Slavery and the Rise of Capitalism

Complete 8 pages APA formatted article: Slavery and the Rise of Capitalism.

In the year between 1526 and 1867 Sub Saharan Africa lost more than 12.5 million people. Slavery is the universal phenomena which have existed from the early history of the human being. Even though the ideologies and the culture have an influence on the system of slavery the industrialization and capitalist development boosted up slavery. The cultural and ideological features of the society acted as the catalyst for the system of slavery. Along with the development of human society, the nature and complexity of the slave system also developed.

Robin Black burn points out that slavery is the dark side of human progress. “Robin Blackburn suggests that it points us towards the “dark side of progress” (p5) in that the inhumanity of the system developed side by side with huge steps forward in knowledge and technique, such as the exploration of the Atlantic and the development of new navigational techniques.” (Blackburn & Verso 1998). Europeans are not sold as chattel slaves. There are many reasons for this. The cultural background may be one reason.

During the middle ages, the white Christians were not bought as slaves because they belong to an implicit community. The law enforced a clear distinction between punitive and chattel slavery. Due to this, the chattel slavery has virtually disappeared from northern Europe by about1400. The basis of the implicit community was ethnicity rather than religion. Galley slavery – Theologians could cite unambiguous scriptural authority for hereditary slavery for outsiders which may be a punishment for original sin.

Baptism does not redeem black skin from slavery. In the book of Genesis in the Bible, we cannot find out any proof from the Bible that the nations of Ham are black. But, the genealogies and apocryphal remarks imply that the nations of Ham are migrated to other lands notably to Ethiopia. Ethiopia came to be inhabited by black people. The&nbsp.literal reading of bible sanctions that black people were divinely ordained for perpetual servitude.&nbsp.