The Role of Money in the Zande Economy

Abstract

IN THIS paper' I want to examine the part that money plays in the present Zande subsistence economy. The Azande are an amalgam of tribes living in the Belgian Congo, Sudan, and French Equatorial Africa. Just prior to European conquest, approximately 750,000 people of this territory had been merged into a remarkably homogeneous culture by a program of conquest and assimilation carried on by the Zande chiefs. In pre-European days, each family, consisting of a man with his wives and dependents, was a largely self-sufficient economic unit, producing most of the things which it consumed in ordinary life. There seems to have been little exchange among households, although iron tools and spears made from locally smelted ore had a limited application as a medium of exchange, being used primarily for marriage payments. Everyone was directly dependent upon the production of the household to which he belonged; there was only a sexual division of labor and there was no full-time occupational specialization. Even the chiefs and blacksmiths, who might be regarded as specialists, depended primarily upon the produce of their own establishments for necessities of life. Also, there was a remarkable absence of special goods designed for display or differentiation and even the wealthiest chiefs simply had a great deal more of everything possessed by the ordinary persons. Wealth was primarily in the form of perishable agricultural produce; little else could be accumulated, and there was a tradition of destroying the property of an individual when he died. How has the introduction of money influenced this subsistence economy? European administration brought with it a small number of merchants and limited amounts of money. Zande country is among the less developed regions in Africa because of its remoteness and its poverty in exportable commodities, and there has been little labor migration. When taxes were introduced in the early 1920's in Zande District of the Sudan, which is the portion of Zande country I know best, most men were not able to pay the annual tax (then about 250) and worked on the roads for five days each year in lieu of cash payment. The development of a small trade in wild pepper soon brought in enough money for most families to pay taxes in cash. Work for the administration and sale of forest produce were the major sources of money until the recent introduction of cotton as a cash crop. The cash income of the Azande is still relatively low, even by African standards. A rough average figure is about $10 per year per family, while a $50 annual income is a relatively high one. A laborer, working regularly, earned about $50 per year in 1955. Nonetheless, the Azande have been using money for about 50 years and they are universally familiar with it as a medium of exchange. Virtually all