White Europeans In S. A. and Slavery

[ANDY-J]

Of all the discussion forums I've been on I don't think I've seen quite as much resentment as I've seen here.Maybe your country has been shat on in the past but that's too bad.South Africans should learn the lessons of the past and get on with building their country's future instead of complaining about how they've been victimised.

[itchy8me]

dont you see we are trying to do just that?

[cjm]

GOVERNMENT RESPONSE
"March 23, 2001
Countries should be ready to discuss compensation for slavery - Dlamini-Zuma

Geneva (Reuters) - Foreign Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma said on Thursday that former colonial powers should be ready to discuss compensation for slavery at a major United Nations conference on tackling racism and xenophobia"

SOME GENERAL COMMENT
I am no expert on this topic but a cursory glance at a dust gathering paperback quickly revealed that it is all but straightforward, particularly should one wish to apportion blame and exact compensation.

Perhaps there is someone out there who has some particular expertise in this field (Andy-J: a lot of what I found is an elaboration on an earlier posting of yours) - why not enlighten us - the one source on which I rely is almost 30 years old. Furthermore it seems these days that the further you get in time the clearer the historians can see what happened - they are also able to dismiss with certainty sources not written long after the event!

So, here is my contribution to a better (?) understanding of the problem:

DID YOU KNOW?

1. Slavery was practised in Africa even before the Europeans appeared on the scene (Oliver & Fage: A Short History of Africa - Penguin African Library (4ed, 1972), p112. This book is hereafter referred to as "History"). Note however that large scale slave trading only developed since the 1600's with the growing European demand.

2. Passengers & crew of ships unlucky enough to be caught by competitors were also enslaved (History, p118).

3. In the 17th century a demand for labour was established by European plantations in tropical America. Particularly with the arrival of the Dutch, French & English in the West Indies & the growing demand for sugar did the slave trade escalate dramatically. The English & the French seem to be the main villains, with the English occupying first place on volume of slaves transported (History, pp120-122).

4. "Invariably the Europeans bought their slaves from African kings or merchants" (History, p123).

5. The parts of Africa worst affected were Angola and East Africa (History, p123).

6. "There had been slavery in Kongo, as in every other part of Africa, long before Europeans began to export slaves overseas..." (History, p128)

7. The Portuguese trained and armed native allies to make war on other tribes in the Congo (particularly in the South) and this eventually spilled over into Angola. The purpose of this war was to supply the slave trade. Angola ended up being the supply base for the Brazil slave trade. The Congo and Angola were badly affected by the slave trade (History, pp128-132).

8. Many of the forrays in the Congo were carried out by cannibal brigands called the Jaga or Yaga. The Manikongos (original rulers of Congo/Angola), who were converted Christians, appealed to the Pope. Stern letters passed from Rome to Lisbon, but the Portuguese government declared itself powerless to excercise control in those areas (History, p130). I would imagine that control by the mother country, generally speaking, was a problem (no telephones or internet). The deviousness of governments in only sending puppets to Africa has however also been pointed out.

9. Namibia and South Africa largely escaped the export slave trade. As a matter of fact South Africa imported slaves as Van Riebeeck was expressly instructed not to enslave the indigenous population. The origin of these slaves was varied. They came from Guinea, Madagascar, Bengal, Angola, India, Bali, Batavia, Macassar, Timor, Burma, the Malayan Peninsula, China, Mozambique, Zanzibar.

Intermarriage and sexual intercourse between the slaves and civilian population were not unknown and some freed slaves also did well for themselves. Slaves outnumbered Europeans by at the Cape by the year 1798. The trend was reversed by the time of abolition in 1834. The 1820 British Settlers were not permitted to own slaves. The slave trade was banned in 1807 in keeping with the rest of the Empire and slavery was abolished on 1 December 1834 (see in general Reader's Digest Illustrated History of South Africa (1988) pp48-53).


10. The pangs of guilt over the slave trade manifested itself most pronouncedly in Britain. Apparently this came about because the Caribbean planters started bringing back domestic slaves with them to England (History, pp137-138). Radical Christians did not like this and started making a fuss. They succeeded in having it effectively abolished from 1811. The African apologists point out that the pangs of guilt took a long time to mature.

11. Slavery was abolished in other European countries as follows: Danes (1804), US (1808), Dutch (1814), and other maritime nations after the Napoleonic war (though at first Portugal and Spain, where it only became LEGAL in 1789 could be induced only to limit it to seas south of the equator) (History, p138).

12. By 1842 the carriage of slaves across the Atlantic was technically illegal for all European and American nations. It was most vigorously enforced by Britain with some support by France and the US. Britain went as far as to persuade/force African rulers to outlaw the export of slaves. "Ultimately, however, it was not any action in Africa which finally extinquished the slave trade, but the cessation of the demand on the other side of the Atlantic. The victory of the North over the slave-owning South of the United States in 1865 was rounded off by the final abolition of slavery in both Cuba and Brazil in the 1880s." (History, p139).

13.The last chapter of the slave trade along the East coast of Africa was written by the Arabs from Oman and Egypt. A flourishing slave trade under their instigation centered at Zanzibar and was also conducted from Egypt. Under European pressure (primarily the British) the export of slaves to former Asian markets was slowed down. It did not stop the internal trade in slaves which continued for many years until the end of the 1800's when it was made illegal by the colonial powers (History, pp174-180).

14. The African apologists would no doubt also point out the importance of European rifles and the ivory trade (which also stimulated the slave trade) in this entire saga. They would also point out that the Europeans were not necessarily motivated by moral principles in bringing the slave trade to an end, although personally I find it hard to believe that it was in their commercial interest to stop it.

[Edited by cjm on 28th March 2001 at 22:05]

[cjm]

What principle would govern the payment of compensation to African countries adversely affected by slavery? The original perpetrators are dead as are the original victims.

Can one project liability onto former slave running countries? It seems to me that the only way one can project liability onto a country for a historic wrong is if some benefit, which still exists, accrued to that country as a result of that wrong. In saying this one is already disregarding the fact that some individuals in that country might not have benefitted. The prosperity of some individuals is projected onto the country as a whole.

A major problem is also showing that present day prosperity can be linked to profits made from the slave trade. After all, many European countries came through disasters of their own such as two world wars. Arguably many previous benefits were wiped out.

A principle such as the above (let's call it unjustified enrichment) would let a whole host of countries off the hook such as Egypt, the successors of the Arabs at Zanzibar, Oman, Portugal, Spain and perhaps even the Danes and the Dutch. I know some of these examples may be contentious but let us say they are not glaring examples of present day opulence and therefore one can assume that no slavery benefits remain !!

Also off the hook would be countries which benefitted from cheap labour but were not slave runners as such. Examples here would be the USA, Cuba, Brazil, South Africa. Of course, arguably, except for the US, these examples have also not retained any tangible benefits. Some people would dearly love to hold the whites in SA liable but then one will have to amend the principle and ensure in each villain country that only the successors of those groups which benefitted in a major way and have retained their benefits are targeted - a very difficult exercise.

Now let us consider mitigating circumstances:
(a) From my cursory reading it seems that Africa was forced by the Europeans to abandon the slave trade and would not have done it of their own accord! Don't shoot me, I am only the messenger! Surely this should be taken into account.

(b) Also relevant here is that many Africans also benefitted from the slave trade. It seems that Africans in fact supplied most of the infrastructure and expertise in Africa.

(c) When the slaves were set free, at least in South Africa, the slave owners were not compensated according to the market value of the slaves. Figures I get from Encyclopaedia of Southern Africa by Rosenthal (5th ed, 1970) sv "slavery", indicate that the slave owners got about half the value of the slaves, payment being made in the form of government stock and stamp duties!

(d) It would appear that some whites had also been enslaved but, as usual, this would not matter much to the African apologists.

(e) Also remember that many European countries were not democracies for at least part of the period under review. Can one hold an oppressed people responsible for the actions of a regime? If the actions were those of private individuals, it seems even more farfetched to project liability onto an entire nation. On the other hand, given the original principle above, this perhaps does not matter if the country as a whole benefitted and has retained its benefits to the present day...

The next problem would be the actual amount of compensation. Surely a fair measure would be to repay to each African country the market value of the slaves exported. I cannot think of any other measure but do I hear howls of disgust and ridicule? By the way, the countries identified as the main culprits liable in terms of the above would be the English & French!! Is it not rather disappointing - there must be some error of logic here...

[Edited by cjm on 29th March 2001 at 20:32]

[mar-T]

I see there is a lot of back and forth about who is to blame. Straight away it becomes a race issue.... strange.

My personal view (most will disagree but I respect that) is that this is human nature. Everybody is trying to get ahead and live better than his neighbor. Sometimes in order to get ahead people do immoral things. It's all about money power and wealth. If africans had invented gunpowder, who is to say that they would not have cruised accross the world and taken themselves some white slaves?

Ambitious people will do anything to succeed. We cannot judge what happended 500 years ago, becuse everybody was living by a differnt set of values... generally the value of one human life was not what it is today.... executions were not looked upon as something immoral as they are today. You cannot compare the times..... back then we would have all had our heads chopped off for even discussing this.

It is always easy to criticise with hindsight. Fact is in this world there will always be people who are better off than others. If everyone had the same standard of living, nobody would bother working and everybody would become poorer. I wouldn't bother working hard if there was nothing in it for me.... would you?

This is what it all boils down to... not nasty bastard europeans trying to be God.... it is the good old fasioned rat race that will live until all living creatures are consumed by it and die!

[Petite_Mary]

As a Canadian, I must say racism is a minor problem where I live. There are so many different ethnic groups out here that it would be awfull!

I'm not really a white person, because I'm half native american, but I must admit white brought problem everywhere they came. Not only did they enslaved black people, but also asians, south african & other native americans.

I think that the bad part is that all europeans were of the same color. I don't think the color has anything to do with what they've done, and that's our mistake.

I can't blame white for what they did to my people because I know native americans enslaved each other. In wild america, if the Sioux were stronger then the Cherokee, the Sioux would try to take the Cherokee's land and take cherokee men, women and children as slaves. Not necessarily because they were of a different race, but because humans naturally have a feeling of brotherhood with their own kind, and don't have that special relation with people of other races. And, because they were stronger.

Europeans saw other Europeans as their own kind. It's like any other mammal. Lions won't eat another lion because, well, it's a LION. An antilope? They don't care. Lions are STRONGER then Antilopes. So, why not?

It's the same with humans, even if we have the pretention to say we're wiser. Europeans happenned to have the deadliest weapons. They weren't necessarily smarter, but they felt they were superior to africans because Africans looked primitive to them. I'm not saying they were right; it was their point of view. Africans evolved in a different way because they had different needs; the Europeans weren't seeing things that way. Like Mar-T said, if the Africans had invented gunpowder, who says the opposite wouldn't have happenned?

What I think is bad, is that people are blaming an entire race because of slavery. It was awfull, I totally agree; but why blame an entire nation? I'm pretty sure that it wasn't the entire white race who agreed with slavery. Look at the war that teared the USA about that subject! Blame the people who tought slavery was the right thing to do. Blame the people who started the whole thing and made money out of it.

I'm white, and I'm against slavery. I have tons of black friends, and I LOVE them because they are different. I love their cultures, I love their ethnic background. But when a black person blame me for what stupid white generals in bad need of control, money and cheap labor did, that makes me sad. That touches me, because I disagree with what those white people did. And that makes me sick to know that some people mistakes me with them.

Racism will stop when people will start to see behind the color of the skin. Behind the differences. A person belongs where his/her heart is, not necessarily where his ancestors were born. And that isn,t up to white, red, blacks or greens; it's up to all of us, togheter.

[Rooivalk]

whats Americas response too killing all (well..90%)
of the red Indians that lived there???????????????
that alone makes history look small..........
remember..they invaded Indian country not vice versa
actual fact apartheid is small compared