Originally published in 1966, this book brings together papers dealing with the emergence and development of elites in sub-Saharan Africa among social categories ranging from farmers and women market traders through foremen and merchants to administrators and managers in government and industry. The authors analyse distinctive social characteristics and attitudes and the development of class consciousness.

A profile of the lives of 60 eminent Black Africans who have reached the top of their professions and social hierarchy in South African society despite the political system. It argues that White fears of a Black government destroying the economy of South Africa are unfounded.

Studying elites through the framework of accountability

The contribution of Western education to the creation of an African-educated elite is well documented. What is not equally well documented is the fact that African-educated elites have used their education and the schools to perpetuate their dominance by denying the poor the knowledge necessary to protect their political and economic rights and to advance in society. On the other hand, educated elites in Africa make opportunities available to their own members through selective ordering, legitimization of certain language forms and learning processes in schools, and legitimization of elite codes and experiences to the exclusion of the histories, experiences, and worldviews of the poor. This book highlights the processes by which the poor in Africa have been disenfranchised and marginalized through schools' ascriptive mechanisms, and explains why African economic development is very slow.

Following independence, most countries in Africa sought to develop, but their governments pursued policies that actually undermined their rural economies. Examining the origins of Africa’s “growth tragedy,” Markets and States in Tropical Africa has for decades shaped the thinking of practitioners and scholars alike. Robert H. Bates’s analysis now faces a challenge, however: the revival of economic growth on the continent. In this edition, Bates provides a new preface and chapter that address the seeds of Africa’s recovery and discuss the significance of the continent’s success for the arguments of this classic work.