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British imperialisms role in the transatlantic slave trade

Marxist Theory · 2026-05-13

Core Argument

The article argues that British capitalism was not a reluctant or secondary participant in the transatlantic slave trade but its dominant architect and primary beneficiary. The central thesis is that the slave trade was not an aberration from an otherwise progressive British history, but the material foundation upon which British industrial capitalism was built. The claim that abolition was driven by British moral superiority is rejected as a legitimising myth: abolition occurred when and because the slave-based plantation system in the West Indies had become economically unviable relative to emerging forms of exploitation, particularly in India. The article insists that the working class can only achieve justice for the victims of imperialism by uprooting the capitalist system itself, not by seeking apologies or reparations from its present-day defenders.

Theoretical Grounding

The analysis is rooted in Marx's concept of primitive accumulation as developed in Capital Volume I — the violent historical process by which the conditions for capitalist production were forcibly created. The article draws directly on Marx's observation that "the veiled slavery of the wage workers in Europe needed, for its pedestal, slavery pure and simple in the new world." It applies the Marxist method of tracing how specific forms of exploitation (chattel slavery) were functional for the development of a particular mode of production (industrial capitalism) at a particular stage, and then became obstacles to its further development.

The argument also deploys a materialist conception of ideology: the moral narratives surrounding abolition are treated not as genuine explanations but as expressions of class interests that shifted when the economic basis for slavery eroded. The article situates itself within the Marxist tradition's long-standing critique of bourgeois historiography — the tendency to present capitalist expansion as a story of progress, civilisation, and moral improvement while obscuring its bloody foundations.

Conjunctural Relevance

The article is explicitly occasioned by the political conjuncture of late 2024. Keir Starmer and King Charles III have refused demands from Commonwealth leaders for reparations or even a symbolic apology for Britain's role in the slave trade, with Starmer offering the platitude of "looking forward, not backwards" and suggesting "non-cash" options such as climate change assistance. Jacob Rees-Mogg has gone further, arguing that former colonies "should pay us" for ending slavery, attributing abolition to "Christian charity."

The article intervenes in this debate by demonstrating that the current ruling-class refusal to reckon with imperial history is not a departure from Labour or Conservative tradition but its logical continuation. The same class that profited from slavery now protects the system that slavery built. The article is also part of a broader campaign — the Revolutionary Communist Party's "Books not Bombs" campaign — which aims to arm the working class with a scientific understanding of imperialism as a precondition for fighting it.

Where the Argument Continues

This article is one chapter of a larger booklet, The Crimes of British Imperialism, produced by the Revolutionary Communist Party. The booklet's stated aim is to educate communists in how to fight imperialism today. The article explicitly signals that abolition did not mark the end of British atrocities but a turning point toward even greater imperial expansion — the "scramble for Africa" and the consolidation of British domination in India. The argument therefore continues into analyses of colonial India, the Opium Wars, the destruction of Irish resistance, and the post-war imperialist order, all of which are presumably treated in other chapters of the booklet.

On In Defence of Marxism and Against the Current, related articles would include those on the Haitian Revolution, the American Civil War and British working-class solidarity, the history of primitive accumulation, and the contemporary politics of imperialist war and reparations. The theoretical framework connects to broader Marxist debates on the relationship between slavery and capitalism, particularly the work of Eric Williams (whose Capitalism and Slavery is an unacknowledged but clear influence) and more recent Marxist historians of racial capitalism.

Connections

  • Eric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery (1944) — The foundational Marxist-influenced text arguing that British industrial capitalism was built on slave-based colonial wealth, and that abolition was driven by economic decline of the West Indian plantations, not moral awakening. This article is effectively a popularisation and updating of Williams's thesis.
  • Karl Marx, Capital Volume I, Part VIII: "The So-Called Primitive Accumulation" — The theoretical source for understanding the violent origins of capitalist property relations.
  • C.L.R. James, The Black Jacobins (1938) — The classic Marxist account of the Haitian Revolution, which the article references in passing.
  • Walter Rodney, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa (1972) — For the broader argument about how the extraction of African labour and resources structured global inequality.
  • Robin Blackburn, The Making of New World Slavery (1997) — A detailed Marxist historical account of the relationship between slavery and modern capitalism.

Key Quotes

  1. "Britain was one of the key architects and the dominant power in the slave trade throughout the 18th Century and the beginning of the 19th. It was on the backs of millions of slaves that British capitalism came to dominate the globe, lay the foundations for world trade, and that its empire was able to rule the waves."

  2. "The first struggle relating to slavery therefore was not to abolish it but to expand it!"

  3. "Abolitionism gained traction when slavery ceased to be profitable."

  4. "£20,000,000 in compensation was paid out to the slave owners for their trouble. To pay for this, a loan was taken out that equated to 40% of GDP which was only paid off in 2015."

  5. "The veiled slavery of the wage workers in Europe needed, for its pedestal, slavery pure and simple in the new world." (Marx, Capital, quoted in the article)

  6. "We — the working class — can only bring justice to the innumerable victims of imperialism by fighting to uproot the entire system that caused these crimes in the first place."