Lesson 4: Legitimate Trade and White Settlement in South Africa
Video Lesson
Learning Competencies: After learning this lesson, you will be able to:
- understand the nature of African and European relationships after the abolishen of the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade;
- realize the nature of the legitimate trade.
- identify the circumstances under which the Whites settled in South Africa;
- analyse the causes of conflicts in South Africa.
Brainstorming Questions
- Why did the Europeans shift from the Trans-Atlantic Slave trade to the legitimate
trade? - What do you think was the primary motive of the Whites in settling in South Africa?
Key terms and concepts
- Legitimate Trade
- Great Trek
The “Legitimate Trade” refers to the economic activities in West Africa that replaced the slave trade in the 19th century. It involved the export of goods such as gum Arabic, groundnuts, and palm oil, which were used in European industries. Despite its name, this trade largely benefited a small elite and did not significantly improve the overall economic conditions of the African population. European interference and control over trade routes continued to inhibit the development of African economies.
The Great Trek was a migration of Dutch-speaking settlers (Boers) from the Cape Colony into the interior of South Africa during the 1830s and 1840s. This movement was driven by discontent with British rule and aimed to establish new Boer republics such as Natal, Transvaal, and the Orange Free State. The Trek led to increased conflicts with indigenous groups like the Zulu and Xhosa and played a key role in shaping the colonial and racial dynamics in South Africa.
The Legitimate Trade
As Europeans gradually outlawed the slave trade, they found West Africa as a fertile ground for what they referred to as the “Legitimate Trade”. During the first half of the 19th century, a range of West African commodities replaced the export of slaves. Production was organized by West African rulers and merchants, who often made use of internal slave labour for cashcrop plantations and for transport. Exports included gum Arabic from Senegal. Gum Arabic was used in the European textile industries for fixing coloured dyes in printed cloth. Other exports were groundnuts from Guinea and palm oil from most of the coastal forest zones.By the middle of the 19th century, palm oil had become West Africa`s major overseas export. It was the main source of lubricant for Europe’s industrial machinery before the development of Petroleum oil.
Nevertheless, the establishment of “legitimate trade” did not allow African states to develop their own economic strength and independence. In the first place, those who benefited from the trade were a small minority of wealthy rulers and merchants. There was little improvement in the social and economic well-being of the bulk of the population. Secondly, the principal imports from Europe (cloth, alcohol and fire arms) did nothing to strengthen indigenous African economies. As the century progressed, European traders, backed up by their governments, made increasing efforts to control West Africa`s internal trade. They sought to maximize their profits by cutting out both the African middle men and their European competitors. It was this heightened level of European trading competition which, in part, led to the ‘Scramble for Africa’ in the 1870s and 1880s.
The White Settlement in South Africa
The Dutch East India Company established a settlement at the Cape of Good Hope in 1652 to support passing European ships by providing fresh produce and a hospital, while also protecting itself with a military fortress against both rival European forces and the indigenous Khoisan people.
In 1657, the Dutch East India Company encouraged soldiers to become permanent farmers, known as Boers, and initially used West African slaves for labor. The Boers’ settlement on Khoisan lands and their cattle raids sparked the first Khoi-Dutch war in 1659, which, due to Khoisan disunity, led to their defeat and the company’s claim over Khoisan lands.
The second Khoisan-Dutch war (1673-77) resulted in significant losses for the Khoisan due to their less organized resistance, leading to large gains in cattle and sheep for the Dutch and rapid Boer settlement expansion. By 1700, the white population in the Cape reached a thousand, with the colony self-sufficient in wheat and fruit and exporting surpluses. Thousands of slaves from Madagascar, Mozambique, and Indonesia worked on Boer farms, leading to a slave population of 25,000 by the end of the 18th century, compared to a white population of 21,000.
Meanwhile, in the early decades of the 18th century, the survival of the Khoisan was threatened more by the emergence of pastoral trek Boers, who paved the way for white settlement deep in the interior. At the same time, the Khoisan perished in thousands as a result of the spread of smallpox epidemics introduced to the Cape by European sailors.
From 1700 to 1760, Boer expansion into Zulu lands led to ongoing wars with the Xhosa starting in 1779. The British took control of the Cape colony in 1795, but discontented Boers migrated north during the 1830s and 1840s in the “Great Trek,” establishing the colonies of Cape, Natal, Transvaal, and Orange Free State. Both the Zulus and the Boers clashed with the British. The discovery of minerals in the 1860s spurred a surge in white settlers, and by the end of the 19th century, Britain had gained control of all four Boer colonies.
The situation in South Africa has become much more extreme. Superior forces had enabled the settlers to occupy much of the better agricultural land. The much more numerous indigenous Bantu and Khoisan speaking inhabitants have been pushed into less favorable or less accessible lands. In time, they served as a reservoir of cheap labor for the settling economy.