long-term effects of Africa's slave trades
By: Nathan Nunn.
Contributors: National Bureau of Economic Research.
Series: NBER working paper series -- no. 13367.; Working paper series (National Bureau of Economic Research) -- working paper no. 13367.
Publisher: National Bureau of Economic Research
Published: 2007
Place of publication: Cambridge, Mass
Language: eng
Number of pages: 39
Subjects: Slave trade -- Economic aspects -- Africa; Economic development -- Econometric models; Africa -- History -- Economic aspects
Description: Can part of Africa's current underdevelopment be explained by its slave trades? To explore this question, I use data from shipping records and historical documents reporting slave ethnicities to construct estimates of the number of slaves exported from each country during Africa's slave trades. I find a robust negative relationship between the number of slaves exported from a country and current economic performance. To better understand if the relationship is causal, I examine the historical evidence on selection into the slave trades, and use instrumental variables. Together the evidence suggests that the slave trades have had an adverse effect on economic development.
Notes: "September 2007"

Includes bibliographical references (p. 35-39).

Also available in PDF from the NBER world wide web site (www.nber.org).