^{page 389 note 1} The perspectives of modernisation and dependency are described in Foster-Carter, Aiden, ‘From Rostow to Gunder Frank: conflicting paradigms in the analysis of underdevelopment’, in World Development (Oxford), 4, 1976, pp. 167–80.Google Scholar

^{page 389 note 1} The political economies of African nations can assume several forms within their dependent context. See Sandbrook, Richard, The Politics of Basic Need: urban aspects of assaulting poverty in Africa (London and Toronto, 1982).Google Scholar

^{page 390 note 1} Lisk, F. and van der Hoeven, R., ‘Measurement and Interpretation of Poverty in Sierra Leone’, in International Labour Review (Geneva), 118, 1979, pp. 713–30.Google Scholar

^{page 390 note 2} Adelman, I., ‘Growth, Income Distribution and Equity-Oriented Development Strategies’, in World Development, 3, 1975, pp. 67–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

^{page 391 note 1} Hardiman, M. and Midgley, J., ‘Social Planning and Access to the Social Services in Developing Countries: the case of Sierra Leone’, in Third World Planning Review (Liverpool), 4, 1982, pp. 74–86.Google Scholar

^{page 391 note 2} Ketkar, S. L., ‘Costs of Education and Manpower Planning in Sierra Leone’, in Damachi, Ukandi G. and Ewusi, K. (eds.), Manpower Supply and Utilization in Ghana, Nigeria and Sierra Leone (Geneva, 1979), pp. 140–70. The higher the education level, the greater the élite and urban bias of the schooling.Google Scholar

^{page 391 note 3} International Labour Office, Ensuring Equitable Growth: a strategy for increasing employment, equity and basic needs satisfaction in Sierra Leone (Addis Ababa, 1981).Google Scholar

^{page 391 note 4} Further indications of such inequalities may be found in Hardiman and Midgley, loc. cit.; Ensuring Equitable Growth; and Lisk and van der Hoeven, loc. cit.

^{page 391 note 5} These notions are more fully explained in de Souza, A. R. and Porter, P. W., ‘The Under-development and Modernization of the Third World’, Association of American Geographers, Commission on College Geography, Resource Paper No. 28, 1974, pp. 60–4.Google Scholar

^{page 393 note 1} The term ‘natural’ does not infer that they are derived from nature; rather, it is employed in order that two distinct causes of disparities can be indicated.

^{page 394 note 1} The most concrete expression of this was the alteration of the five-year National Development Plan (1974/75–1978/79) to a series of annual plans.

^{page 395 note 1} Hoogvelt, Ankie M. M. and Tinker, Anthony M., ‘The Rôle of Colonial and Post-Colonial States in Imperialism - a Case-Study of the Sierra Leone Development Company’, in The Journal of Modern African Studies (Cambridge), 16, 1, 03 1978, pp. 67–79.Google Scholar

^{page 395 note 2} According to West Africa (London), 17 01 1983, the mine has been reopened by Austro-Mineral.Google ScholarPubMed

^{page 395 note 3} On the lack of ‘forward’ and the paucity of ‘backward’ linkages, see Killick, Tony, ‘The Development Impact of Mining Activities in Sierra Leone’, in Pearson, Scott R. and Cownie, John (eds.), Commodity Exports and African Economic Development (Lexington, 1974), pp. 217–35.Google Scholar

^{page 395 note 4} Riddell, J. Barry, ‘Transport Network Evolution in the Post-Independence Period’, in Sierra Leone Geographical Journal (Freetown), 14, 1970, pp. 20–30,Google Scholar and The Spatial Dynamics of Modernization in Sierra Leone: structure, diffusion and response (Evanston, 1970).Google Scholar

^{page 396 note 1} In the first five years after independence, the subsidy to the railway supplied by the Government was Le. 5.2 million. Pratt, S. A. J., ‘The Development of the Sierra Leone Railway’, Freetown, 06 1966, pp. 8–9.Google Scholar

^{page 396 note 2} Over the 1951–1961 period, the proportion of agricultural goods moved by the railway declined from 89.42 to 38.58 per cent. Pratt, op. cit. p. 73.

^{page 396 note 3} The military rule of the National Reformation Council is described by Bebler, Anton, ‘The African Military, Nationalism and Economic Development: the case of Sierra Leone, 1967–1968’, in Journal of African Studies (Los Angeles), 1, 1974 pp. 70–86,Google Scholar and Military Rule in Africa: Dahomey, Ghana, Sierra Leone, and Mali (New York, 1973);Google Scholar and the programme of the International Monetary Fund is detailed by Bhatia, R. J., Szapary, G., and Quinn, B., ‘Stabilization Programme in Sierra Leone’, in International Monetary Fund Staff Papers (Washington, D.C.), 16, 1969, pp. 504–28.Google Scholar

^{page 396 note 4} In the period between 1977 and 1984, Sierra Leone has had to reschedule its debts through the Paris Club on three occasions. The Economist Intelligence Unit (London), 1, 1984, p. 21.Google Scholar

^{page 396 note 5} These conditions were: (i) significantly reduce domestic credit; (ii) generate additional tax revenue; (iii) hold down incomes in both the private and public sectors; (iv) impose limits on external borrowing; (v) reduce government expenditure; (vi) strengthen and diversify exports; and (vii) mobilise private financial savings. See Office of the President, 12 Years of Economic Achievement and Political Consolidation under the APC and Dr. Siaka Stevens: 1968–1980 (Freetown, nd.), p. 445.Google Scholar

^{page 397 note 1} Hardiman and Midgley, loc. cit.

^{page 397 note 2} See Robson, Peter, ‘The Mano River Union’, in The Journal of Modern African Studies, 20, 4, 12 1982, pp. 613–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

^{page 397 note 3} Renninger, John P., Multinational Cooperation for Development in West Africa (Oxford and New York, 1979). See also the special feature on ‘ECOWAS: the first decade’, in West Africa, 27 May 1985, pp. 1047–63.Google Scholar

^{page 398 note 1} This is not to minimise the profound difficulties for such a nascent community. The expulsion of aliens from Nigeria is but one indication.

^{page 398 note 2} 12 Years of Economic Achievement.

^{page 398 note 3} Sandbrook, op. cit.

^{page 398 note 4} Although the unique features provided by the Creole and Lebanese communities must not be discounted, they should not be allowed to draw attention away from other generalities and processes.

^{page 399 note 1} For comparisons between actual and proposed spending allocations, see Riddell, J. Barry, ‘Beyond the Geography of Modernization: the state as a redistribution mechanism in independent Sierra Leone’, in Canadian Journal of African Studies (Ottawa), 19, 1985. For the divergences between the proposals of the 1974/5 to 1978/9 plan and actual expenditure, as well as the absolute reductions in spending in all sectors (and relative increases and decreases in most),Google Scholar see Narapalasingam, S., Chief Technical Adviser, Central Planning Unit, ‘Overall Review of the Economy of Sierra Leone’, Seminar on ‘Towards a Strategy for the Second National Development Plan for Sierra Leone’, Freetown, December 1980.Google Scholar

^{page 399 note 2} The overall pattern is valid; however, great care must be taken in considering individual items. In many cases, monies were not spent on specified projects and their performances have not been audited.

^{page 400 note 1} The international value of the Sierra Leone currency has dropped sharply during the last 18 years. While pegged to the U.K. £ the Leone fell, for example, from U.S. $1·40 in January to $1·20 in December 1967, when sterling was devalued. The Leone was pegged to the S.D.R. in November 1978 and has fallen most recently from U.S. $0·40 in July 1984 to as low as $0·17 by August 1985.

^{page 400 note 2} So that the most recent census (1974) indicates that 46 per cent of those employed in the modern sector worked for the Government and another 12 per cent for public corporations. See Central Planning Unit, Ministry of Development and Economic Planning, ‘Overall Review of the Economy’.

^{page 401 note 1} An indication of growth is that the salary bill of the Government increased from Le. 33·51 million in 1975–1976 to an estimated Le. 90·00 million five years later. Ibid.

^{page 401 note 2} The option of democratic opposition was also eliminated by the formation of a one-party state in 1978. Other ways of removing opposition have included: hanging leaders of (real or imagined) coups; stifling reporters by the Newspaper Amendment Bill; and employing thugs and para-military forces. Meanwhile the support of the army is promoted by regular pay, new barracks, and assured rice supplies. An attempt has been made to weaken the Labour Congress (which organised the 1981 strike) by giving one leader a parliamentary seat and by accusing the other of financial misdeeds.

^{page 401 note 3} Most of this money was borrowed. Sierra Leone's external public debt was as high as U.S. $359 million by 1983.

^{page 402 note 1} The urban–rural disparities are masked by the residents of these areas and also by government rhetoric and spending. For example, those who have moved into the city maintain linkages through tribal affiliations, circular migration, visits to rural homelands, and remittances. The result is that although the two milieux are different, the human contacts and movements meld them. The distinction is masked in political speeches and publications. At the same time, the rural population is largely unorganised, immobile, and illiterate. Also, large sums of money spent on highly ‘visible’ integrated agricultural development projects, oil-palm schemes, seed-multiplication efforts, and land resources surveys, hide the fact that most is disbursed elsewhere.

^{page 402 note 2} International Labour Office, op. cit.; Levi, John (ed.), African Agriculture: economic action and reaction in Sierra Leone (Slough, 1976);Google ScholarSaylor, R. G., The Economic System of Sierra Leone (Durham, N.C., 1967);Google ScholarConteh, B. K., ‘The State and the Farmer: a review of Government's relationship with the agricultural sector in Sierra Leone’, in Bank of Sierra Leone Economic Review (Freetown), 11, 1–2, 01–06 1977, pp. 1–32;Google Scholar and C. D. Spencer, ‘The Sierra Leone Produce Marketing Board and the Maintenance of Price Stability of Agricultural Exports in Sierra Leone’, in ibid. 8, 1–2, January–December 1973, pp. 1–27.

^{page 403 note 1} The only exception to this policy, which began in 1952, was during the brief 1974–1975 period, when the purchase price of rice was raised to economic levels: so much was then offered for sale that the Rice Corporation was unable to purchase it all.

^{page 403 note 2} Population data are from the 1974 Census; ‘rural’ includes all localities under 2,000 people.

^{page 403 note 3} Lisk and van der Hoeven, loc. cit. p. 728.

^{page 403 note 4} Ibid. p. 720.

^{page 403 note 5} Binns, J. A., ‘Agricultural Change in Sierra Leone’, in Geography (London), 67, 1982, pp. 113–25;Google ScholarKarimu, John. A., ‘Strategies for Peasant Farmer Development: an evaluation of a rural development project in Northern Sierra Leone’, Ph.D. dissertation, University of London, 1981;Google ScholarKamara, John and Turay, Harry, Some Socio-Economic Structures and Related Grass Roots Problems in Rural Sierra Leone, Vol. 2 (Njala, 1981);Google ScholarSpencer, D. S. C., ‘Rice Policy in Sierra Leone’, in Pearson, Scott R. et al. (Eds.), Rice in West Africa: policy and economics (Stanford, 1981), pp. 175–200;Google Scholar and Williams, Olu, ‘Agro-Rural Development Strategies: past, present, and future’, Freetown, 12 1980.Google Scholar

^{page 403 note 6} According to Binns, loc. cit., those without access to at least three acres of swamp land were excluded.

^{page 404 note 2} Particulars and backgrounds may be found in the weekly West Africa between 10 August 1981 and 1 February 1982.

^{page 405 note 1} Efforts at greater self-sufficiency take place periodically because of the mounting cost of imports.