Published with the support of the Department of History, the Laney Graduate School, and the Emory College of Arts and Science at Emory University; and the University of Wisconsin–Madison African Studies Program.
African Economic History was founded in 1974 by the African Studies Program at the University of Wisconsin and subsequently has also been associated with the Harriet Tubman Institute for Research on Africa and Its Diasporas at York University. The journal publishes scholarly essays in English, French, and Portuguese on the economic history of African societies from precolonial times to the present. It features research in a variety of fields and time periods, including studies on labor, slavery, trade and commercial networks, economic transformations, colonialism, migration, development policies, social and economic inequalities, and poverty. The audience includes historians, economists, anthropologists, sociologists, political scientists, policymakers, and a range of other scholars interested in African economies—past and present.
Special Issues:
Currency Transition in West Africa: From Commodity to Colonial Currencies, African Economic History 53(1), 2025
Economic Sovereignty in South Africa, African Economic History 52(1), 2025
Women at Work in Sub-Saharan Africa: Reciprocal, Reproductive, Tributary and Commodified Labor, c.1800–2000, African Economic History 50(1), 2022
Unraveling Aspects of African Economic History: Essays in Honor of Paul E. Lovejoy, African Economic History 49(1), 2021
Colonial Economic History in West Africa: The Gold Coast and Gambia in Comparative Perspective, African Economic History 47(2), 2020
Labor and Mobility in African History, African Economic History 44, 2016
African Women's Access and Rights to Property in the Portuguese Empire, African Economic History 43, 2016
Ransoming Practices in Africa: Past and Present, African Economic History 42, 2014