Colonialism didn’t just have a detrimental effect on Africa’s politics and economy. It also dismantled its existing legal systems. Europeans replaced local laws on everything from marriage and landownership to criminal justice and commerce with their own.
For example, in southern parts of the continent, they introduced Roman-Dutch law, which replaced communal land ownership with private property rights. This led to the majority of the indigenous population losing their land. In Kenya, colonisers expelled most local tribes and settled in what became known as the White Highlands. Since then, the cultivation of lucrative tea and coffee has only been permitted under new European laws.
These changes also devastated Africa’s cultural heritage. The British exported countless artefacts – an act that wasn’t considered theft at the time because the laws governing valuable objects were drafted by the colonisers themselves. Although Africa is still ununified, it has all the tools necessary today to create its own laws. Will it be able to integrate into the global legal system?
