The Problem of Tropical Africa. A Review of Recent Books

Abstract

HE political map of Africa in I891 shows almost complete partition of territory among the European powers; but this is far from saying that there was effective occupation of the country or effective administration of the natives. The boundary lines represented merely the scope of future economic and social reorganization and development by the various powers. In short, that earlier period was one of political adventure; the present period is one of economic development. Because the African continent has a number of distinct zones ranging from the humid central tropical forests to the desert borders north and south, economic development takes place under widely varying physical conditions, and there is an equally wide difference in possibilities from place to place. To adapt colonial practice and administrative schemes to the zonal arrangements of nature is a problem of great magnitude; and it is vastly complicated by the fact that the territories in question are inhabited by diverse hunting, pastoral, and agricultural races whose social and political organizations are imperilled or overthrown by the white man and the foundations of whose character are being sapped by the substitution of the white man's organization and purpose. This is not to say that the ultimate effect of white development will be bad but only that it may be bad and that it undoubtedly has already produced extremely serious effects here and there.