ECS2609 - Economic History of South Africa

Purpose: To enable students to critically assess the development of the Western market economy in South Africa by looking at topics such as the origins of the indigenous precapitalist economy, the development of the Cape Colony from a refreshment station to a far-flung colony of settlement under the Dutch East India Company (1652-1795), South Africa during the agricultural era (1795-1870), the impact of the mining revolution (1870-1910), and the gradual industrialisation of South Africa after 1910.