Review of Paul Lovejoy's "Transformations in Slavery." (2000, 2e)
Paul E. Lovejoy, Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2000, 1e 1983), pgs. 412.
First published in 1983, and republished as an updated second edition in 2000, Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa is a fascinating and wide ranging survey that covers the growth of slavery in Africa from the medieval period to the end of the nineteenth century. Written by Paul E. Lovejoy (1943 - present), a prolific writer and an emeritus professor of history at York University in Canada, this book surveys the entire continent, tracing differences in patterns of slavery and transformations that are spurred by both internal and external developments that lead to slavery becoming an core part of the African economic landscape by the 1880s.
Lovejoy, drawing on Marxist thought emphasizes the shifting means of production in Africa and the preeminence of economics in telling the story of the expansion of slavery. Ultimately Lovejoy argues against the popular academic idea that African slavery was more “mild” or “humane.” Instead he notes it was an exploitative and violent institution in most of Africa. He does note that African slavery was different from slavery in the Americas, and that external factors emanating from Europe and the Islamic world influenced the development of African slavery as an economic institution.
In many ways Lovejoy straddles the line between scholars such as Patrick Manning & Gwendolyn Hall and John Thornton. While acknowledging that slavery developed radically and grew only after European entrance into the African slave trade, he does note that Thornton is not entirely wrong in that regional variations mean that slavery was a part of African history long before the first Europeans began trading on the coasts of West Africa.
Lovejoy is emphatic that slavery is inherently tied to exploitation and violence in various forms, noting that the key distinctions between New World and African slavery was the manipulation of race ( a key rational in New World slavery) and how fast economic rationalization for the institution occurred (the New World was founded on this). While slavery in Africa did evolve with the rise of the Atlantic slave trade, Lovejoy argues that this was not solely a European driven phenomenon, but rather ought to be situated as a combination between European, Islamic, and African people’s influences. Importantly, Lovejoy notes that plantation economies were present and growing in Africa, particularly after the end of the slave trade.
Lovejoy devotes considerable attention to various regions and more attention than most to the role of the Islamic slave trade in driving market growth. His inclusion of Islamic markets, though smaller and with different motivations for participation in the trade (women and eunuchs predominated the Islamic trade), adds a significant ripple that brings in East Africa far more prominently into the narrative. Furthermore, the role of jihads in Africa and the role they played in expanding, consolidating, and building up the institution of slavery are explored.
The regional focus and Lovejoy’s explicit emphasis on differences and change over time were refreshing. Rather than frame African culture as static (an issue with scholarship that over relies on anthropological studies), Lovejoy shows how cultural and political shifts affect the motivations of those participating in the slave trade. Furthermore, this regional focus allows the reader to note how essential warfare is in the development of the Atlantic slave trade. However, rather than frame this as an European imposition he notes that the instability of states post 1600 (in part a result of devastating droughts that led to political collapse and mass migration) and the rise of local warlords who utilized the slave trade to build up slave armies and also increase revenue flow through trading with Europeans were the primary causes in the increase of slave trading. Europeans provided a ready and eager market, but they could not create that market in most of Africa without African participation.
This book, though over emphasizing economics, with the constant emphasis that slavery was indeed tied to production, was fascinating to study. Lovejoy’s demonstration of the interlocking of a global market economy and the push and pull factors of market forces helped develop changes in slavery. I also found his emphasis on violence as key in political change important, though I wonder if more emphasis could have been given to note that political instability comes from far more than just economic issues.
Finally, one critique is his lack of engagement with moral and ideological rationale in ending the slave trade. The attacks on the trade first and then slavery itself within Africa follow a long standing pattern of antislavery activity which targeted the importation of future slaves before rooting out the institution itself. This is an important note because activists were well aware, as Lovejoy pointed out, that simply by ending slavery in one area merely caused the slave trade to move where they would export. When American and British governments ended the slave trade in the first decade of the 1800s, the trade merely shifted further south to Cuba and Brazil.
However, despite these few quibbles, this was an interesting book that provides a fascinating regional study of African slavery through a Marxian or economics dominated lens. Not perfect, it was a good study nonetheless.
Robert Swanson