Volume 35, Number 5 · March 31, 1988
The Benefit of Slavery
By David Brion Davis
Economic Growth and the Ending of the Transatlantic Slave Trade
by David Eltis
Oxford University Press, 418 pp., $39.95
Capitalism and Antislavery: British Mobilization in Comparative Perspective
by Seymour Drescher
Oxford University Press, 300 pp., $19.95
Last year a casual tourist flying by Air Jamaica to Montego Bay could learn in one sentence why the British freed their West Indian slaves. 'When the sugar industry began to decline,' the airline's journal Skywritings reported in 'Jamaica A to Z,' 'slavery was finally abolished.' Not a word about William Wilberforce and the other abolitionist heroes buried in Westminster Abbey. Even well-read Americans might not suspect that Skywritings' matter-of-fact statement is the product of a momentous historiographical debate which involves the third world's understanding of capitalism and the capacity of parliamentary governments for meaningful social reform.
Review, 4003 words
To read the full text of this piece, please choose one of the following options:
|
If you are already a subscriber to the Review's electronic edition, please sign in: |
To subscribe to the electronic edition, please press the button below. |
To purchase access to this article for $3, please press the button below. |