23 August marks the International Day of Remembrance for the Victims of the Slave Trade and its Abolition. This date was chosen by the General Conference of UNESCO in memory of the famous Haitian Revolution - a major slave uprising on the island of Santo Domingo on the night of August 22-23, which subsequently led to the emergence of Haiti - the world's first state under the rule of freed slaves and the first independent country in Latin America. It is believed that before the slave trade was officially banned in the 19th century, at different times from the African continent to the North American colonies of Great Britain alone, at least 14 million Africans were exported for the purpose of enslaving. Millions of Africans were delivered to the Spanish, Portuguese, French and Dutch colonies. They laid the foundation for the black population of the New World, which today is especially numerous in Brazil, the United States and the Caribbean. However, these colossal figures concern only a very limited in time and geography period of the transatlantic slave trade of the 16th-19th centuries, carried out by Portuguese, Spanish, French, English, American, Dutch slave traders. The true scale of the slave trade in the world throughout its history cannot be accurately calculated.
Slave Route to the New World
The transatlantic slave trade began its history in the middle of the 15th century, with the beginning of the Age of Discovery. Moreover, it was officially sanctioned by none other than Pope Nicholas V, who issued in 1452 a special bull that allowed Portugal to seize land on the African continent and sell black Africans into slavery. Thus, at the origins of the slave trade was, among other things, the Catholic Church, which patronized the then maritime powers - Spain and Portugal, which were considered the stronghold of the papal throne. In the first phase of the transatlantic slave trade, it was the Portuguese who were destined to play a key role in it. This was due to the fact that it was the Portuguese who began the systematic development of the African continent before all European states.
Prince Henry the Navigator (1394-1460), who stood at the beginning of the Portuguese maritime epic, set the goal of his military-political and nautical activities to search for a sea route to India. Over the course of forty years, this unique Portuguese political, military and religious figure has equipped numerous expeditions, sending them to find a way to India and to discover new lands.
- The Portuguese Prince Henry received his nickname "Navigator", or "Navigator", for the fact that he devoted almost his entire adult life to the exploration of new lands and the extension of the power of the Portuguese crown to them. He not only equipped and sent expeditions, but also personally participated in the capture of Ceuta, founded the famous school of navigation and navigation in Sagres.
Portuguese expeditions sent by Prince Henry circled the western coast of the African continent, scouting coastal territories and building Portuguese trading posts at strategically important points. The history of the Portuguese slave trade began with the activities of Heinrich the Navigator and the expeditions he sent. The first slaves were taken from the western coast of the African continent and taken to Lisbon, after which the Portuguese throne obtained permission from the Pope to colonize the African continent and export black slaves.
Nevertheless, until the middle of the 17th century, the African continent, especially its western coast, was in the spectrum of interests of the Portuguese crown in secondary positions. In the XV-XVI centuries. The Portuguese monarchs considered their main task to be the search for a sea route to India, and then ensuring the security of Portuguese forts in India, East Africa and the sea route from India to Portugal. The situation changed at the end of the 17th century, when plantation agriculture began to develop actively in Brazil, which was developed by the Portuguese. Similar processes took place in other European colonies in the New World, which sharply increased the demand for African slaves, who were considered a much more acceptable labor force than the American Indians, who did not know how and did not want to work on plantations. The increase in the demand for slaves brought the attention of the Portuguese monarchs to their trading posts on the West African coast. The main source of slaves for Portuguese Brazil was the coast of Angola. By this time, Angola began to be actively developed by the Portuguese, who drew attention to its significant human resources. If slaves came to the Spanish, English and French colonies in the West Indies and North America primarily from the coast of the Gulf of Guinea, then to Brazil the main flow was directed from Angola, although there were also large deliveries of slaves from Portuguese trading posts on the territory of the Slave Coast.
Later, with the development of European colonization of the African continent on the one hand, and the New World on the other, Spain, the Netherlands, England, and France joined the process of the transatlantic slave trade. Each of these states had colonies in the New World and African trading posts from which slaves were exported. It was on the use of slave labor that the entire economy of "both Americas" was actually based for several centuries. It turned out to be a kind of "triangle of the slave trade". Slaves came from the West African coast to America, with the help of whose labor they cultivated crops on plantations, obtained minerals in mines, then exported to Europe. This situation persisted in general until the turn of the 18th - 19th centuries, despite numerous protests by supporters of the abolition of slavery, inspired by the ideas of French humanists or sectarian Quakers. The beginning of the end of the "triangle" was laid precisely by the events of the night of August 22-23, 1791 in the colony of Santo Domingo.
Sugar Island
By the end of the 1880s, the island of Haiti, named at its discovery by Christopher Columbus Hispaniola (1492), was divided into two parts. The Spaniards, who originally owned the island, in 1697 officially recognized France's rights to a third of the island, which had been controlled by French pirates since 1625. This is how the history of the French colony of Santo Domingo began. The Spanish part of the island later became the Dominican Republic, the French - the Republic of Haiti, but more on that later.
Santo Domingo was one of the most significant West Indian colonies. There were numerous plantations, which provided 40% of the total then world sugar turnover. The plantations belonged to Europeans of French origin, including many descendants of Sephardic Jews who emigrated to the countries of the New World, fleeing European anti-Semitic sentiments. Moreover, it was the French part of the island that was the most significant economically.
- oddly enough, the history of French expansion on the island of Hispaniola, later renamed Santo Domingo and Haiti, was started by pirates - buccaneers. Having settled on the west coast of the island, they terrorized the Spanish authorities, who owned the island as a whole, and, in the end, ensured that the Spaniards were forced to recognize the sovereignty of France over this part of their colonial possession.
The social structure of Santo Domingo at the time described included three main groups of the population. The upper level of the social hierarchy was occupied by the French - first of all, the natives of France, who formed the backbone of the administrative apparatus, as well as Creoles - the descendants of French settlers who were already born on the island, and other Europeans. Their total number reached 40,000 people, in whose hands practically all the land property of the colony was concentrated. In addition to the French and other Europeans, about 30,000 freedmen and their descendants also lived on the island. They were mainly mulattos - the descendants of the ties of European men with their African slaves, who received release. They, of course, were not the elite of colonial society and were recognized as racially inferior, but due to their free position and the presence of European blood, the colonialists considered them as a pillar of their power. Among the mulattoes were not only overseers, police guards, minor officials, but also plantation managers and even owners of their own plantations.
At the bottom of colonial society there were 500,000 black slaves. At that time, it was actually half of all slaves in the West Indies. Slaves in Santo Domingo were imported from the coast of West Africa - primarily from the so-called. Slave Coast, located on the territory of modern Benin, Togo and part of Nigeria, as well as from the territory of modern Guinea. That is, the Haitian slaves were the descendants of African peoples living in those areas. At the new place of residence, people from various African tribes mixed, as a result of which a special unique Afro-Caribbean culture was formed, which absorbed elements of the cultures of both West African peoples and the colonialists. By the 1780s. the importation of slaves into the territory of Santo Domingo reached its peak. If in 1771 15 thousand slaves were imported a year, then in 1786 already 28 thousand Africans arrived annually, and by 1787 the French plantations began to receive 40 thousand black slaves.
However, as the African population increased, social problems also grew in the colony. In many ways, they turned out to be associated with the emergence of a significant stratum of "colored" - mulattos, who, receiving liberation from slavery, began to grow richer and, accordingly, claim to expand their social rights. Some mulattoes themselves became planters, as a rule, settling in mountainous areas that are inaccessible and unsuitable for sugar cultivation. Here they created coffee plantations. By the way, by the end of the 18th century, Santo Domingo exported 60% of the coffee consumed in Europe. By the same time, a third of the plantations of the colony and a quarter of black slaves were in the hands of the mulattoes. Yes, yes, yesterday's slaves or their descendants did not hesitate to use the slave labor of their darker fellow tribesmen, being no less cruel masters than the French.
The uprising of 23 August and the "black consul"
When the Great French Revolution took place, the mulattoes demanded that the French government equal rights with whites. The representative of the mulattoes, Jacques Vincent Auger, went to Paris, from where he returned imbued with the spirit of the revolution and demanded that the mulattoes and whites be completely equalized, including in the field of voting rights. Since the colonial administration was much more conservative than the Parisian revolutionaries, Governor Jacques Auger refused and the latter raised an uprising in early 1791. The colonial troops succeeded in suppressing the uprising, and Auger himself was arrested and put to death. Nevertheless, the beginning of the struggle of the African population of the island for their liberation was laid. On the night of August 22-23, 1791, the next major uprising began, led by Alejandro Bukman. Naturally, the first victims of the uprising were European settlers. In just two months, 2,000 people of European origin were killed. Plantations were also burned - yesterday's slaves did not imagine further prospects for the economic development of the island and did not intend to engage in farming. However, initially, the French troops, with the help of the British who came to help from the neighboring British colonies in the West Indies, managed to partially suppress the uprising and execute Buckman.
However, the suppression of the first wave of the uprising, the beginning of which is now celebrated as the International Day of Remembrance for the Victims of the Slave Trade and its Abolition, only triggered a second wave - more organized and, therefore, more dangerous. After Buchmann's execution, François Dominique Toussaint (1743-1803), better known to the modern reader as Toussaint-Louverture, stood at the head of the rebellious slaves. In Soviet times, the writer A. K. Vinogradov wrote a novel about him and the Haitian Revolution, The Black Consul. Indeed, Toussaint-Louverture was an extraordinary figure and in many respects aroused respect even among his opponents. Toussaint was a black slave who, despite his status, received a decent education by colonial standards. He worked for his master as a doctor, then in 1776 he received the long-awaited release and worked as an estate manager. Apparently, out of a sense of gratitude to his master for his release, as well as for his human decency, Toussaint, shortly after the start of the August 1791 uprising, helped the family of the former owner to escape and escape. After that, Toussaint joined the uprising and, due to his education, as well as outstanding qualities, quickly became one of its leaders.
- Toussaint-Louverture was probably the most adequate leader of the Haitians in the entire history of the struggle for independence and the further sovereign existence of the country. He gravitated towards European culture and sent his two sons, born to a mulatto wife, to study in France. By the way, they later returned to the island with a French expeditionary force.
Meanwhile, the French authorities also displayed controversial policies. If in Paris the power was in the hands of revolutionaries, oriented, among other things, to the abolition of slavery, then in the colony the local administration, supported by the planters, was not going to lose their positions and sources of income. Therefore, there was a confrontation between the central government of France and the governor of Santo Domingo. As soon as in 1794 the abolition of slavery was officially proclaimed in France, Toussaint heeded the advice of the revolutionary governor of the island, Etienne Laveau, and, at the head of the rebellious slaves, went over to the side of the Convention. The rebel leader was promoted to the military rank of brigadier general, after which Toussaint led the hostilities against the Spanish troops, who were trying, taking advantage of the political crisis in France, to take over the colony and suppress the slave uprising. Later, Toussaint's troops clashed with British troops, also sent from the nearest British colonies to suppress the black uprising. Proving himself an outstanding military leader, Toussaint was able to expel both the Spaniards and the British from the island. At the same time, Toussaint dealt with the leaders of the mulattoes, who were trying to maintain a leading position on the island after the expulsion of the French planters. In 1801, the Colonial Assembly declared the autonomy of the Colony of Santo Domingo. Toussaint-Louverture became the governor, of course.
The further fate of the day before yesterday's slave, yesterday's leader of the rebels and the current governor of blacks, was unenviable and became the complete opposite of the triumph of the 1790s. This was due to the fact that the metropolis, where by that time Napoleon Bonaparte was in power, decided to stop the "riots" taking place in Santo Domingo and sent expeditionary troops to the island. Yesterday's closest associates of the "black consul" went over to the side of the French. The father of Haitian independence himself was arrested and taken to France, where he died two years later in the prison castle of Fort-de-Joux. The dreams of the "black consul" of Haiti as a free republic of yesterday's slaves were not destined to come true. What came to replace French colonial rule and plantation slavery had nothing to do with genuine ideas of freedom and equality. In October 1802, the leaders of the mulattoes raised an uprising against the French expeditionary corps, and on November 18, 1803, they were able to finally defeat it. On January 1, 1804, the creation of a new independent state, the Republic of Haiti, was proclaimed.
The sad fate of Haiti
For two hundred and ten years of sovereign existence, the first independent colony has turned from the most economically developed region of the West Indies into one of the poorest countries in the world, shaken by constant coups, with an overwhelming level of crime and appalling poverty of the vast majority of the population. Naturally, it is worth telling how it happened. 9 months after the proclamation of Haiti's independence, on September 22, 1804, a former associate of Toussaint-Louverture, Jean Jacques Dessalines (1758-1806), also a former slave and then a rebel commander, proclaimed himself Emperor of Haiti, Jacob I.
- the former slave of Dessalines before his release was named in honor of the master Jacques Duclos. Despite the fact that he initiated the real genocide of the white population on the island, he saved his master from death, following the example of Toussaint Louverture. It is clear that Dessaline was haunted by Napoleon's laurels, but the Haitian lacked the leadership talent of the great Corsican.
The first-order decision of the newly-minted monarch was the total massacre of the white population, as a result of which there was virtually no left on the island. Accordingly, there are practically no specialists left who can develop the economy, heal and teach people, build buildings and roads. But among yesterday's rebels, there were many who wanted to become kings and emperors themselves.
Two years after proclaiming himself Emperor of Haiti, Jean-Jacques Dessalines was brutally murdered by yesterday's associates. One of them, Henri Christophe, was appointed head of the interim military government. At first, he tolerated this modest title for a long time, five years, but in 1811 he could not stand it and proclaimed himself king of Haiti, Henri I. Note - he was clearly more modest than Dessaline and did not claim imperial regalia. But from his supporters he formed the Haitian nobility, generously endowing them with aristocratic titles. Yesterday's slaves became dukes, earls, viscounts.
In the southwest of the island, after the murder of Dessalin, the mulatto planters raised their heads. Their leader, the mulatto Alexander Petion, turned out to be a more adequate person than his former comrades-in-arms in the struggle. He did not proclaim himself emperor and king, but was approved as the first president of Haiti. Thus, until 1820, when King Henri Christophe shot himself, fearing more terrible reprisals from the participants in the uprising against him, there were two Haiti - the monarchy and the republic. General education was proclaimed in the republic, distribution of lands to yesterday's slaves was organized. In general, these were almost the best times for the country in its entire history. At least, Petion tried to somehow contribute to the economic revival of the former colony, while not forgetting to support the national liberation movement in the Spanish colonies of Latin America - to help Bolivar and other leaders of the struggle for the sovereignty of Latin American countries. However, Petion died even before Christophe's suicide - in 1818. Under the rule of Petion's successor, Jean Pierre Boyer, the two Haitis were united. Boyer ruled until 1843, after which he was overthrown and came that black streak in the history of Haiti, which continues to the present day.
The reasons for the dire socio-economic situation and constant political confusion in the first state of African slaves largely lie in the specifics of the social system that took shape in the country after pre-colonization. First of all, it should be noted that the slaughtered or escaped planters were replaced by no less cruel exploiters from among the mulattoes and Negroes. The economy in the country practically did not develop, and constant military coups only destabilized the political situation. The 20th century turned out to be even worse for Haiti than the 19th century. It was marked by the American occupation in 1915-1934, which aimed to protect the interests of American companies from constant unrest in the republic, the brutal dictatorship of "Papa Duvalier" in 1957-1971. worldwide fame, a series of uprisings and military coups. The latest large-scale news about Haiti is the 2010 earthquake, which claimed the lives of 300 thousand people and caused serious damage to the already frail infrastructure of the country, and the cholera epidemic in the same 2010, which cost the lives of 8 thousand Haitians.
Today, the socio-economic situation in Haiti can be best illustrated by numbers. Two thirds of the Haitian population (60%) do not have a job or a permanent source of income, but those who work do not have adequate income - 80% of Haitians live below the poverty line. Half of the country's population (50%) is completely illiterate. The AIDS epidemic continues in the country - 6% of the republic's residents are infected with the immunodeficiency virus (and this is according to official data). In fact, Haiti, in the truest sense of the word, has become a veritable "black hole" of the New World. In Soviet historical and political literature, the socio-economic and political problems of Haiti were explained by the machinations of American imperialism, interested in exploiting the population and territory of the island. In fact, while the role of the United States in artificially cultivating backwardness in Central America cannot be discounted, the history of the country is the root of many of the country's troubles. Starting with the genocide of the white population, the destruction of profitable plantations and the destruction of infrastructure, the leaders of yesterday's slaves failed to build a normal state and themselves doomed it to the dire situation in which Haiti has existed for two centuries. The old slogan “we will destroy everything to the ground, and then …” only worked in the first half. No, of course, many of those who were nobody really became “everything” in sovereign Haiti, but thanks to their methods of government, the new world was never built.
Modern "living slain"
Meanwhile, the problem of slavery and the slave trade remains relevant in the modern world. Although 223 years have passed since the Haitian uprising of August 23, 1791, a little less - since the liberation of slaves by the European colonial powers, slavery still occurs today. Even if we do not talk about all the well-known examples of sexual slavery, the use of the labor of abducted or by force detained people, there is slavery and, as they say, "on an industrial scale." Human rights organizations, speaking about the scale of slavery in the modern world, cite numbers up to 200 million people. However, the figure of the English sociologist Kevin Bales, who speaks of 27 million slaves, is most likely closer to the truth. First of all, their labor is used in third world countries - in households, the agro-industrial complex, mining and manufacturing industries.
Regions of the spread of mass slavery in the modern world - first of all, the countries of South Asia - India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, some states of West, Central and East Africa, Latin America. In India and Bangladesh, slavery can primarily mean virtually unpaid child labor in certain industries. Families of landless peasants, who, despite their lack of material prosperity, have an extremely high birth rate, sell their sons and daughters out of despair to enterprises where the latter work virtually free of charge and in extremely difficult and dangerous conditions for life and health. In Thailand, there is "sexual slavery", which took the form of the mass sale of girls from remote areas of the country to brothels in major resort cities (Thailand is a place of attraction for "sex tourists" from all over the world). Child labor is widely used on plantations to collect cocoa beans and peanuts in West Africa, primarily in Côte d'Ivoire, where slaves from neighboring and more economically backward Mali and Burkina Faso are sent.
In Mauritania, the social structure is still reminiscent of the phenomenon of slavery. As you know, in this country, one of the most backward and closed even by the standards of the African continent, the caste division of society remains. There is the highest military nobility - "Hasans" from the Arab-Bedouin tribes, Muslim clergy - "Marabuts" and nomadic pastoralists - "Zenaga" - mainly of Berber origin, as well as "Haratins" - the descendants of slaves and freedmen. The number of slaves in Mauritania is 20% of the population - by far the highest in the world. Three times the Mauritanian authorities tried to ban slavery - and all to no avail. The first time was in 1905, under the influence of France. The second time - in 1981, the last time - quite recently, in 2007.
Whether the ancestors of the Mauritanian have anything to do with slaves is quite simple to find out - by the color of their skin. The upper castes of Moorish society are Caucasian Arabs and Berbers, the lower castes are Negroids, the descendants of African slaves from Senegal and Mali who were captured by nomads. Since the higher castes do not allow their status to fulfill their "work duties", all agricultural and handicraft work, caring for livestock, and household work falls on the shoulders of slaves. But in Mauritania, slavery is special - Eastern, also called "domestic". Many of these "slaves" live well, so even after the official abolition of slavery in the country they are in no hurry to leave their masters, living in the position of domestic servants. Indeed, if they leave, they will inevitably be doomed to poverty and unemployment.
In Niger, slavery was officially abolished only in 1995 - less than twenty years ago. Naturally, after such a short time has elapsed, one can hardly talk about the complete eradication of this archaic phenomenon in the life of the country. International organizations speak of at least 43,000 slaves in modern Niger. Their focus is, on the one hand, the tribal confederations of nomads - Tuareg, where slavery is similar to the Moorish, and on the other hand - the houses of the tribal nobility of the Hausa people, where significant numbers of "domestic slaves" are also kept. A similar situation takes place in Mali, the social structure of which is in many ways similar to the Mauritanian and Nigerian.
Needless to say, slavery persists in the very Haiti, from where the struggle for the emancipation of slaves began. In modern Haitian society, a phenomenon called "restavek" is widespread. This is the name of children and adolescents sold into domestic slavery to more prosperous fellow citizens. The overwhelming majority of families, given the total poverty of Haitian society and massive unemployment, are unable to provide even food for the children born, as a result of which, as soon as the child grows to a more or less independent age, he is sold into domestic slavery. International organizations claim that the country has up to 300 thousand "restavki".
- The number of child slaves in Haiti increased even more after the catastrophic earthquake of 2010, when hundreds of thousands of already poor families lost even their squalid homes and meager property. Surviving children became the only commodity, due to the sale of which it was possible to exist for some time.
Considering that the population in the republic is about 10 million people, this is not a small figure. As a rule, restavek are exploited as domestic servants, moreover, they are cruelly treated and, upon reaching adolescence, are most often thrown out into the street. Deprived of education and lacking a profession, yesterday's "slave children" join the ranks of street prostitutes, homeless people, petty criminals.
Despite the protests of international organizations, "restavek" in Haiti is so widespread that it is considered absolutely normal in Haitian society. A domestic slave can be presented as a wedding present to newlyweds, they can even be sold to a relatively poor family. More often than not, the social status and prosperity of the owner is also reflected in the little slave - in the poor families of the "restavek" life is even worse than in the wealthy. Very often, from a poor family living in a slum area of Port-au-Prince or another Haitian city, a child is sold into slavery into a family with approximately the same material wealth. Naturally, the police and authorities turn a blind eye to such a massive phenomenon in Haitian society.
It is significant that many migrants from archaic societies in Asia and Africa are transferring their social relations to the "host countries" of Europe and America. Thus, the police of European states have repeatedly uncovered cases of "internal slavery" in the diaspora of Asian and African migrants. Immigrants from Mauritania, Somalia, Sudan or India can keep slaves in the "migrant quarters" of London, Paris or Berlin, completely without thinking about the relevance of this phenomenon in "civilized Europe." Cases of slavery are frequent and widely covered in the post-Soviet space, including the Russian Federation. Obviously, the possibilities for maintaining such a situation are dictated not only by social conditions in the Third World countries, which condemn their natives to the role of guest workers and slaves in the homes and enterprises of more successful compatriots, but also by the policy of multiculturalism, which allows the existence of enclaves of completely alien cultures on European territory.
Thus, the existence of slavery in the modern world indicates that the topic of the fight against the slave trade is relevant not only in relation to the old historical events in the New World, to the transatlantic supply of slaves from Africa to America. It is the poverty and powerlessness in the Third World countries, the plundering of their national wealth by transnational corporations, and the corruption of local governments that become a favorable background for the preservation of this monstrous phenomenon. And, in some cases, as the example of Haitian history cited in this article demonstrates, the soil of modern slavery is abundantly fertilized by the descendants of yesterday's slaves.
