History of the Upper Guinea Coast: 1545–1800

by Walter Rodney

Walter Rodney is revered throughout the Caribbean as a teacher, a hero, and a martyr. This book remains the foremost work on the region.

Genres: Africa, History, Nonfiction, Western Africa

290 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1970

About the author

In his short life, the Guyanese intellectual Walter Rodney emerged as one of the leading thinkers and activists of the anticolonial revolution, leading movements in North America, the African continent, and the Caribbean. In each locale, Rodney found himself a lightning rod for working class Black Power. His deportation catalyzed twentieth-century Jamaica’s most significant rebellion, the 1968 Rodney riots, and his scholarship trained a generation how to think politics at an international scale. In 1980, shortly after founding of the Working People’s Alliance in Guyana, the 38-year-old Rodney was assassinated.

Reviews

[John le Boát · Rating 4 out of 5]

A History of the Upper Guinea Coast: 1545-1800 is a seminal piece that inspired a generation of historians to come.

It's un-surprising that it did this considering the amazing quality of book. Rodney is a fantastic writer who shows deep passion and conviction for this severely under-researched region which he explores in amazing depth. Rodney effortlessly challenges assumptions of nationhood, colonialism and race in this piece that serves to give a newer and fairer explanation of the Upper Guinea Coast.

One technique of Rodney's writing that truly gripped me was his ability to holistically explore the themes of his chapters. What I mean by this is that Rodney begins each chapter jumping between concepts and features of the upper Guinea coast in a way that seems unorganised and messy. This is all subverted as each chapter progresses and he is able to somehow tie these sprawling ideas together into a cohesive and digestible argument to better educate the reader on the History of the Upper Guinea Coast.

This and many other of Rodney's writing techniques contribute to the easy nature of reading Rodney. As someone who had very little knowledge of the region before reading this piece - and also not being a particularly confident reader myself - I found comfort in Rodney's writing. He assumes the reader doesn't know anything and as a result teaches them everything.

For being such a politically active and opinionated man, he doesn't allow his views to cloud his history as many other radical writers of the time have. This is not to say his views aren't present, and I don't think even Rodney himself would suggest he's impartial, in fact the very founding belief of the text is anti-nation and presumably related to his pan-Africanist beliefs. Overall, I found Rodney to be a factual teacher who sought to educate people on the area he showed so much passion for, a task he exceeds in, in my view.

I would definitely recommend Rodney's work to somebody looking to learn about this region and broader African history. Although it can be dense at times and despite Rodney's best efforts, some areas of dense conceptual explanation can be difficult to understand as a new reader. However when exploring such a broad period of such a culturally rich area this is to be expected. This should by no means dissuade people from reading his work, take your time and Rodney's work will permeate through.

3.7/5

[JRT · Rating 5 out of 5]

The great Walter Rodney details the history of this West African region prior to the advent of Euro-colonial boundaries. He notes that this particular region was geographically and ethnically unified (despite various tribal differentiations), consisting of both cultural and linguistic unity among all peoples of this region. Rodney explores the sociopolitical structure of these littoral and interior societies, noting that contrary to popular belief, the majority of the societies in this region were “states” insofar as they had traditional Kingships and chiefs ruling over the people and controlling the land. One of the more fascinating aspects of Rodney’s historical account of this region was his identification of class distinctions in the various states / societies of West Africa. Rodney also identified the existence of “private” property—owned by the Kings, chiefs, and nobility. Rodney notes that contrary to popular belief, common property was rare in these West African states, and as such, inequality did indeed persist. Nevertheless, Rodney does make clear that the economics of the region was noticeable different than that of Europe. Africans generally did not take more than they needed and were not driven by profit. That positively impacted how they dealt with one another, but also opened them up to exploitation by the avaricious Europeans.

The heart of this book is Rodney’s analysis and depictions of the Upper Guinea Coast’s earliest contacts with Europe. He notes that Portugal wasn’t initially looking to directly colonize the Upper Guinea Coast, but ultimately did so for purposes of better facilitating their monopoly on West African trade from the islands off the coast. Rodney makes clear that the Portuguese dealt with African kings and chiefs, not the common peoples. This allowed them to gain comfort, protection, and access to goods—including and especially, slaves. The Portuguese-Guinea Coast relationship started with hospitality and a “guest / stranger” dynamic. Europeans were expected to act as guests, which meant paying homage to chiefs, bearing gifts, and obeying African customs. The relationship deteriorated when Europeans started resisting aspects of African customs that they found objectionable (mostly having to do with property rights). Nevertheless, the relationship persisted over the centuries due to Portugal's unceasing need for slaves, and the African nobility’s naked dependency on various European goods.

Walter Rodney excels in dispelling myths, particularly about how the Atlantic slave trade began and operated. First, Rodney demonstrates that it did not begin with Africans volunteering themselves up due to poor socioeconomic conditions brought on by famine. Nor was it a product of European domination, as the Portuguese lacked the will and capacity to overwhelm African forces. Further, the Atlantic trade was not a product of a pre-existing intra-African trade, nor was it propelled by Muslim or Mulattoe traders (both of which were extremely active traders during this time period). Rather, the slave trade was propelled by the opportunistic Portuguese crown and settlers (and later other European competitors), all of whom took advantage of ethnic wars and leveraged African dependency on European goods. The Atlantic trade was expanded by wars, which ultimately became pretexts for the trade. The trade also imposed European standards of crime and punishment, leading to the smallest infractions (and sometimes fraudulent accusations) culminating in enslavement. Further, indebtedness was a major justification for the ensnaring of African slaves. Importantly, as Rodney notes, European presence and imperatives were the main factors for the explosion of enslavement.

One of the most difficult parts of the book to read was African complicity in the Atlantic slave trade. Rodney identifies the Bijago, Mandinka, Beafadas, Casangas, Susus, Mane, etc., as all being directly involved in supplying African slaves to Portugal. He notes that while the Djolas and Balantas resisted, and some tribes were more predatory than others (the tribes with the least developed state structures were the least likely to collaborate with Europe in the trade), almost all tribes / ethnic groups were implicated. However, Rodney makes clear that the trade was less about tribal divisions (because chiefs often sold out their own subjects) and more about class division. In short, the masses of Africans were victims by the collaboration of the West African elite with Europe. The African nobility literally sold-out the African masses. Rodney painstakingly details how Europeans essentially established a system of neo-colonialism (indirect control via economic dependency) BEFORE they ever directly colonized Africa. African rulers became utterly dependent on European goods, including and especially horses, guns, alcohol, cloths, iron and other metals, and were willing to engage in wars of conquest in order to acquire slaves just to secure these products from Europe.

Rodney ultimately details the consequences of the Atlantic slave trade, Continuous intra-African wars, the inability of the African ruling class to maintain societal order and their complete abandonment and exploitation of the African masses, and the establishment of European-esque models of crime, punishment, and domestic servitude. African society had been transformed to revolve around the production and reproduction of slave labor for Europeans. Put simply, under the influence of the European-directed slave trade, Africans destroyed each other. This is a tough, but necessary history to grapple with. Especially for African people.

[Feargal McGovern · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started reading this book whilst I was in on holiday in Senegal. Afterall, what better book to read, than a book about the poltical economic history of the region - Senegal (in particular the cape vert peninsula, Dakar) to the west of the Ivory Coast.

I found the first half of the book a bit hard to follow as he was describing the history of (proto)national movements, conflicts etc, that owing to our eurocentric conception of history, we know little about - of course making Rodney's work an important correction.

None the less the book is great, and I found the idea of the lead up to the colonisation of Africa by Europeans as being essentially a struggle between the desire for 'free trade' by the africans (to sell to the highest bidder and buy commodities from the most competitive seller) vs monopoly (various european powers wanting to exclude others from the market), to be very compelling.

Another important nuance is on the subject of Africans themselves participating in the slave trade. Right wing apologists for slavery often like to invoke the fact that it was Africans doing the selling, as a means to claim that Euoprean slavers were no worse than them, and further, that the african slave market existed long before Europeans arrived.
While this is true, the first response to these claim, is that the nature of slavery before europeans was much less brutal, in the sense that a person taken as a slave by one tribe typically after some years became integrated as a member of that tribe,
secondly that it didnt nessecarily mean being restricted to the hardest most physically labourious work (a slave could be employed in any occupation from farming, to artisanal crafts, teaching, accounting or civil service).
thirdly slavery was relatively limited before european contact, it was the demands of europeans and integration in the developing capitalist market that intensified the rate of ensalvery of africans by africans.
fourthy, that what ever the conditions and history of african slavery pre european involvement, Euoprean slavery led to a massive depopulation of the african continent, with africa still suffering from the social and economic consequences of underpopulation to this day.
And finally a fifth element, though it is more a response to liberals who try to obscure the question of class (all whites equal bad, all blacks equal victims) is that not all blacks suffered (nor participated) equally). Enslavery was a weapon used by the ruling class against their own population, as a means to recuperate debts, steal property, expulse contenders to rulership, and simply to make money (for example framing people of particular crimes, the punishment, being sold to slavery). Even when other kingdoms waged war against each other for the purpose of taking slaves to be sold to the european slave market, there were agreements between kingdoms and europeans to not buy or sell nobles. Though from time to times nobles were sold to slavery, it was a rareity, with african slavery being every much a crime carried out by the african nobility against the masses.
Rodney further emphasises this by pointing out that the owerwhelming trend of the more 'socially developed' african societies with clearly defined class structures were the most active participants in the slave trade, while those that continued to maintain more communal 'stateless' existence being the most opposed and less engaged (the Djola in south west Senegal for example, who are cited as one of the few tribes continued to grow throughout the period of slavery).

Beyond this as well Rodney also talks a great deal about the economic and commercial hisotry , the different products produced trade and culutral links that connected the region, which I found also incredibly illuminating.
Overall really great book, and I feel I have a much richer understanding of the political economic history of the upper guinea coast.

[Luís Garcia · Rating 5 out of 5]

(lido em Pequim, China)

[stephen · Rating 5 out of 5]

it was the time of tape ripping and collapsing at the end of a conference. i did not know and had not thought about the fact that i did not know that the monthly review press was still around. but there they were, sort of, as a small quadrant of books within the nyu press display.

the time of ripping tape is the time of very cheap books. while handing over the small amount i paid, i confirmed that monthly review still exists.
"still extant?" yes "smaller than ever?" 4 people. "snippy i expect" yes.