Land distribution and inequality in a black settler colony: the case of Sierra Leone, 1792–1831†

Land distribution is considered to be one of the main contributors to inequality in pre‐industrial societies. This article contributes to the debate on the origins of economic inequality in pre‐industrial African societies by studying land inequality at a particularly early stage of African economic history. The research examines land distribution and inequality in land ownership among settlers in the Colony of Sierra Leone for three benchmark years over the first 40 years of its existence. The findings show that land inequality was low at the founding of the Colony but increased substantially over time. We suggest that this increase was enabled by a shift in the type of egalitarianism pursued by the colonial authorities, which was reflected in a change in the redistributive policy applied, which allowed later settlers to appropriate land more freely than had been previously possible.     

African agricultural productivity and the transatlantic slave trade: evidence from Senegambia in the nineteenth century

Agriculture has played a central role in Africa's long‐term economic development. Previous research has argued that the low productivity of African economies has posed significant challenges to African efforts to produce an agricultural surplus or to develop commercial agriculture. Low agricultural productivity has also served as a key explanation for the transatlantic slave trade, on the basis that it was more profitable to export humans overseas than to grow and export produce. However, the field has suffered from a lack of comparable empirical evidence. This article contributes to this field by presenting quantitative data on historical land and labour productivity in Africa, from a case study of the agricultural productivity of Senegambia in the early nineteenth century. Focusing on five key crops, our results suggest that both land and labour productivity was lower in Senegambia than it was in all other parts of the world for which we have found comparable data. This article thus lends support to claims that stress ecological factors as one of the main determinants of Africa's historical development.     

Designing <Emphasis Type="Italic">interaction</Emphasis>: How do interaction design students address interaction?

Interaction design is usually described as being concerned with interactions with and through artifacts but independent of a specific implementation. Design work has been characterized as a conversation between the designer and the situation and this conversation poses a particular challenge for interaction design as interactions can be elusive and difficult to describe. Moreover, current trends in interaction design introduce physical materials to a higher degree resulting in even more complex design situations. There is a lack of knowledge about how interaction designers, and especially students, address the very phenomenon of interaction. This study contributes by describing how interaction design students attempt to address aspects of interaction and by presenting an in-depth analysis in the context of an interactionary-type design exercise. The quantitative and qualitative findings showed that (1) the design students brought up aspects of interactivity and dynamics through talk and gestures but (2) a comprehensive design idea about interaction did not guide the design work and they were to a little degree engaged in planning sequences of interactions or interaction on a longer time scale, (3) using physical materials disrupted interaction design, and, (4) there was a lack of continuity when addressing interaction compared to how proposals about artifacts were pursued. As interaction is the core of interaction design, the findings are discussed in terms of how the immaterial design materials may “talk back” to designers. Practical strategies for how the observed phenomena could be constructively addressed within interaction design education are suggested.     

Transaction costs of early modern multinational enterprise: measuring the transatlantic information lag of the British Royal African Company and its successor, 1680–1818

There is extensive previous research on the early modern chartered multinational corporations, their development and how they dealt with the various challenges they faced. This article attempts to contribute to this field of research by estimating quantitatively the information lag in early modern multinational enterprise, studying the case of the British Royal African Company and its successor the Company of Merchants Trading to Africa. The results show that the transatlantic information lag decreased somewhat during the second half of the eighteenth century. The decrease was however quite modest, and far less striking than has been claimed in some previous research. During the period, this information lag therefore still posed a major constraint on the development of multinational enterprise.     

Copper sheathing and the British slave trade

British slave traders were early and rapid adopters of the new technique of sheathing ships' hulls with copper. From the 1780s this innovation increased sailing speeds of British slave ships by about a sixth, prolonged the ships' lives by at least a half, and reduced the death rates of slaves on the middle passage by about half. It was, above all, the fall in death rates, and possibly the improved condition of surviving slaves, that made the investment so compelling. Copper sheathing may have paid for itself in a single voyage, even though it was usually good for several. By the 1790s few slave ships, even if making only a single voyage, were uncoppered. These results confirm that copper sheathing was one of the major improvements in shipping productivity before the use of iron and steam in the mid‐nineteenth century.     

INFLATION AND SWITCHES BETWEEN SPECIE AND PAPER STANDARDS IN SWEDEN 1668 - 1931: A PUBLIC FINANCE INTERPRETATION

In this study, the recent literature on the integration of fiscal and monetary policy is used to examine the suspensions and resumptions of currency convertibility in Sweden during the period 1668–1931. We demonstrate that urgent demands for financing of war expenditures forced the Swedish Riksbank to abandon convertibility of its notes in all cases of suspensions prior to 1914. We argue that the suspension periods should be regarded as unexpected lapses into discretion from rule-bound convertibility regimes rather than as part of an optimal ex ante public finance policy. All resumptions of convertibility, except for the resumption of 1924, implied an ex post formal devaluation. All suspensions were illegal, except in 1931 when a constitutional escape clause was invoked.     

Black Box Engineering: Redefining the Role of Product Specifications

Original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) in numerous industries recognize the benefits of involving their suppliers in the product design process. Specifications play a central role in guiding that supplier-OEM relationship. For so-called “black-box” parts, the OEM specifies overall requirements for product function and performance, cost targets, and development lead time, and then communicates this information to suppliers, who perform detailed engineering and testing. Black-box engineering marks a fundamental change in the buyer-supplier relationship, and companies that use or plan to adopt this practice must understand the factors that contribute to its successful implementation. Using survey responses from more than 300 suppliers to a European automobile OEM, Christer Karlsson, Rajesh Nellore, and Klas Soderquist identify the problems those suppliers face in the specification process. To provide insight into the context and the causes of those problems, they also describe the results of case studies conducted in the OEM and two suppliers. In this way, they attempt to identify critical factors that can help to improve the specifications process both internally at an OEM and between the OEM and its suppliers. The respondents identified numerous problems that they face in the specifications process. Based on feedback from product development managers and design staff members in the case study companies, those problems are categorized as follows: technical content and the level of detail in requirements, changes of specifications, cost, interpretation and understanding, and supplier participation in the specification process. Black-box engineering redefines the role of specifications. Instead of a fixed document that dictates to the supplier, the specification becomes an open medium for communicating functional and performance requirements and necessary technical adjustments. In other words, black-box products require a highly interactive design process. Product development managers for suppliers and OEMs must understand that they cannot avoid changes in specifications during black-box engineering projects. Rather than view such changes as wastes of time and effort, they should approach the black-box engineering process as a learning opportunity. By working with several parallel sets of functional solutions, which they can validate with the customer before developing detailed dimensional definitions, suppliers can limit the amount of time they lose as a result of changes in specifications.