Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-xtgtn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T21:09:31.242Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Imachi Nkwu: Trade and the Commons

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 February 2014

James Fenske
James Fenske*
Affiliation:
University Lecturer in Economic History, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, Manor Road Building, Oxford, OX1 3UQ, United Kingdom. E-mail: james.fenske@economics.ox.ac.uk.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The conventional view is that an increase in the value of a natural resource can lead to private property over it. Many Igbo groups in Nigeria, however, curtailed private rights over palm trees in response to the palm produce trade of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. I use the Ostrom (2007, 2009) framework for analyzing social-ecological systems to guide the construction of a model of this transition. An increase in the resource price leads the owner to prefer communal harvesting, which simplifies monitoring against theft. I support this framework with evidence from colonial court records. “Palm cutting always cause palaver.”

Obuba of Ububa, Nkwo Udara Civil Suit 111/37

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 74 , Issue 1 , March 2014 , pp. 39 - 68
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 2014 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

This article was previously titled, “Imachi Nkwu: How Commercialization of Natural Resources Can Create Common Property.” I would like to thank my advisors Timothy Guinnane, Benjamin Polak, and Christopher Udry for their guidance. Thank you as well to Achyuta Adhvaryu, Prashant Bharadwaj, Hoyt Bleakley, Jean-Paul Carvalho, Rahul Deb, Avner Greif, Carol Heim, Frank Lewis, Deirdre McCloskey, Marjorie McIntosh, Florian Ploeckl, Maher Said, Veronica Santarosa, and the participants of the Yale Graduate Student Workshop, the NEUDC, the University of Massachusetts Economic History and Development Workshop, the SITE summer workshop, and the World Economic History Congress for their comments and advice. Thanks are also due to Robert Allen for generously sharing data. Archival research for this project was made possible with support from the MacMillan Center at Yale University, the Gilder Lehrman Center, and the Georg Walter Leitner Program. I would also like to thank Anayo Enechukwu, Joseph Ayodokun (victoria005@yahoo.co.uk, www.nigeriaresearch.com), and the staff of the National Archives, Enugu, for helping with the logistics of my research.

References

REFERENCES

Afigbo, A. E. “Revolution and Reaction in Eastern Nigeria: 1900-1929.” Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria 3, no. 3 (1966): 539-57.Google Scholar
Allen, R. C. Global Economic History: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.Google Scholar
Alston, L. J., Harris, E., and Mueller, B.. “The Development of Property Rights on Frontiers: Endowments, Norms, and Politics.” The Journal of Economic History 72, no. 3 (2012): 741-70.Google Scholar
Alston, L. J., Libecap, G. D., and Mueller, B.. Titles, Conflict, and Land Use: The Development of Property Rights and Land Reform on the Brazilian Amazon Frontier. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999.Google Scholar
Alston, L. J., Libecap, G. D., and Schneider, R.. “The Determinants and Impact of Property Rights: Land Titles on the Brazilian Frontier.” Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization 12, no. 1 (1996): 25–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aweto, A. O. “Agriculture in Urhoboland.” In Studies in Urhobo Culture, edited by Ekeh, P., 699–716. Buffalo, NY: Uhrobo Historical Society, 2005.Google Scholar
Baland, J.-M., and Platteau, J.-P.. “Division of the Commons: A Partial Assessment of the New Institutional Economics of Land Rights.” American Journal of Agricultural Economics 80, no. 3 (1998): 644-50.Google Scholar
Baland, J.-M., and Platteau, J.-P.. “Economics of Common Property Management Regimes.” In Handbook of Environmental Economics, Volume 1, edited by Mäler, K.-G. and Vincent, J. R., 127–90. Amsterdam: Elsevier Science, 2003.Google Scholar
Besley, T., and Ghatak, M.. “Property Rights and Economic Development.” In Handbook of Development Economics, edited by Rodrik, D. and Rosenzweig, M., 4525–95. Amsterdam: Elsevier Science, 2009.Google Scholar
Bridges, A. F. B. “Report on Oil Palm Survey in the Western Provinces.” Oxford: Rhodes House Library, MSS. Afr.s. 679, 1938.Google Scholar
Brown, C. A. “We Were All Slaves:” African Miners, Culture, and Resistance at the Enugu Government Colliery. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2003.Google Scholar
Chubb, L. T. Ibo Land Tenure. Ibadan: Ibadan University Press, 1961.Google Scholar
Chuku, G. Igbo Women and Economic Transformation in Southeastern Nigeria, 1900-1960. New York: Routledge, 2005.Google Scholar
Clay, K., and Wright, G.. “Order Without Law? Property Rights During the California Gold Rush.” Explorations in Economic History 42, no. 2 (2005): 155-83.Google Scholar
Copeland, B. R., and Taylor, M. S.. “Trade, Tragedy, and the Commons.” American Economic Review 99, no. 3 (2009): 725-49.Google Scholar
Demsetz, H. “Toward a Theory of Property Rights.” American Economic Review 57, no. 2 (1967): 347-59.Google Scholar
Dietz, T., Ostrom, E., and Stern, P. C.. “The Struggle to Govern the Commons. Science 302, no. 5652 (2003): 1907–12.Google Scholar
Fehr, E., and Gächter, S.. “Fairness and Retaliation: The Economics of Reciprocity.” The Journal of Economic Perspectives 14, no. 3 (2000): 159-81.Google Scholar
Fenoaltea, S. “Risk, Transaction Costs, and the Organization of Medieval Agriculture.” Explorations in Economic History 13, no. 2 (1976): 129-51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Forde, C. D. The Yoruba-Speaking Peoples of South-Western Nigeria. London: International African Institute, 1951.Google Scholar
Gailey, H. A. The Road to Aba: A Study of British Administrative Policy in Eastern Nigeria. New York: New York University Press, 1970.Google Scholar
Green, M. M. Land Tenure in an Ibo Village: In South-Eastern Nigeria. Monographs on Social Anthropology, No. 6, Percy Lund, Humphries, for The London School of Economics and Political Science, London, 1941.Google Scholar
Hansen, Z. K., and Libecap, G. D.. The Allocation of Property Rights to Land: U.S. Land Policy and Farm Failure in the Northern Great Plains. Explorations in Economic History 41, no. 2 (2004): 103-29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hirshleifer, J. The Dark Side of the Force: Economic Foundations of Conflict Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.Google Scholar
Janssen, M. A., Holahan, R., Lee, A., and Ostrom, E.. “Lab Experiments for the Study of Social-Ecological Systems.” Science 328, no. 5978 (2010): 613-17.Google Scholar
Johnsen, D. B. “Salmon, Science, and Reciprocity on the Northwest Coast.” Ecology and Society 14, no. 2 (2009): 43.Google Scholar
Johnson, R. N., and Libecap, G. D.. “Contracting Problems and Regulation: The Case of the Fishery. American Economic Review 72, no. 5 (1982):1005–22.Google Scholar
Libecap, G. D. “Property Rights in Economic History: Implications for Research.” Explorations in Economic History 23, no. 3 (1986): 227-52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Libecap, G. D. “The Assignment of Property Rights on the Western Frontier: Lessons for Contemporary Environmental and Resource Policy. The Journal of Economic History 67, no. 2 (2007): 257-90.Google Scholar
Libecap, G. D., and Johnson, R. N.. “Legislating Commons: The Navajo Tribal Council and the Navajo Range.” Economic Inquiry 18, no. 1 (1980): 69–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Libecap, G. D., and Smith, J. L.. “The Economic Evolution of Petroleum Property Rights in the United States. The Journal of Legal Studies 31, S2 (2002): S589–S608.Google Scholar
Libecap, G. D., and Wiggins, S. N.. “Contractual Responses to the Common Pool: Prorationing of Crude Oil Production. American Economic Review 74, no. 1 (1984): 87–98.Google Scholar
Lloyd, P. C. “Some Problems of Tenancy in Yoruba Land Tenure. African Studies 12, no. 3 (1953): 93–103.Google Scholar
Lynn, M. Commerce and Economic Change in West Africa: The Palm Oil Trade in the Nineteenth Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.Google Scholar
Martin, S. M. Palm Oil and Protest: An Economic History of the Ngwa Region, South-Eastern Nigeria, 1800-1980. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988.Google Scholar
Masclet, D., Noussair, C. Tucker, S., and Villeval, M.-C. “Monetary and Nonmonetary Punishment in the Voluntary Contributions Mechanism.” American Economic Review 93, no. 1 (2003): 366-80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McCloskey, D. “English Open Fields as Behavior Towards Risk.” Research in Economic History 1 (1976): 124-70.Google Scholar
Netting, R. M. “What Alpine Peasants Have in Common: Observations on Communal Tenure in a Swiss Village.” Human Ecology 4, no. 2 (1976): 135-46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Oriji, J. N. Ngwa History: A Study of Social and Economic Changes in Igbo Mini-States in Time Perspective. New York: P. Lang, 1991.Google Scholar
Oroge, E. A. The Institution of Slavery in Yorubaland with Particular Reference to the Nineteenth Century. Ph.D. thesis, The University of Birmingham, 1971.Google Scholar
Ostrom, E. Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.Google Scholar
Ostrom, E. “A Diagnostic Approach for Going Beyond Panaceas.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104, no. 39 (2007): 15181–187.Google Scholar
Ostrom, E. “A General Framework for Analyzing Sustainability of Social-Ecological Systems.” Science 325, no. 5939 (2009): 419-22.Google Scholar
Otite, O. “Rural Migrants as Catalysts in Rural Development: The Urhobo in Ondo State, Nigeria.” Africa: Journal of the International African Institute 49, no. 3 (1979): 226-34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Platteau, J.-P. “The Evolutionary Theory of Land Rights as Applied to Sub-Saharan Africa: A Critical Assessment.” Development and Change 27, no. 1 (1996): 29–86.Google Scholar
Poteete, A. R., Janssen, M., and Ostrom, E.. Working Together: Collective Action, the Commons, and Multiple Methods in Practice. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2010.Google Scholar
Runge, C. F. “Common Property and Collective Action in Economic Development.” World Development 14, no. 5 (1986): 623-35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, H. E. “Semicommon Property Rights and Scattering in the Open Fields.” The Journal of Legal Studies 29, no. 1 (2000): 131-69.Google Scholar
Uchendu, V. C. “The Igbo of Southeastern Nigeria.” Fort Worth, TX: Holt, Reinhart, and Winston, 1965.Google Scholar
Udo, R. K. “The Migrant Tenant Farmer of Eastern Nigeria.” Africa 34, no. 4 (1964): 326-39.Google Scholar
Usoro, E. J. The Nigerian Oil Palm Industry. Ibadan: Ibadan University Press, 1974.Google Scholar
Ward-Price, H. L. Land Tenure in the Yoruba Provinces. Lagos: Government Printer, 1939.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: PDF

Fenske Supplementary Material

Appendix

Download Fenske Supplementary Material(PDF)
PDF 82.7 KB