All this warfare and conflict not only caused major loss of
life and human suffering but also put in motion a particular
path of institutional development in Africa. Before the early
modern era, African societies were less centralized
politically than those of Eurasia. Most polities were small
scale, with tribal chiefs and perhaps kings controlling land
and resources. Many, as we showed with Somalia, had no
structure of hierarchical political authority at all. The slave
trade initiated two adverse political processes. First, many
polities initially became more absolutist, organized around
a single objective: to enslave and sell others to European