« Where your treasure is, there will be your heart also » , goes the popular adage. This fits in well in the British mercantilist system during the time of slavery. «The reason for slavery », wrote Gibbon Wakefield, was «not moral but economical circumstances ». Slavery at its peak was the engine of Britain’s economic growth for almost three centuries, until the advent of the Industrial Revolution. But the slave system was to be buffeted by a new phenomenon – the economic decline – in the second part of the nineteenth century. This was how a defining moment came in the history of slavery.

The economic decline Britain witnessed sounded, according to Eric Williams, the demise of slavery. The « decline theory » intended to explain the move for abolition is an argument that many English historians refuse to buy in. They argue that humanitarian sentiments of the British people and the campaign of the Abolitionist movement exposing slavery in all its horrors were central in leaving Parliament with no choice but to pass a legislation ending the slave trade in 1807 and colonial slavery in 1833.

Thus, when the Colonial secretary, Edward Stanley, proposed the Slavery Abolition Act to Parliament in 1833, he reiterated the feeling about « the liberal and humane spirit of the age ». That « humane spirit », he said, « demanded that pecuniary interest of planters and merchants be sacrificed to the great popular abhorrence of slavery ».

That love for humanity regardless of race, religion or colour overriding economic interests, unheard of before, was a dramatic change of trajectory. Britain wanted the world to know that on humanitarian grounds, it was setting a « glorious example » as a great mover of justice and a champion of freedom. That sudden show of compassion for the negro slaves was seen as something very much unusual in Britain. Some would denounce this act as mere « British hypocrisy ».

The launching in the UK of the bicentenary celebration for the abolition of slavery in 2007 marked yet another occasion to show to the world the sense and sensibilities that characterised former Parliamentarians and society in general. It brought back in focus the heroic struggles of Abolitionists, prominent among them were Granville Sharp, Thomas Clarkson and William Wilberforce. As if the abolition of slavery was made possible thanks to the strenuous efforts of these men, the descendants of slaves today must owe a debt of gratitude to those who spread through the abolition movement the rays of the humanitarian torch that liberated the slaves from their despicable state.

But was it really the abhorrence of slavery and the kind-heartedness of Britain that motivated the decision of doing away with that hideous institution? Eric Williams who would become in the 1960s Prime Minister of the Caribbean island of Trinidad and Tobago advances a powerful argument.

The research works undertaken for his doctoral thesis at Oxford in 1938 led him to a conclusion that since then has sparked passionate debates among scholars. No way, he argues, that abolition was engineered by a humanitarian movement. In his seminal book, Capitalism and Slavery, Williams tries to debunk the myth surrounding the British compassion that was said to have broken the chains of slavery. It was nothing more than Britain’s economic decline in the late 18th century that triggered its gradual phasing out. Slavery as a driver of business was carefully nurtured as long as it was profitable and guaranteed the enrichment of the Europeans. The British economy was mainly agriculture driven so much so that when slavery was abolished, Indian immigrants were hired to maintain the empire as a going concern.

The foundation of the British Empire rested on a plantation economy. It was the « commercial bourgeoisie » represented by a « solid phalanx » of the British society that included the landed aristocracy, the political elite and the ecclesiastics that controlled the whole spectrum of the economy. It was exploitative capitalism in which profits were relentlessly pursued without a concern for human values. However, that « commercial bourgeoisie » was by the 1770s outpaced by a new breed of capitalism, the « Industrial bourgeoisie », which built their fortunes on the emerging manufacturing sector.

« Britain wanted the world to know that on humanitarian grounds, it was setting a ‘glorious example’... »

Williams dwelt on several factors that led to Britain’s economic disintegration. The first stage of decline came with the American Revolution in 1776. The Atlantic lake Britain used to exploit and which was the source of its economic strength was drying up because as an independent United States grouping almost thirteen colonies, the US having cut umbilical cord with Britain began engaging in free trade with Britain’s rivals in the region. The long enjoyed British monopolistic mercantilism that was shaped by the triangular trade stood threatened by the entry of « laissez-faire » commercial capitalism after 1776. Brazil and Cuba became big sugar producers and suppliers to neighbouring colonies. When the triangular trade collapsed, the Balance sheets in London showed profits dwindling year in, year out.

The advent of the Industrial era was another setback. It benefited the rising Industrialist community rather than the slave traders who realised the time was up for them to down shutters and look for greener pastures. As manufacturing industries propelled by machineries slashed production costs and proved more efficient than slave labour, there was a sudden upsurge in the demand for cotton and related products. Sugar was no longer king. Some European countries had turned to beet sugar production. Thus, the need for slave-based labour and slave produced goods faded, the more so as the argument reinforced by the Economist Adam Smith that slave labour was becoming unproductive and costly brought about a change of mindset. A worried Prime Minister, William Pitt, reacted by shifting the focus to India where supplies of cheap labour were abundant. In plantation colonies, slave labour was replaced by indentured labour from India.

If slavery was becoming less profitable, another worrying factor was the resistance put up by the slave population in the West Indies. Slaves’ uprisings became common occurrences putting at risk lives and properties. Planters wanted to take no chance. The horrible event in Haiti where the slave rebel Toussaint L’Ouverture staged a successful coup, was much cause for concern as it was feared such revolts could spread to other colonies. Planters were giving up sugar cane cultivation and looking for trouble free investments. Slaves’ revolts precipitated, it was said, the passing of the Emancipation Bill in 1833.

While the initiatives of British MPs and Abolitionists pressing for the abolition of slavery in Parliament were profusely lauded, one cannot lose sight of the fact that those MPs represented the vested interests. Their motivation was self-interest, to extract maximum compensations from the Imperial government before the slave system collapsed. The Abolitionist Committee was unleashed just in time to press for that with in the background unfolding the humanitarian element.

Hailed as a great « Liberator » of slaves, William Wilberforce, himself a member of Parliament, led the campaign with the blessing of none other than Prime Minister William Pitt. Many of the parliamentarians were themselves either slave traders or plantation owners in the Caribbean. Riding high on the supposedly growing anti-slavery waves, they passed an Act abolishing slavery and voted for a compensation of twenty millions pounds, after having rejected a grant of fifteen millions earlier, to recoup, it was said, the costs of their investment in the slave business. These sums were then ploughed back in large commercial houses during the Industrial Revolution. Some of these business firms are still active today having stood the test of time. The slaves were left in the lurch. Not a single penny was voted for their rehabilitation as the Abolitionists disappeared in the thick mist overcasting the London sky once their compensations were granted.

To challenge William’s argument, Professor Seymour Drescher, author of Econocide, in the 1970s claims that slavery was still profitable by the late nineteenth century. It was essentially the humanitarian and not the economic element, he wrote, that led to abolition. Britain was, to use the Shakespearean phase, « full of the milk of human kindness » when it came to slavery. It was so hurt by the plight of the slaves that it could no longer bear their hardship. By abolishing slavery, Britain claims, according to Drescher, « an imperial triumph on behalf of humanity ».