African economic history is back on the academic agenda. It developed into a distinct field of study between the 1950s and 1980s, but the interest of historians waned in the 1990s. Its revival became notable in the late 2000s, especially because of the rising engagement of social scientists with long-term historical perspectives, which has come along with new questions, new data and new methods of investigation. The newly established African Economic History Network (<http://www.aehnetwork.org/>) links historians and social scientists working in the field and is still expanding rapidly.

Africa's Development in Historical Perspective is yet another sign of this renaissance, with contributions from historians and social scientists. The edited volume is the outcome of a conference held in Accra, in 2010, by a Harvard working group on ‘Understanding African Poverty over the Longue Durée’. This conference aimed to situate Africa more firmly within the broader literature on the Great Divergence, by applying historical approaches to questions of comparative economic development. The book seeks to inspire students and scholars interested in questions of long-term African development, with the ultimate objective to establish a research agenda that promotes ‘the type of synthesis or consensus that has emerged for the Americas’ (p. 2). The sixteen chapters are subdivided in four thematic parts on: the longue durée; culture, entrepreneurship, and development; institutions; and external forces. The scope of the volume is breathtaking and the chapters are all of high quality. Topics range from the long-term economic impact of malaria (Weil), to social norms of redistribution (Platteau), textile history of East Africa (Clarence-Smith), the cash-crop revolution in tropical colonial Africa (Austin), and the reinvention of the wheel (Chaves et al.).

A critical reader may note that the book includes a list of formidable scholars, but has no contributions from the ‘new generation’ who have joined the field in recent years, with the notable exception of Nunn's chapter on gender and missionary influence on colonial Africa. This clearly shows the explosion of the field. At the time of the Accra conference, this ‘new’ generation of scholars was not yet in the picture. Moreover, the introductory chapter, written by the editors, goes a long way in highlighting the new strands of literature produced by this new generation.

Africa's Development in Historical Perspective also reflects the current state of the field in another important respect: it offers a rather eclectic read. The volume as a whole absolutely inspires, but readers in search of a coherent and focused research agenda may be slightly disappointed. It is telling that the editors make no attempt to define the term ‘development’ in the introduction. This begs the soul-searching question: do African economic historians have a common idea of the development paths and outcomes that needs explaining? Of course, there is the strong popular view that African development can be usefully characterized as one of persistent poverty, but how does that relate to present-day economic and political dynamics in the region? After all, the income gap between sub-Saharan Africa and large parts of East and Southern Asia (India, China and Indonesia, for example) has become a tangible gap only in the past few decades. Why can't Africa simply be a bit behind the rest? In order to work towards a shared research agenda, more reflection on the conceptualization of African ‘development’ is urgently needed.

In that respect, it is somewhat surprising to see that one of the key themes of such an agenda is presented in the introduction as part of an emerging consensus: the famous ‘reversal of fortune’ thesis, which holds that Africa not only lost ground in relative terms after 1450 (see the chapter by Ehret), but also has suffered from an absolute economic decline (Inikori's chapter) as it was swallowed by processes of globalization. Indeed, the classic dependency view as advocated by Rodney (How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, 1972) looms large in the introduction of the book. However, the ‘reversal of fortune’ thesis is an idea that sells well to politically correct establishments, but the empirical support is still in its infancy. For instance, what to make of the temporal gap of two centuries between the supposed reversal of African ‘development’ in the fifteenth century and the intensification of the slave trade in the eighteenth century? Indeed, expanding the empirical basis for this time period should be one of the key aspects of a common research agenda in African economic history, as it seems that conclusions are running ahead of the empirical evidence.

And what to do with the long-standing colonial legacies debate? The book offers the view that European colonial rule must have retarded Africa's long-term development, not only because of extractive practices and institutions, but also because it intervened in African practices of violence and conflict (see the chapters by Reid and Bates on the detrimental impact of the imperial peace). But without adequate counterfactuals to empirically verify or falsify conclusions on the long-term impact of colonialism it may be worthwhile to move beyond the frames of ‘negative’ and ‘positive’ legacies. Releasing the field from the stifling question of ‘blame’ would clear the ground for a deeper study of how colonialism fed into indigenous processes of social change. By substituting ‘colonial legacies’ for ‘entangled legacies’, we will gain a richer historical understanding of African development.

Africa's Development in Historical Perspective shows the wealth of exciting research questions that can be taken up in African economic history. It also shows the promise of real empirical and theoretical progress that can be made in the years ahead. This book is also an asset for teaching African economic history, and for the growing group of scholars with a latent or genuine interest in historical perspectives on African development it is a must-read. But the biggest contribution of this volume may emerge only a few decades from now, when it will be cited as a landmark display of the state of the art in the mid-2010s, an era in which African economic history was still in search of its explananda.