Economic Growth & End of Transatlantic Slave Trade - Hardcover

Eltis, David

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0195041356 ISBN 13: 9780195041354

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1997

Synopsis

This study is the first to consider the consequences of Britain's abolition of the Atlantic slave trade for British imperial expansion and the world economy. It argues that the British led the way in ending that trade just when it was beginning to be important for the world economy, when there was a great need for labour around the world, and shows that Britain's control of the slave trade and great reliance on slave labour had played a major role in its empire's rise to world economic dominance. Contesting the view that Britain stood to benefit from the abolition of the slave trade, the author shows that British economic expansion was hindered greatly as a result.

About this title

Review:

'for light on slavery and the slave-trade - the latest, strongest light - it is necessary to turn to the formidable treatise by David Eltis ... The analysis, supported at every step by graphs, citations, tables and whatever else is required is rigorously economic. ELtis never allows his readers to lose sight of the fact that slavery was above all an economic institution.' Times Literary Supplement

'Eltis has good answers, but not crude or simplistic ones, that challenge a good many traditional assumptions that historians and economists have held about the place of the slave trade in the world economy. His book will be a landmark for a very long time.' David Brion Davis; Yale University

'extensive study ... David Eltis has written an excellent book that will be a landmark for some time to come.' P.C. Emmer, Centre for the History of European Expansion, Leiden, International Journal of Maritime History

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0195041356
• ISBN 13: 9780195041354
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 436