West African studies

by Mary Henrietta Kingsley

Wherein the student, having said divers harsh things of those who destroy but do not reconstruct, recognises that, having attempted destruction, it is but seemly to set forth some other way whereby the West African colonies could be managed.

West Africa, I own, is a make of country difficult for a power with a different kind of culture, climate and set of institutions, and so on, to manage from Europe satisfactorily. But, as things go, I venture to think it presents no especial difficulty; that all the difficulties that exist in this matter are difficulties arising from misunderstandings,—things removable, not things of essence, barring only fever.

Also I feel convinced that no one of our English governmental methods at present existing is suitable for its administration. It is no use saying, Look at our Indian system, why not just introduce that into West Africa? I have the greatest admiration for our Indian system; it is the right thing in the right place, thanks to its having healthily grown up, fostered by experts, military and civil. Nevertheless it would not do for West Africa to-day. What we want there is the sowing of a similar system, not the transplanting of the Indian in its perfect form, for that is to-day for West Africa infinitely too expensive. If a man before his fortune is made spends a fortune, he ends badly; if he measures his expenditure with his income and develops his opportunities, he ends as a millionaire; and we must never forget that great dictum that the State is the perfection of the individual man, and should mould our politics accordingly.

I hold it to be a sound and healthy idea of ours that our possessions over-sea should pay their own way, and I therefore distrust the cucumber-frame form of financial politics that at present holds the field in West African affairs. It has been the pride and boast of the West African colonies that they have paid their way; let it remain so. It seems to me unsound that our colonies there should receive loans wherewith to carry on; for, for one thing, it makes them carry on more than is good for them, and merely means a piling up of debt; and, for another, it gives West Africa the notion that it is England’s business to support her, which to my mind it distinctly is not; for if we wanted a lapdog set of colonies we could get healthier ones elsewhere. Moreover, it pauperises instead of fostering the proper pride, without which nothing can flourish.

Apart from our Indian system, we have, for governing those regions where our race cannot locally produce a sufficient population of its own to take the reins of government out of the hands of officialdom in England, only two other systems, namely, the Chartered Company and the Crown Colony. I beg to urge that it is high time we had a third system. Concerning the Crown Colony system for Africa, I have spoken as tolerantly as I believe it is possible for any one acquainted with its working in West Africa to speak. If I were to say any more I might say something uncivil, which, of course, I do not wish to do. Concerning the Chartered Company system, I need only remark that there are two distinct breeds of Chartered Companies—the one whose attention is turned to the trade, the other whose attention is turned to the lands over which its charter gives it dominion. The first kind is represented in Africa by the Royal Niger Company, the second by the South African.

The second form of Chartered Company, that interested in land, we have not in West Africa under the name of a Company; but the present Crown Colony system represents it, and I feel certain that whatever good the South African Company may have done for the empire in South Africa, it has done an immense amount of harm in Western Africa. For some, to me unknown, reason the South African Company has found favour in the sight of officialdom in London; and, fascinated by its success in South Africa, yet recognising its drawbacks, officialdom has attempted to introduce what they regard as best in the South African system into West Africa. I do not think any student can avoid coming to the conclusion that the policy which is now driving the Crown Colonies in West Africa is one and the same with that of Mr. Rhodes. I do not mean that Mr. Rhodes, had he had the handling of West Africa, would himself have used this form of policy. He formulated it for South Africa; but, with his careful study of such things as local needs, he would have formulated another form for West Africa, which is a totally different region.

To take only two of the differences, and state them brutally. First, in West Africa the most valuable asset you have is the native: the more heavily the district there is populated with Africans, and the more prosperous those natives are, the better for you; for it means more trade. All the gold, ivory, oil, rubber, and timber in West Africa are useless to you without the African to work them; you can get no other race that can replace him, and work them; the thing has now been tried, and it has failed. Whereas in South Africa the converse is true: you can do without the African there, you can replace him with pretty nearly any other kind of man you like, or do the work yourself. The second difference is, that the land in South Africa is worth your having, you can go and domesticate on it; whereas in West Africa you cannot. A failure to recognise these differences is at the root of our present ill-judged West African policy, outside the Royal Niger Company’s domain; by introducing South African methods we are trying to get what is of no use to us, the Landes Hoheit, and thereby devastating what is of use to us, the trade.

However, I will not detain you over this interesting question of Chartered Company government. I merely wish to draw your attention to the two breeds, the Land Company, and the Trade Company; and to urge that they are things to be applied in their respective proper environments. I can honestly assure you, I know every blessed, single, mortal thing that can be said against the trade form which I admire, for I have lived under a hail of this sort of information since I was discovered by my big juju, Liverpool, to be such an admirer of what I called a co-ordinate system of government and trade, and Liverpool called divers things.

I shall go to my grave believing that Liverpool had reasons for attacking the Company, but neglected fundamental facts in its controversy with the Trade Company, which, to it, was “a little more than kith, and less than kind.” The Royal Niger Company has demonstrated its adaptation to its environment. Without any forced labour, without any direct taxation, it has paid. I venture to think, though I have no doubt it would severely hurt the feelings of the R.N.C., that we may regard the Royal Niger Company as representing the perfected system of native government in West Africa plus English courage and activity. I believe that on this foundation has been built its success. For say what you like, if the Royal Niger had not got on well with the natives in its territories—dealt cleanly, honestly, rationally with them—it would never have extended its influence in the grand way it has, represented only by a mere handful of white men, in what is, as far as we know, the most densely populated region with the highest and most organised form of native power in all tropical Africa. Had it not been to the natives it ruled a just, honourable, and desirable form of government, it would long ago have been stamped out by them, or would have been compelled to call in England’s armed support to maintain it, as the Crown Colony system has been compelled to do in Sierra Leone and on the Gold Coast. It has not had to call in Imperial assistance, and it has paid its shareholders—a sound, healthy conduct; but, nevertheless, remember that all the great debt of gratitude you and every one of the English owe the Royal Niger Company for defending the honour of England against Continental enterprise, for maintaining the honour of England in the eyes of the native races with whom it had made treaties, you do not owe to the Chartered Company system, but to Sir George Goldie, the man who had to use it because it was the best existing system available for such a region. You have too much sense to give all the honour to Lord Kitchener of Khartoum’s sword, though a sword is an excellent thing. I trust, therefore, you have too much sense to give all honour to the Chartered Company, even when it is a trading company. Trade is an excellent thing, but, in the case of the Royal Niger, this very factor, trade, restricts the man who uses the Chartered Company to a set of white men and a set of black. Therefore, never can I feel that either Liverpool or the Brass men have profited by the R.N.C. as they would have done if there had been a better system available for dealing with what Mr. St. Loe Strachey delicately calls “a dark-skinned population” with an insufficient local white population at hand. Briefly, I should say that the Chartered Company system keeps its “ain fish-guts for its ain sea-maws” too much. Therefore now, when, like many before me who have laboured strenuously to reform, I have given up the idea that reformation is possible for the individual on whom they have expended their powers, and have decided that there are some people whom you can only reform with a gun, I will start reforming myself, and say the Chartered Company system is not good enough, taken all round as things are, for West Africa for these reasons.

First, a Chartered Company consists of a band of merchants, ruling through, and by, a great man. If that great man who expands the influence and power of the Company lives long enough to establish a form of policy, well and good. I have sufficient trust in the common sense of a band of English merchants, provided their interest is common, to believe they will adhere to the policy; but suppose he does not, or suppose you do not start with a good man, you will merely have a mess, as has been demonstrated by the perpetual failures of our French friends’ Chartered Companies. By the way, I may remark that although France is no great admirer of the chartered system with us, she is devoted to it for herself, sprinkling all her West African possessions with them freely, only unfortunately, as their names are usually far longer than their banking accounts, they do not grow conspicuous; even apart from these private and subsidised Chartered Companies in French possessions, France follows the chartered system imperially in West Africa by keeping out non-French trade with differential tariffs, and so on. But, after all, in this matter she is no worse than English critics of the Royal Niger; and it is a common trait of all West African palavers that those who criticise are amply well provided themselves with the very faults they find so repulsive in others—it’s the climate.