Colonial Missionary Education Legacy on African Literacy
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2025-07-08
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en
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This paper investigates the persistent legacy of Christian missionary work in Africa on current literacy rates. Missionaries were responsible for the majority of education during colonial times. Geographical or institutional barriers, such as disease burdens or governmental restrictions, often confined missionaries. A new dataset was built using the exact geographical locations of the Protestant missions in 1903 and Catholic missions in 1924. These are combined with detailed geographical raster data and demographic data. This paper shows that countries with more missions, and districts near missions are associated with higher current literacy rates. Using this detailed geographical data, it is also determined what factors could have driven mission placement selection, and how this led to a disparity in development paths over time.
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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen