Colonial rule in Africa — economy and society
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Flip to reveal answersWhat was the 'White Highlands' in colonial Kenya?
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Question
What was the 'White Highlands' in colonial Kenya?
Answer
Fertile highland land reserved by law (1915 Crown Lands Ordinance) exclusively for European settler farming.
Question
What was the kipande system?
Answer
From 1920, every African man had to carry an identity pass recording his employer, making it easier for the state to control African labour.
Question
Why did hut and poll taxes push Africans into wage labour?
Answer
Africans needed cash to pay these taxes, and wage labour on settler farms was often the only way to earn it.
Question
When and why was the Uganda Railway built?
Answer
Built 1896-1901 from Mombasa to Lake Victoria, originally to move troops/goods for Uganda — it later opened the highlands to settler cash-crop export.
Question
What crop were African farmers banned from growing until the 1950s (the Swynnerton Plan of 1954), and why does this matter?
Answer
Coffee — the most profitable export crop; the ban protected settler profits and shows race-based economic policy.
Question
What is a 'squatter' in the colonial Kenyan context?
Answer
An African allowed to live on a settler's farm in exchange for labour, with shrinking land rights over time.
Question
Compare mission churches and Africanist (independent) churches.
Answer
Mission churches: European-led, often banned local customs, taught obedience to colonial rule. Africanist churches: African-led, blended Christianity with local custom, often linked to land/political grievances.
Question
What triggered the rise of Kikuyu independent churches like Watu wa Mungu?
Answer
Mission churches banning practices such as female circumcision in the late 1920s caused breakaways into African-led churches.
Question
How did migration to towns affect traditional Kenyan social structures?
Answer
It weakened elders' authority over land and marriage, scattered extended families, and created new urban communities shaped by wage labour.
Question
Did colonial rule create Kenyan ethnic identities from nothing?
Answer
No — identities like Kikuyu and Luo existed before 1895; the debate is whether colonial administration hardened and politicised them by classifying people by 'tribe'.
Question
Name three roles played by different groups in Kenya's colonial economy.
Answer
European settlers owned large farms; African squatters/labourers supplied farm labour; the Asian community ran much retail trade and skilled railway work.
Question
What is the strongest argument that Kenya's colonial economy was 'deliberately exploitative'?
Answer
Land, tax and pass laws were designed by and for the settler state, and the coffee ban shows explicit race-based economic policy.
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Full study notes for Colonial rule in Africa — economy and society
Topic 10.8 hub
Colonialism in Côte d'Ivoire, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Senegal and Uganda (1890–1980)
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