Slaverys Global Impact and Economic Justifications,...

Slavery’s Global Impact and Economic Justifications, Today and Yesterday Slavery existed in some form in every region of the world. During the earliest civilizations, slave labor built nations and empires in Europe, Egypt, Greece, Asia and Africa. Thousands of years later, the Portuguese, Dutch and English realized the profit value that a market in human capital would provide. Africans were exported from their homeland to the New World under the most miserable conditions imaginable. Prof. Marcus Rediker, author of The Slave Ship, A Human History says, â€Å"We’re fascinated by all the tall ships except the most important one, and that’s the slave ship. And that one we can hardly bear to look at†. Slaves were packed like sardines†¦show more content†¦Ã¢â‚¬Å"In India, Hindu law dictates that a slave should not be mistreated. A slave was to be housed, clothed and fed, and, in certain cases, could be beaten, but only on their back when punished. A slave could try to escape once, and if they succeeded they could go back t o their caste. If an owner was very religious, he would treat his slaves well† (Bogucki, 2008). In reality though, the life of a slave was different from what the religion required. Often a slave’s life was filled with terror; in most cases, they were mistreated, beaten, and killed for the slightest infraction. They were forced to haul water in poor weather, carry heavy loads of goods or other supplies and were responsible for the upkeep of their owner’s homes. Some royal governments imported slaves from Greece to work as palace guards. Women and castrated males (eunuchs) were used to protect a king’s harem of concubines and some women guards would become connubial. Ewald (1992) suggests that slavery and the slave trade in the Atlantic and Islamic Africa cannot be compared. The Islamic world began trading slaves a thousand years before the Atlantic slave trade. Slaves who sailed on the Red Sea, and the Indian Ocean, or those who crossed the Sahara Desert ended up in Muslim societies. Rulers and owners of large tracts of land used thousands of slaves for agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa, usually in dire conditions. Of the Saharan salt mines it is said that no slave lived