Resource pooling across colonies was needed to justify acquisition costs.

Evidence

If, instead, those same food resources were sparse, and especially if they were clumped into rare but concentrated patches, then the male would face a very different set of payoffs for guarding a territory. He would still pay a price for producing the weapon, and for expending time and energy fighting to keep rival males out of his territory. But now these territories would matter, and the benefits he could glean from guarding them might be significant. Females would be much more likely to visit him, since the resources they needed were few and far between, and one of the only places where they could access them was inside his territory. Indeed, lots of females might visit his territory and, if the resources were localized enough to be readily defended from rival males, he might be able to mate with a disproportionate number of these females—more females than other males who were not able to guard a territory, and possibly even more than males who were guarding a territory, if his territory were bigger or better than theirs or contained more of the limiting resources. — Emlen, Douglas J, Animal Weapons_ The Evolution of Battle, 202 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Things didn’t improve for the former African colonies after France joined the eurozone. In fact, a nasty cocktail has emerged with the ongoing currency arrangements, merging with the neoliberal austerity bias of the eurozone to further limit hopes for African prosperity. The unseemly colonial resource grab thus morphed, later, into a neoliberal regime that maintained the extraction mechanisms and increased inequality. But it was a creeping process. — Fanny Pigeaud_ Ndongo Samba Sylla, Africa’s Last Colonial Currency, 28 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Clumped scarce resources make guarding territories economically worthwhile — Emlen, Douglas J, Animal Weapons_ The Evolution of Battle, 202; The colonial resource grab morphed into a neoliberal regime that maintained extraction mechanisms — Fanny Pigeaud_ Ndongo Samba Sylla, Africa’s Last Colonial Currency, 28

Related

• The colonial resource grab morphed into a neoliberal regime that maintained extraction mechanisms (similarity 0.85)
• Enclave economies centered on resource extraction become privileged spaces of war (similarity 0.82)
• The colonial export economy locked the freed colony into sugar and coffee production. (similarity 0.80)
• Today’s urban-regional divides echo older colonial extraction patterns. (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Clumped scarce resources make guarding territories economically worthwhile #corroborates (0.80) — Emlen, Douglas J, Animal Weapons_ The Evolution of Battle, 202
• The colonial resource grab morphed into a neoliberal regime that maintained extraction mechanisms #expands (0.55) — Fanny Pigeaud_ Ndongo Samba Sylla, Africa’s Last Colonial Currency, 28