Gareth Austin
Title and contact details
 Reader in Economic History
Room C314
Tel: +44 (0)20 7955 7068
Fax: +44 (0)20 7955 7730
g.m.austin@lse.ac.uk
Office hours:Tuesday 4.30pm-5.30pm (EH413 surgery only)/Thursday 2.40-4.30pm
Research Interests
- Core interest: modern economic history of Sub-Saharan Africa, especially West Africa from c.1800 to the present, including contemporary development issues in historical perspective.
- Primary research: economic history of southern Ghana, especially Asante, particularly cocoa farming, rural capitalism, agrarian institutions and indigenous entrepreneurship.
- Comparative economic history of Africa, Asia and Latin America.
- Global economic history, especially economic development, culture and economic behaviour, empires, slavery.
Current Research
-
Book on 'Markets, Slaves and States in West Africa'.
-
With Kaoru Sugihara (Kyoto), co-edited volume on Labour-Intensive Industrialization in Global History.
Main long-term project: a revisionist book on African economic development in historical perspective. (first fruits were 3 journal articles published since December 2007).
Current Teaching
- EH315 Africa and the World Economy (full unit course)
- EH401 Historical Analysis of Economic Change (Michaelmas Term; with Dr Debin Ma)
- EH413 African Economic Development in Historical Perspective (Michaelmas Term)
School and Administrative Role:
Main External Responsibility
President, European Network in Universal and Global History (ENIUGH)
Selected publication
'Labour, Land and Capital in Ghana: From Slavery to Free Labour in Asante, 1807-1956 (University of Rochester Press: Rochester, NY, January 2005). 616 pages including prelims. ISBN 1-58046-161-1. A paperback edition was published in January 2009, by University of Rochester Press in the USA and Boydell and Brewer in UK. http://www.boydell.co.uk/80463150.htm
Some recent papers which may be downloaded
(if you use them, please acknowledge; feedback welcome at g.m.austin@lse.ac.uk):
‘The "Reversal of fortune" thesis and the compression of history: perspectives from African and comparative economic history’, Journal of International Development 20: 8, pp.996-1027. ‘Resources, Techniques and Strategies South of the Sahara: Revising the Factor Endowments Perspective on African Economic Development, 1500-2000’ Economic History Review, volume 61, no.3, August 2008, pp.587-624. This is a pre-publication version. Please cite published version, available at http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1468-0289.2007.00409.x ‘Reciprocal Comparison and African History: Tackling Conceptual Eurocentrism in the Study of Africa’s Economic Past’ African Studies Review 50:3 (Dec. 2007), 1-28 Co-authored with Professor Chibuike Uche, (University of Nigeria, Enugu), ‘Collusion and Competition in Colonial Economies: Banking in British West Africa, 1916-1960’, Business History Review 81 (Spring 2007), 1-26. ‘Labour and Land in Ghana, 1874-1939: A Shifting Ratio and an Institutional Revolution’, Australian Economic History Review, 47:1, pp.95-120. DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8446.2006.00198.x. Please cite the published version. See the journal issue at http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/118480605/issue - 'Global History and Economic Teaching: a view of the L.S.E. Experience in Research and Graduate Teaching', in Patrick Manning (ed.) Global Practice in World History: Advances Worldwide (Princeton: Markus Weiner, 2008), pp.99-111. Here is a pre-publication version.
Links to scholarly networks in which I am involved
Links to journals or book series on whose editorial boards I participate
CV
CV and list of Publications (PDF) ^
|
