6 - Accumulation and Conspicuous Consumption: The Poverty of Entrepreneurship in Western Nigeria, ca. 1850–1930

Summary

The failure to develop a concept of business as an impersonal and long-term occupation helps to explain why, in spite of its many attributes, the African business community in Lagos was unable to produce a capitalist class capable of competing successfully with expatriate firms.

(Hopkins 1964, 444)

Introduction

The underdevelopment of West African entrepreneurship, epitomized by the near-total absence of an indigenous capitalist class, alluded to here by Professor A. G. Hopkins, has been examined within the framework of divergent explanations – cultural versus structural. In the same vein, Gareth Austin, pondering the “basic question … [of] the apparent rarity of transgenerational continuity of specific businesses in West Africa,” suggested any of three possibilities for further investigation: the institutional (cultural issues, such as inheritance practices); the general instability of economic life (the vicissitudes and risks associated with enterprises); and the changes wrought by colonial intervention. Against the background of the propositions by Hopkins and Austin, this chapter argues, first, that the cultural context was as important as the constraining structure of British colonialism in explaining the underdevelopment of indigenous entrepreneurship, and, second, that both dynamics should be taken together in any meaningful explanation. The importance of the cultural dynamic, highlighted in this chapter, is anchored on indigenous Yoruba conceptions of accumulation, wealth, and social status.

First, the Yoruba distinguished among the poor (akuse, olòsì, and tálíkà), the rich (olówó), the wealthy (olórò or olólà), and the honorable person (olólá). Second, they esteemed the wealthy, who had property and assets (olórò or olólà) above the possessor of mere cash (olówó). Third, as society also prioritized honor, a person who combined honor and wealth with generosity – the bòròkìní or gbajúmò – was the ideal entrepreneur (Falola 1984, 71). The profiles of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Yoruba entrepreneurs in Lagos and its hinterland show that, with few exceptions, the aspiring bòròkìní or gbajúmò eagerly sought to earn societal approval.