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HEHC 2024

The Economic History of Colonialism

LSE EH
Wageningen

13, 14 December 2024, Vera Anstey Suite, Old Building, LSE

Contributors to the Handbook of the Economic History of Colonialism (Routledge 2025) will join this workshop. The Handbook focuses on two major waves of European overseas colonialism: Americas (1490s-1820s) and Asia/Africa (1850s-1970s). These waves were global, modernising and world-shaping. Research on economic changes that followed has evolved from broad generalisations to nuanced studies emphasising local factors and diversity. Key themes include institutional change, integration, environmental impact, extraction/development dynamics, regional specificities, inequality, and living standards.

The workshop will reflect this shift and showcase new scholarship in the field.

Organisers: Ewout Frankema, Wageningen and Tirthankar Roy, LSE

The handbook will contain chapters on the Caribbean (Trevor Burnard), British West Africa (Gareth Austin), colonialism and the environment (Corey Ross), colonialism and law (Tirthankar Roy), technology and science (Ewout Frankema & Tirthankar Roy) and colonialism and the Industrial Revolution (Giorgio Riello) which are not presented at the conference.

The conference organizers are grateful for financial support from the Dutch Research Council (NWO) to the project "South-South Divergence: Comparative Histories of Regional Integration in Southeast Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa since 1850" (NWO VICI grant no. VI.C.201.062), and from the LSE Economic History Department.