Colonial Rule and Religious Change: Evidence from Africa's Colonial Borders
TLDR
Colonial direct rule in Africa led to greater Christian adoption by disrupting social structures, unlike indirect rule which preserved indigenous religions.
Key contributions
- Christian adherence is substantially higher under French and Portuguese direct rule.
- Traditional religions persisted more where British indirect rule prevailed.
- Direct rule's disruption of inherited social order enabled Christianity's expansion.
- Indirect rule's preservation of social structures allowed indigenous religions to endure.
Why it matters
This paper clarifies how different colonial governance strategies profoundly shaped religious identity in Africa. It highlights the critical role of social structure disruption in religious conversion, offering new insights into the long-term legacies of colonialism.
Original Abstract
The European colonization of sub-Saharan Africa drove a massive shift from indigenous religions to Christianity, yet the channels through which this transformation occurred remain poorly understood. Using a geographic regression discontinuity design at colonial borders in sub-Saharan Africa, I find that Christian adherence is substantially higher under French and Portuguese direct rule than under British indirect rule -- a gap that implies a correspondingly greater persistence of traditional religions where indirect rule prevailed. Neither mission presence nor pre-colonial political centralization can account for the discontinuity. Instead, the evidence points to the disruption of the inherited social order as the key channel: where direct rule eroded rigid traditional social structures, Christianity -- which bypassed hereditary boundaries -- expanded to fill the void; where indirect rule preserved them, indigenous religions endured. These findings shed light on the dynamics of religious identity change and how it was shaped by colonialism.
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