My point is that plantation owners are going to plant something, so why would they not develop a sugar economy considering tobacco's limitations?
Why would there be serfs when Africa already has a long tradition of slavery, particularly since some of these states are likely to be Muslim states and Islam condones slavery? Imperial Russia's serfdom emerged under local conditions, so it's hard to replicate that in Africa. African states also are unlikely to care about the welfare of peoples beyond their borders, especially those of different religions, or who allegedly are practicing their religion wrong.
What happened at otl, was that the spanish started sugar cane in the caribbean but as soon as they conquered the incas and aztecs they abandoned that production to concentrate on the production of gold and silver. This production returns to the Caribbean with the Dutch who tried to conquer Brazil and after learning the technique with the Portuguese/Brazilians they made a copy in the Caribbean(after being expelled from brazil). Perhaps if the Dutch did not invade Brazil, this would prevent sugar production in the Caribbean, or at least for a long time.
As your post implies, its far easier to enslave people who are different. Conversly, its harder to enslave ones own people- or closely related people.
I don't know about that. The Greeks and Romans, for example, were quite happy to enslave similar peoples -- other Greeks for the Greeks, other Italians for the Romans. Although the Romans ended up enslaving non-Italians more, that was because Italy had already been conquered and so they were no longer capturing large numbers of Italians in war (the primary source of slaves in the ancient world), not because of any moral qualms about enslaving related nations.
Due to the conquest of the Incas and Aztecs, sugar production was not a priority for the Spanish crown. With its production in the caribbean increasing in the 17 century. Christopher Columbus introduced sugarcane planting to America on his second trip to the continent, in 1493, in what is now the Dominican Republic. When the Spaniards discovered the gold and silver of the Aztec and Inca civilizations in the early 16th century, sugar cane cultivation and sugar production were forgotten.
After Spain conquered the Mexican mainland, the Caribbean islands were used more as protected harbors along shipping routes than as sugar growing islands. But if you have data indicating a high sugar production in the Caribbean during the period by the Spaniards, I would like to see it, because I unfortunately cannot find data on sugar production in the Caribbean and South America in the 16th to 18th centuries. percentage or absolute numbers. Everything I've read about sugar production in the Caribbean always focuses on the sugar boom of the 17th century by the Dutch, British and French. Speaking little of sugar production by the Spanish in the new world, with most cases talking about the abandonment of these farms in exchange for the gold rush. When they talk about sugar production by the Spaniards, Cuba is mentioned in the 18th century, which together with Brazil were the largest producers. But before that, everything I read only states that Brazil was the absolute producer of sugarcane (According to Prado Jr. (1976), until the 17th century, Brazil was the world's largest producer of sugar).
Yes they helped but the Portuguese and Spanish (to a lesser extent) already used slaves in the production of sugar like Madeira. After the island of Madeira the Portuguese colonization of the Azores in 1439, the Cape Verde Islands (1462), and São Tomé and Principe (1486). producing sugar with black slaves (mostly bought from the kingdom of Kongo). There is already a precedent for the use of slaves in sugar production from the beginning of the 15th century. I am not saying that it is impossible not to have the slave trade, but massive changes must take place so that this does not occur. Producing sugar using slaves was already done by the Abbasid Caliphate.
The Spanish on Hispaniola enslaved the native people very early on. When this led to much of the native population dying, Las Casas argued for African slaves to be used instead.
I think we can generally assume that if a country is importing more slaves, they’re at least managing to maintain or grow production with it. That said:
www.slavevoyages.org
Yes, in general. From 1695 onwards in Brazil this becomes complicated by the gold rush. But until that period yes. Great website. Being able to select the European country, African region, by time etc,I think we can generally assume that if a country is importing more slaves, they’re at least managing to maintain or grow production with it. That said:
Estimates
Drawing on extensive archival records, this digital memorial allows analysis of the ships, traders, and captives in the Atlantic slave trade. The three databases below provide details of 36,000 trans-Atlantic slave voyages, 10,000 intra-American ventures, names and personal information. You can...
This is unlikely to change much. The African Slave Trade existed long before the arrival of Europeans, they just tapped int the existing market (and greatly expanded the demand). With the partial exception of the Portuguese, most of the slave traders were not themselves raiders. They just traded with the coastal groups who themselves raided and traded with the interior.
I discussed the topic using that data in this thread:
Greek enslavement of other Greeks was before they became a unified people. Greeks in the era of the city states did not view members of other city states as being of the same ethnicity. Thus, the "foreign" aspect of owner to slave was maintained.
Slavery was no longer socially tenable in Europe because it was an inefficient system compared to serfdom and eventually because the very system was racialised, not because the slaves looked like the owners. Practically every culture with slavery never had a problem enslaving people of their own ethnicity, including state societies like Korea for instance.
The thing is that you'll never have those factors in Africa because of the size and aforementioned diversity of the continent, and it wasn't like African states cared much about selling Arab or white slave traders their criminals or debt slaves.
Korean Nobi system was far more serf (permanent under class of laborers / sharecroppers ) like than slavery. Nobi could own real property, owned their own homes, could sell excess crops, could buy their full freedom- even had maternity leave.
