The Roots of Inequality
Many of the nations, industries, and institutions we know today are rooted in the long history of colonial expansion and racial slavery. From agricultural practices to racial hierarchies, these systems shaped the structures of our modern world and created massive inequality.
Colonialism and Racial Slavery
Enslaved people on J. J. Smith's plantation, South Carolina. Timothy O'Sullivan, 1862
In the 15th century, European states launched maritime expeditions in pursuit of new resources, establishing colonies in the Americas and parts of Africa and Asia.
Over several centuries, colonizers violently displaced Indigenous peoples and built mines and plantations dependent on enslaved laborers. Unlike earlier forms of slavery and bondage, this slavery was based on skin color.
Over twelve million Africans were forcibly removed from their homelands and enslaved through the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Generations of people were trapped in this cruel institution of racial and hereditary slavery, from the first Africans sold in Lisbon, Portugal, in 1444 to the abolition of slavery in Brazil in 1888.
Who Profited from Slavery and Colonialism?
Nations, Individuals, Industries, and Institutions
Subscription floor of Lloyd’s of London Insurance company, ca. 1800
Nations and peoples around the world profited from colonial expansion and the slave trade. Countries—Britain, France, Portugal, Spain, the Netherlands, Denmark, the United States, Brazil, and others—built their economies from the profits of colonial expansion and enslaved labor. Individuals, from monarchs to merchants, amassed great personal wealth.
Entire industries also emerged and flourished in response to colonial expansion and enslaved labor. Insurance, finance, agriculture, shipping, and manufacturing industries greatly expanded during this period.
Global institutions still operating today—including Barclays, Banco do Brasil, and Aetna—financed and insured colonial expeditions and the slave trade. Other institutions like universities and museums were built by enslaved labor and profited from colonial plunder.
Building Empires and Global Markets
Colonial powers treated people and the environment as disposable resources for the accumulation of wealth. European colonists displaced Indigenous peoples and cleared land to build plantations and mines for large-scale commercial farming and resource extraction.
Enslaved people were exploited and forced to toil on these sites, becoming the backbone of colonial expansion and profit. Commodities produced by enslaved laborers were transported for sale to port cities along the Atlantic Ocean. A new global marketplace emerged where distant geographies were connected through the labor and the products of racial slavery.
Creating Plantations and Mines
Vergelegen Farm, Western Cape, South Africa, 18th century
Enslaved Africans working at a Spanish gold mine, Panama, 1560
Plantations organized people and land to maximize profits. Indigenous communities were violently displaced, and vast swaths of land were cleared to make way for large-scale agriculture. Plantations created societies dependent on a Black laboring class and a European ruling class.
Enslaved people were also forced to mine for gold, silver, and precious minerals, later traded on the global market. These commodities enriched colonial powers and bolstered global trade, while devastating local communities and exacerbating wealth inequality. Colonial mining and the plantation system created models of exploitative resource extraction that define many of our modern economies.
Constructing Cities
View of the Port of Liverpool, 1725
From Liverpool to Rio de Janeiro, European and American port cities flourished due to slavery and the development of related industries like shipping and insurance. Some African cities—such as Luanda and Ouidah—became slave trading centers. However, these cities were economically disadvantaged by increased European colonial presence on the African continent during the 19th and 20th centuries. Urban centers also became places of enslaved labor and home to enslaved dockworkers, sailors, craftspeople, and domestic workers.
Making Race and Anti-Blackness
Race is a social invention, not a biological reality. It was constructed over hundreds of years, created at the intersection of racial slavery, colonialism, and capitalism.
Religious, scientific, and legal arguments were used to legitimize and justify the enslavement of Africans and Indigenous Americans. Such arguments attempted to explain the exploitative caste system in colonial slave societies and justify the dehumanizing system of slavery.
Through these hierarchies and beliefs, European colonizers positioned themselves as superior to non-Europeans, fueling discrimination against Africans and people of African descent and laying the foundation for today’s anti-Black racism and white supremacy.
The Church
Who Has a Soul?
Romanus pontifex, papal bull of Pope Nicholas V, 1455
Map of the world from Liber Chronicarum, Hartmann Schedel, 1500
Religious institutions such as the Catholic Church profited from colonialism and slavery. To justify racial slavery, the Church argued that non-Christians—and later non-Europeans—could be enslaved. Supporters of slavery explained the differences between Africans and Europeans through warped biblical interpretations that associated Black skin with sin and white skin with purity.
Science
Who Is Human?
De humana physiognomonia. Giambattista della Porta, 1586
A General System of Nature, by Carl Linnaeus, 1806
The Atlantic trade led to new encounters between diverse groups of people. These encounters and European colonization of unfamiliar environments supported the development of modern natural science. Naturalists sought to understand the physical differences between plants, animals, and people. In the search for a classification system for humankind, they created “scientific” theories of racial differences and hierarchy.
Colonial Society
Who Has Power?
Painting illustrating the racial caste system of New Spain, 18th century
The Code Noir, 1685
While each colony defined race differently, every colony created racial classification systems to exploit people’s labor in the pursuit of profit. Legal codes were established to enforce racial hierarchies and restrict the political, physical, and social mobility of enslaved laborers and non-Europeans.