Capital and Coercion: Why Slavery Persisted after Britain Banned the Trade
Martins, Igor LU
(2026)
- Abstract
- In 1807, Britain outlawed the slave trade across its empire. Yet in the Cape Colony, households continued accumulating slaves for decades afterwards. New evidence from digitised tax censuses suggests the answer lies not in labour demand, but in the financial value of enslaved people as capital assets.
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/f30e2195-b58c-4c9f-ae5c-6cecd3047d69
- author
- Martins, Igor
LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2026-04-27
- type
- Other contribution
- publication status
- published
- subject
- publisher
- European Historical Economics Society
- project
- The establishment, growth and legacy of a settler colony: Quantitative panel studies of the political economy of Cape Colony
- The Cape of the Good Hope Panel: Long-term studies of growth, inequality and labour coercion in the global south
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- f30e2195-b58c-4c9f-ae5c-6cecd3047d69
- date added to LUP
- 2026-05-08 23:20:56
- date last changed
- 2026-05-11 10:06:06
@misc{f30e2195-b58c-4c9f-ae5c-6cecd3047d69,
abstract = {{In 1807, Britain outlawed the slave trade across its empire. Yet in the Cape Colony, households continued accumulating slaves for decades afterwards. New evidence from digitised tax censuses suggests the answer lies not in labour demand, but in the financial value of enslaved people as capital assets.}},
author = {{Martins, Igor}},
language = {{eng}},
month = {{04}},
publisher = {{European Historical Economics Society}},
title = {{Capital and Coercion: Why Slavery Persisted after Britain Banned the Trade}},
year = {{2026}},
}