SUGAR AND THE MAKING OF THE ATLANTIC WORLD

1. Highlights the complex interplay of forces that characterized the sugar revolution in the
Atlantic world.
2. Rapid expansion of sugar cultivation across the Atlantic world, particularly in regions
such as the Caribbean islands and Brazil. CAUSED BY EUROPEAN COLONIZATION AND
DEMAND FOR SUGAR IN EUROPE.
3. Large scale of sugar production/cultivation shaped the economic landscape of the
Atlantic world.
4. Human cost of revolution: African slaves, harsh/brutal labour conditions, indentured
servitude, dehumanizing nature of chattel slavery.
 Indentured servitude= working without pay.
 I.S vs Slavery= i.servants ultimately attain their freedom
after completing their contract whereas enslaved people
are denied their freedom.
 Chattel slavery= the enslaved person and their offspring is
considered the personal property( chattel) of someone
else, and can be bought and sold.
5. Sugar cultivation fuelled the growth of mercantile capitalism ( the
capitalists involved in producing sugar became more powerful and rich) transforming
global trade patterns and generating immense wealth for European colonial powers.
Sugar created the trajectory( PATH) of globalization and industrial revolution in the
textile industry.

1. INTRODUCTION
 CHAPTER focuses on the making of the Atlantic world
from the late 15th century.
1. The role of Christopher Columbus,
2. The ‘discovery’ and settlement of the New World and,
3. The role of slavery and sugar in the formation of a global north
Atlantic economy.
 Atlantic is used as a unit of historical analysis.
 British historian David Armitage calls the Atlantic a
European ‘invention. NOT BECAUSE Europeans were its
 only denizens, but because Europeans were the first to
connect its four sides into a single entity.
 Before 1492 /15th century and Columbus, the Atlantic did
not exist as one single commercial or social-political
entity.
 Historiographies of the Atlantic have shifted to become
more ‘multicoloured’.
 ATLANTIC is now understood in terms of all the people
that have crossed and populated it.] AND NOT only in
terms of the birth of North American civilisation with its
roots in Europe,
 The most important shifts in focus has been the Atlantic
Slave Trade and its impact on creating a hybrid (mixed)
Atlantic Ocean world.

2. CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS AND THE COLUMBUS EXCHANGE

 COLUMBUS:
 was an explorer and adventure who contracted his
services to the Spanish crown and set sail in a westerly
direction hoping to reach the east. [wanted to go EAST
but mistakenly landed on the WEST] He landed on one of
the Bahamas islands.
 a key figure in European expansion into the New World
(North and South America and the Caribbean).
 European expansion into the Americas amounted to genocide
of local populations: introduction of new crops and plants and
new diseases leading to the death of virtually entire
populations
 COLUMBIAN EXCHANGE TERM: transfer of plants, animals, and
diseases between the Old World of Europe and Africa and the
New World of the Americans +Caribbean.[ used by American
historian Alfred W Crosby in 1972.]
  Introduction of crops such as sugar and coffee; which in
the 18th and 19th century which led to labour of African
slaves on the plantations of the new world
 Europeans also brought diseases such as smallpox, yellow
fever, influenza, chickenpox and malaria – diseases which
killed large numbers of indigenous peoples(GENOCIDE)
 Americans and West Indies had no immunity against the
diseases, so a large 80%–100% of people in some local
communities died.
 Which led to labour shortage which could only be solved
by African slaves, leading to African Slave Trade
 SUMMARY: Arrival(15th)- Intro of crops- Diseases-
Genocide- Labour shortage- African Slave Trade.

3. SLAVE PLANTATIONS- SUGAR TRIANGLE IN THE ATLANTIC.

1. African Slaves 2. Sugar (main plantation commodity)
3. Plantation Eco. Slaves from AFRICA, Sugar from AMERICA,
Capital from EUROPE.

 Portugues were the first to create this.

 Established plantations in 1.Sao Tome and Principe and
Madeira THEN transported to 2.their colony in Brazil from
which it spread to the wider Caribbean( in the Northern
Atlantuc Ocean) region.
A) A.SLAVES: (West Africa)
 Were resistant to new European diseases, increasing
their attractiveness as labour.
 Were cheap.
 Had few opportunities to escape as they were
transported thousands of km away from their
homes.
  Britain, because of its naval superiority, quickly
dominated the slave trade [ had 62% of slaves
from West Africa. b/w 1701 &1810] 18th@19th c.
NAVAL SUPERIORITY= command of the sea when it
is so strong that its rivals cannot attack it directly
 Percentage composition of Slaves:
1. Majority: South America (where most plantations were) –
49%. (South America, Portuguese, Brazil)
2. West Indies (separates the Caribbean Sea)– 42%
3. North and Central America – 6.8%
4. Least no. Europe itself – 1.8%
 Sources of Slaves:
1. Initially: Senegambia on the west coast, Kongo and Angola.
2. Later on: Gold Coast, Dahomey and Mozambique, among
others.
3. THE SUGAR REVOLUTION
 Sugar plantations revolutionised the New World, especially the
Caribbean.
 SOCIAL (shift from peasant to slave-labour society) and
ECONOMIC REVOLUTION(shift from small holdings to large
plantations for mass cultivation). PEASANT= poor farmer who
works on planations and doesn’t have much money.
 Portuguese and Spanish first engaged in cane cultivation in
their Atlantic island possessions such as Sao Tome and Principe
(Portugal) and the Canaries (Spain).
 Impact of sugar cultivation:
 Caribbean islands such as Guadeloupe, Barbados,
Jamaica, Haiti, Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Dominican
Republic, among others, all experienced dramatic social,
political, economic and cultural changes directly linked to
sugar cultivation in the period 1640-1690. 17th centrury.
  French and English islands followed Bahamas example;
changing from European [peasant societies into slave-
based plantation societies].
 Increased demand or sugar was mostly noticed in the
Caribbean.
4. THE DEMAND FOR SUGAR:
 During 12th to (16th)/ 17th century= Sugar was expensive and
only the European rich/ noble could afford it.
 Thus it became symbolic marker of distinction and social status.
 Sugar was first used a s a SPICE to bland (little to no taste)
foods.
 The Crusades( religious people) of the 11th to 13th centuries
increased European exposure to sugar.
 Court records of Henry II (1154-1189) indicate significant royal
expenditure on sugar.
 Sugar’s increasing use in confection and as decoration,
particularly in marzipan . Ceremonial importance – associated
with particular foods to be served at royal feasts and religious
ceremonies.
 Increased cultivation of sugar in the Atlantic decreased sugar
prices, making it more affordable to the ordinary Europeans.
 Sugar was then used as a sweetener for tea, which replaced
alcoholic beverages.

4. THE PLANATION ECONOMY.

 The Plantation Economy Theory explains the experience and
evolution of societies subjected to European-controlled
sugarcane production by an enslaved African labor force and
later by indentured Asian laborers (mostly Indians). [HOW
CARIBBEAN WAS DEVELOPED/ UNDERVELOPED IN
COMPARISON TO FIRST WORL COUNTRIES.]
 By Lloyd Best (economist from Trinidad) and Kari Levitt
(Austrian-Canadian economist) in the 1970.
 ARGUES: -
-the Caribbean economy goes through cycles of ‘boom’ and
‘bust’ AND THAT periods of ‘boom’ are not sufficient for the
region to sustain its economy during the period of ‘bust’.
- Insufficiency due to the foreign ownership of the ‘plantation
sector; as products are geared towards exports RATHER THAN
domestic development.
- which creates a permanent environment of economic
dependency.