Western Africa
Western Africa
In Western Africa, practices of clientage were applied to incorporate merchants for as long as they accepted the terms of trade and residence. The establishment of imperial enclaves modified this dependency. Governors and consuls worked for a wider sphere of influence through African allies, treaty states, and stipending chiefs. Reversal of status from the 1870s followed from greater reliance on treaty jurisdiction and use of force against the Asante, some Yoruba states and the Hausa–Fulani emirates. But officials had to come to terms with the chiefdoms and hierarchies they found to meet the obligations of protectorate administration. Chiefs were utilized for judicial and financial purposes as official clients. In each of the colonial states the pattern of over-rule was conditioned by local political structures. Administrative histories provide contrasting examples of the decline of chieftaincy or its empowerment, in the face of elite competition in local government and in state politics during decolonization.
Keywords: clientage, reversal of status, Asante, Yoruba states, Hausa–Fulani emirates, elite competition, decolonization
Oxford Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us .
