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Critical Convergence: The Great Depression and the Meshing of Nigerian and British Anti-Colonial Polemic

Abstract This article explores the salient, often ignored, convergences between the discourses of colonizers and the colonized in Africa. Using Nigerian criticisms of British colonial handling of the Great Depression, and a similar critique of British colonial economic recovery measures penned by the British colonial statistician in Nigeria, S.M Jacob, the article contends that, in spite of stylistic and motivational differences, both sets of critics desired similar colonial reforms and were grounded in a common desire to compel British colonialism to fulfill its paternalistic promises to Nigerians during a time of economic crisis. The article argues that the two bodies of anti-colonial criticism wittingly or unwittingly sought to salvage the colonial enterprise by compelling the colonial state to avert public outrage that might threaten British rule. Although Nigerian critics recognized the imperative of eventual self-government, their critiques and those of Jacob were united in their common conviction that the best way to avert a further discrediting of British colonial rhetoric was for the state to provide relief to Nigeria's economically beleaguered peoples. Both sets of critics desired a colonial system that functioned effectively for the benefit of Nigerians, even if their motivation for desiring this outcome and their ultimate goals differed.