How a colonial currency still ties 14 African countries to France
The CFA franc, a currency created during French colonial rule, continues to be used by 14 countries in West and Central Africa today. This monetary arrangement provides nominal stability—meaning exchange rates are fixed and inflation is low—but it comes at a steep cost: these nations have surrendered their fiscal and monetary autonomy to France, which guarantees the currency's convertibility. As a result, the system reinforces economic dependency, limits the ability of these countries to pursue independent development policies, and actively hinders regional trade and industrial growth [2]. The proposed replacement, the Eco currency, has been discussed for years but remains unimplemented, illustrating how deeply entrenched colonial financial structures are.
Why economic growth alone hasn't fixed inequality in the Global South
Colonial powers didn't just extract resources—they built entire systems designed to maintain control. These 'extractive institutions' concentrated land, education, and political power in the hands of a small elite, often along racial or ethnic lines. After independence, many postcolonial governments inherited and preserved these structures rather than dismantling them. The result is that even when economies grow, the benefits rarely reach the majority. A 2026 analysis of the Global South shows that these institutional legacies continue to shape who gets access to land, jobs, and political influence, meaning growth alone cannot solve inequality without deep structural and institutional reform [4].
How colonial-era planning still shapes Egypt's cities—and why it failed
Egypt's approach to urban development, particularly in desert areas, still carries the fingerprints of its colonial past. The government's New Urban Communities Program (NUCP) was designed to relieve overcrowding in the Nile Valley by building new cities in the desert. But the program was built on a top-down, mono-institutional model rooted in Egypt's quasi-colonial history—meaning decisions were made by a single central authority without meaningful local input. The result was a spectacular failure: despite decades of effort and massive investment, only 1.6% of the population had moved to these new cities by 2017 [1]. The research argues that this approach ignored indigenous and locally validated methods of urban growth, and that a municipally guided model—one that empowers local communities—is needed to fix the problem.
Sources used in this answer
Revitalizing Urban Governance: Integrating Smart Growth and Decolonial Perspectives for Municipal Empowerment in Shaping Growth Across Egyptian Desert Landscapes
Egypt's New Urban Communities Program, rooted in colonial-era planning, decongested only 1.6% of the population by 2017, showing the failure of top-down, mono-institutional urban growth models.
Decolonization and the legacy of currency: the case of France’s former colonies
The CFA franc system, a colonial-era currency arrangement, still ties 14 West and Central African countries to France, limiting their monetary autonomy and industrial development despite providing nominal stability.
The colonial past and/in history textbooks: A literature review.
A review of 44 studies found that history textbooks in former colonizing countries resist postcolonial transformation, while textbooks in former colonies more often connect past injustices to present-day neocolonialism and inequality.
Colonial Legacies and Contemporary Economic Inequality in the Global South
Colonial extractive institutions and social hierarchies (based on race, caste, ethnicity) were embedded in postcolonial governance, and continue to shape access to land, education, labor markets, and political power in the Global South.
Slavery and Colonialism in the History of Economic Thought
Classical economists from the Enlightenment onward criticized slavery and colonialism as both ethically wrong and economically irrational, arguing that choosing slavery hindered long-term industrial development in former American colonies.