africa (which failed to industrialize) it was backwards.

If you can provide more specifics, I am willing to re-evaluate my opinion.
Excellent information and explanation! :)

Also, I've got a question--while this thread is about Africa, out of curiosity--in the entire world, which non-White countries other than Japan (and excluding the Americas, of course) had high or relatively high literacy levels in the 19th century and earlier?
 

Zachariah

Banned
Excellent information and explanation! :)

Also, I've got a question--while this thread is about Africa, out of curiosity--in the entire world, which non-White countries other than Japan (and excluding the Americas, of course) had high or relatively high literacy levels in the 19th century and earlier?

Well, a word of advice- don't believe the literacy rates cited by Paradox in Victoria II. You should find this article about the levels of literacy in the Sikh Empire very interesting. http://dailysikhupdates.com/scholar-1881-punjab-educated-place-world-sikh-empire/. One of the central tenets of the Sikh faith was universal literacy, with the Gurmukhi script created and standardized by the second Sikh Guru Angad Dev Ji for this specific purpose, and Maharajah Ranjit Singh's Sikh Empire was the first in the world to introduce compulsory state-funded universal education for both males and females, resulting in what the East India Company themselves admitted was most likely the highest literacy rate in the world, potentially rivaling that of even the contemporary Netherlands (90%) at the time of annexation- so high that the British implemented a book-burning program to curb it and reduce literacy rates for fear of rebellion. Before its annexation, and the anti-literacy program in 1857, the Sikh Empire had an estimated 330,000 students in higher education, equivalent to 2.75% of its entire population of roughly 12M; for comparison, the USA only managed to reach and surpass this level of college enrollment in the mid 1950's. It's one of the mods which I added to my own version of Victoria II to make it more historically accurate- and let me tell you, it makes a huge difference when you're playing as the Sikh Empire. Great Power status guaranteed...
 
You ought to read Male' Rising, in which the Sokoto Emirate is takeb over by exiled slaves from Brazil and begins industrializing. Other than that Egypt is the classic example.
 
Well, a word of advice- don't believe the literacy rates cited by Paradox in Victoria II. You should find this article about the levels of literacy in the Sikh Empire very interesting. http://dailysikhupdates.com/scholar-1881-punjab-educated-place-world-sikh-empire/. One of the central tenets of the Sikh faith was universal literacy, with the Gurmukhi script created and standardized by the second Sikh Guru Angad Dev Ji for this specific purpose, and Maharajah Ranjit Singh's Sikh Empire was the first in the world to introduce compulsory state-funded universal education for both males and females, resulting in what the East India Company themselves admitted was most likely the highest literacy rate in the world, potentially rivaling that of even the contemporary Netherlands (90%) at the time of annexation- so high that the British implemented a book-burning program to curb it and reduce literacy rates for fear of rebellion. Before its annexation, and the anti-literacy program in 1857, the Sikh Empire had an estimated 330,000 students in higher education, equivalent to 2.75% of its entire population of roughly 12M; for comparison, the USA only managed to reach and surpass this level of college enrollment in the mid 1950's. It's one of the mods which I added to my own version of Victoria II to make it more historically accurate- and let me tell you, it makes a huge difference when you're playing as the Sikh Empire. Great Power status guaranteed...
hear hear. As a Punjabi it annoys me to no end when every single TL set during this era essentially ignores this and results in a British controlled subcontinent every single god-damned time. /mini-rant
 

Deleted member 67076

I will admit I lack expertise on the Sokoto Caliphate, but I remain highly skeptical of your claims. Meiji Japan was an extremely advanced society. There was widespread literacy in Japan with rates similar to Europe at the time. Literacy in the Sokoto Caliphate was among a very narrow elite and along Islamic theology and jurisprudence, not science and engineering.
Not claiming parity with both, but merely that you can get a period of rapid change and economic expansion like that of Meiji Japan. The society was already transforming in ways that would be conductive to industrialization.

Japan also had an extremely highly skilled workforce that could make almost everything the country needed, and its workforce could transfer their skills to value added industrial work. In Japan there were specialized work forces dedicated to producing one type of goods, not just peasants who crafted items in their homes when they were not planting or harvesting, or just in a few special arsenals producing items solely for government use. The small cottage industries in Africa were nowhere near that level of skill or size relative to the population. Edo period Japan had major highways, bridges, a postal service, lighthouses, civil engineering, and other advanced public infrastructure and services. It had banks and a financial industry that could capitalize investment. I am not aware of anything similar in the Sokoto Caliphate. It simply lacks enough skilled people, knowledge, and capital to industrialize.

This is literally Sokoto. The country's large size and population combined with its stability, decentralization of political control (thus giving experimentation of rule) and flourishing of its intellectual/political elite provided enough of a demand for goods, which were attended to by classes of artisans. Its Islamic governance provided the framework for rationalized economic policy that in effect led to economic standardization alongside incentives for public infrastructure. (Lovejoy, Paul E. “LONG-DISTANCE TRADE AND ISLAM: THE CASE OF THE NINETEENTH-CENTURY HAUSA KOLA TRADE.” Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria, vol. 5, no. 4, 1971,) Additionally, the Islamic Quranic schools and associations were responsible for a boon in literacy over the decades. (Mottin A. Rashid, and A. Rashid Moten. “POLITICAL DYNAMISM OF ISLAM IN NIGERIA.” Islamic Studies, vol 26, no 2, 1987)

Its why entire towns like Kura were devoted to textile production, or towns such as Babba Karofi to dye production, and there was enough of a road system to make transport of said goods and dyes profitable. (Shea, Philip J. “Big Is Sometimes Best: The Sokoto Caliphate and Economic Advantages of Size in the Textile Industry.” African Economic History) The Kano region was at one point estimated to produce around half of the Western Sudan's textiles, yet at the same time it was not the only major textile center- competing with Ilorin and Bida in the latter half of the 19th century as time passed. (Kriger, Colleen. “Textile Production and Gender in the Sokoto Caliphate.” The Journal of African History) Technological innovation and diffusion was well attested in the region, congruent with the explosion of textile manufacturing. For example, the vertical loom became standard practice amongst even remote villages.

I'm not sure where you're getting this notion of Sokoto, or the broader Western Africa as relatively primitive state societies.

Japan was a much more urbanized country - Edo had a population of a million people (making it the biggest city in the world for a time), four more that were in the hundreds of thousands, and several dozens with populations over 10,000. How large were the major urban centers of the Sokoto Caliphate? I know this region of Africa was relatively more urbanized than the rest of Africa, but the urban population was still low. The explorer Heinrich Barth estimated that the city of Sokoto itself around 1853 only had around 20,000 people and that was the capital! That's only about the number thirty on the list of populated urban centers in Japan at the time. So while Sokoto had a total population of about one-third of Japan (ten million to thirty million), its urban population was dramatically lower indicating a far lower sophistication in economy, administration, and technology.
Sokoto was in the process of rapid urbanization. And I have no idea where you got that 20,000 number given other explorers such as Chapperton claimed Sokoto had around 200,000 inhabitants being the largest city in West Africa and later writers attest to being a very large city. Furthermore, a number of cities sprung up around the various fortresses propped up by the Caliphate and the emirates' plantations. (Swindell, Kenneth. “Population and Agriculture in the Sokoto-Rima Basin of North-West Nigeria: A Study of Political Intervention, Adaptation and Change, 1800-1980". Cahiers d'Études Africaines, vol. 26, no. 101/102, 1986)

So no, the Sokoto Caliphate was nowhere near being similar to Meiji Japan. The Caliphate was relatively more advanced than much of sub-Saharan Africa, but even compared to North Africa (which failed to industrialize) it was backwards.

If you can provide more specifics, I am willing to re-evaluate my opinion.
Again, I'm not claiming total equality to Japan, far from it, but merely that there was the potential for the rapid administrative and economic transformations akin to Japan. We have a political stable state (minus the bungle of the last few Caliphs, which can be butterflied away) undergoing large population growth, large expanses in education, productivity and busineses

If you want specifics, I can point to plenty of authors such as the above.
 
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