The American Crucible: Slavery, Emancipation and Human Rights, Robin Blackburn, London: Verso, 2011*
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Abstract
Plantation slavery in the New World, in particular its relationship to the emergence of capitalism in Europe and North America, has long been a subject of debate and discussion among historians and social scientists. While there are literally thousands of monographs studying various aspects of chattel slavery in the US South, the Caribbean and Brazil, only a handful of works attempt to provide a synthetic account of its rise and decline from the sixteenth through nineteenth centuries. Few scholars, on the Left or Right, have made as profound a contribution to such a history as Robin Blackburn. Blackburn’s latest work, The American Crucible: Slavery, Emancipation and Human Rights, does not simply summarise and update his earlier work, but extends his analysis to the rise and decline of ‘second slavery’ in nineteenth-century Cuba, Brazil and the US South. The American Crucible provides a multi-causal explanation of the origins and abolition of New World plantation slavery, examining the complex interactions between the rise of capitalism, political crises in the metropolitan countries, the transformation of popular and elite attitudes toward slavery, and the struggles of the slaves themselves. However, Blackburn’s inability to grapple with the specific structure and dynamics of capitalist and slave social-property relations, and their changing historical relationship, weakens key elements of his analysis.
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Allen Robert Carson & Weisdorf Jacob Louis ‘Was There an “Industrious Revolution” Before the Industrial Revolution? An Empirical Exercise for England, c.1300–1830’, Economic History Review 2011 64 3 715 729
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Ashworth John Slavery, Capitalism, and Politics in the Antebellum Republic, Volume 1: Commerce and Compromise, 1820–1850 1995 Cambridge Cambridge University Press
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Ashworth John Slavery, Capitalism, and Politics in the Antebellum Republic, Volume 2: The Coming of the Civil War, 1850–1861 2007 Cambridge Cambridge University Press
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Blackburn Robin The Overthrow of Colonial Slavery, 1776–1848 1988 London Verso
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Blackburn Robin The Making of New World Slavery: From the Baroque to the Modern, 1492–1800 1997 London Verso
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Brenner Robert P. Aston T.H. & Philpin C.H.E. ‘Agrarian Class Structure and Economic Development in Early Modern Europe’ The Brenner Debate: Agrarian Class Structure and Economic Development in Pre-Industrial Europe 1985 Cambridge Cambridge University Press
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Brenner Robert P. Merchants and Revolution: Commercial Change, Political Conflict, and London’s Overseas Traders, 1550–1653 1993 Princeton Princeton University Press
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De Vries Jan ‘The Industrial Revolution and the Industrious Revolution’ Journal of Economic History 1994 54 2 249 270
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Fishlow Albert American Railroads and the Transformation of the Ante-bellum Economy 1965a Cambridge, MA. Harvard University Press
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Fishlow Albert Andreano Ralph L. ‘Antebellum Interregional Trade Reconsidered’ New Views on American Economic Development 1965b Cambridge, MA. Harvard University Press
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Genovese Eugene D. From Rebellion to Revolution: Afro-American Slave Revolts in The Making of The New World 1981 New York Vintage Books
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Hilliard Sam Bowers Hog Meat and Hoecake: Food Supply in the Old South, 1840–1860 1972 Carbondale Southern Illinois University Press
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James Cyril Lionel Robert The Black Jacobins: Toussaint L’Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution 1963 [1938] New York Vintage Books
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Mintz Sidney W. Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History 1985 Harmondsworth Penguin Books
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North Douglass C. ‘International Capital Flows and the Development of the American West’, The Journal of Economic History 1956 16 4 493 505
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North Douglass C. The Economic Growth of the United States, 1790–1860 1961 New York Harper and Row
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Post Charles The American Road to Capitalism: Studies in Class-Structure, Economic Development and Political Conflict, 1620– 1877, Historical Materialism 2011a Leiden Brill Book Series
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Post Charles ‘Social-Property Relations, Class-Conflict and the Origins of the US Civil War: Towards a New Social Interpretation’ Historical Materialism 2011b 19 4 58 97
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Tomich Dale W. Slavery In the Circuit of Sugar: Martinique and the World Economy, 1830–1848 1990 Baltimore Johns Hopkins University Press
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Tomich Dale W. ‘The “Second Slavery”: Bonded Labor and the Transformation of the Nineteenth-Century World Economy’ Through the Prism of Slavery: Labor, Capital, and World Economy 2004 Boulder Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc
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1.
Blackburn 1988.
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2.
Blackburn 1997.
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3.
Tomich 2004.
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4.
Blackburn 1997, Chapter 10.
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5.
This argument is derived from Brenner 1985.
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6.
De Vries 1994; Allen and Weisdorf 2011.
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7.
James 1963; Genovese 1981, Chapter Three.
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8.
Ashworth 1995 and 2007.
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10.
Brenner 1985.
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11.
Brenner 1993, Part I.
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12.
Mintz 1985, Chapter 3.
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13.
The following is drawn from Wood 1988, Chapter I.
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14.
The following is drawn from Post 2011a, Chapter 3.
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15.
Tomich 2004, p. 57.
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16.
Tomich 1990, p. 286.
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17.
This analysis is drawn from Tomich 2004.
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18.
Tomich 2004, p. 61.
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19.
The following is based on Post 2011a, Chapter 5, and Post 2011b.
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20.
North 1961.
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21.
Fishlow 1965a and 1965b; Hilliard 1972.
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22.
North 1956; North 1961, Chapter VII.
| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
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The American Crucible: Slavery, Emancipation and Human Rights, Robin Blackburn, London: Verso, 2011*
In: Historical MaterialismSearch for other papers by Charles Post in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Abstract
Plantation slavery in the New World, in particular its relationship to the emergence of capitalism in Europe and North America, has long been a subject of debate and discussion among historians and social scientists. While there are literally thousands of monographs studying various aspects of chattel slavery in the US South, the Caribbean and Brazil, only a handful of works attempt to provide a synthetic account of its rise and decline from the sixteenth through nineteenth centuries. Few scholars, on the Left or Right, have made as profound a contribution to such a history as Robin Blackburn. Blackburn’s latest work, The American Crucible: Slavery, Emancipation and Human Rights, does not simply summarise and update his earlier work, but extends his analysis to the rise and decline of ‘second slavery’ in nineteenth-century Cuba, Brazil and the US South. The American Crucible provides a multi-causal explanation of the origins and abolition of New World plantation slavery, examining the complex interactions between the rise of capitalism, political crises in the metropolitan countries, the transformation of popular and elite attitudes toward slavery, and the struggles of the slaves themselves. However, Blackburn’s inability to grapple with the specific structure and dynamics of capitalist and slave social-property relations, and their changing historical relationship, weakens key elements of his analysis.
| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 1136 | 99 | 7 |
| Full Text Views | 374 | 18 | 3 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 300 | 36 | 7 |
