Testing the Boundaries of Marginality: Twentieth-Century Slavery and Emancipation Struggles in Nkanu, Northern Igboland, 1920–29

1996 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-80 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carolyn A. Brown
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Forced Labor ◽  
Historical Study ◽  
Political Equality ◽  
Slave Women ◽  
Colonial Economy ◽  
Women And Children ◽  
Colonial Order ◽  
Labor Requirements ◽  
Reign Of Terror

In 1914 the Enugu Government Colliery and the construction of its railway link to the Biafran coast used slave-owning chiefs as labor recruiters. Although aware of slavery in the Nkanu clan area the state simply outlawed the slave trade and excessive treatment but left it to slaves to secure their ‘freedom’. Nkanu slavery was unusually pervasive, incorporating over half of some villages, with few opportunities for manumission or marriage to the freeborn. Severe ritualistic proscriptions excluded slave men from village politics. But forced labor destabilized slavery, causing unrest which reached crisis proportions in the fall of 1922. The revolt presents a unique opportunity for historical study of the goals, ideology and strategies of indigenous slave populations creating ‘freedom’ within the emergent colonial order.When owners demanded slaves' wages, the slaves resisted and demanded full social and political equality with the freeborn. Slaves who remained in the village struggled to provision Enugu's urban working class. For both slavery hindered opportunities in the colonial economy. In retaliation owners evicted slave families, increased their labor requirements and unleashed a reign of terror, abduction and sacrifice of slave women and children. By the fall of 1922 local government collapsed forcing the state to develop a policy on emancipation. It is significant that this struggle converted the slaves from a scattered subordinate group of patrilineages to an aggressive and cohesive community.

Continuing the Bleeding of These Pueblos Will Shortly Make Them Cadavers: The Potosi Mita, Cultural Identity, and Communal Survival in Colonial Peru

2000 ◽  
Vol 56 (4) ◽  
pp. 529-562 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ward Stavig
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
The State ◽  
Forced Labor ◽  
Community Members ◽  
Colonial Peru ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Status ◽  
State Obligations ◽  
Colonial Economy ◽  
Andean Highlands

The exploitation of Andean villagers under the forced labor regime for the mines of Potosi is almost as infamous as the silver they extracted from the cerro rico is famous. Established by Viceroy Toledo in the 1570s, the mita, as the system of forced labor was known, remained in place until the smoke and shot of Latin American independence struggles were in the air. For over two centuries, Spain forced thousands upon thousands of naturales (a common colonial term for indigenous people) from communities throughout the southern Andean highlands to lend their muscle and sweat, and all too often their blood and their lives, to keep Potosi's veins open and flowing. Through this work the mitayos and their communities not only drove the colonial economy, but also were a major force in sustaining the Spanish empire and in helping forge the modern world's dominant economic system. Conversely, mita exploitation threatened the very survival of the communities subject to it. The mita was so onerous that virtually all indigenous peoples subject to the labor draft, regardless of ethnicity or class, raised an almost continuous voice of protest from their communities against the mita and its abuses. Tensions created by the mita also severely strained the bonds that linked community, curaca, and the state, which were primary ingredients in the social glue that kept colonial Andean society from coming apart. To avoid descending into the mines, and to escape such horrors as laboring over mercury vapors, many people permanently fled their communities, giving up the status of originarios (community members with rights such as access to land and subject to state obligations) to become forasteros (indigenous person not living in community of origin, or descendant of the same, without communal rights but exempt from many state obligations). In this way the mita, one of the few forces that had potential for uniting Andean peoples in opposition to the state also fractured them. Communal solidarity was severely strained and neither the shared experience of the mita nor the commonality of experience in Potosi created sufficient cohesion to overcome the ethnic and regional differences that divided them.

scholarly journals Pleistocene Mammals from Pampean Region (Argentina). Biostratigraphic, Biogeographic, and Environmental Implications

Quaternary ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 15
Author(s):  
José Luis Prado ◽  
María Teresa Alberdi ◽  
Jonathan Bellinzoni
Keyword(s):  
South America ◽  
The State ◽  
Historical Study ◽  
South American ◽  
Environmental Implications ◽  
Sedimentary Sequences ◽  
Pampean Region ◽  
Mammalian Faunas ◽  
Pleistocene Mammals ◽  
Fossil Records

The Pampean Region contains sedimentary sequences with abundant mammal fossil records, which constitute the chronological outline of the Plio–Pleistocene of South America. These classic localities have been used for more than a century to correlate with other South American regions. Throughout this time, a series of misinterpretations have appeared. To understand the stratigraphic significance of these localities and the geochronological situation of each unit referring to the Pleistocene, a critical historical study of the antecedents was carried out, evaluating the state of each unit. The biostratigraphic studies of the Pampean Region’s mammalian faunas improved the understanding of biogeographic changes taking into account the environmental fluctuations of the Pleistocene.

A Practical Army of Liberation

2018 ◽  
pp. 106-132
Author(s):  
Kristopher A. Teters
Keyword(s):  
Moral Reasons ◽  
Border States ◽  
Military Necessity ◽  
Slave Women ◽  
Emancipation Proclamation ◽  
Women And Children

After the final Emancipation Proclamation went into effect in January 1863, western armies generally liberated slaves quite vigorously. But always driving this emancipation policy first and foremost were practical military considerations. Many officers supported emancipation because it would help win the war, and this was exactly how they carried out the policy. As much as possible, officers focused on freeing slaves for the army’s benefit, often targeting able-bodied men who could be of most use as teamsters, pioneers, laborers, and soldiers. Given these military priorities, officers frequently saw the slave women and children flocking to their camps as a military burden and usually sent them to hellish contraband camps or to labor for wages on plantations. In the politically sensitive border states of Kentucky and Missouri, emancipation was especially slow and conflict ridden. Yet even there, military necessity forced commanders to eventually adopt increasingly emancipationist policies. A few officers did support emancipation for moral reasons, but moral imperatives had very little influence on emancipation policies in the field. Officers’ prevailing racial beliefs help explain why many of them were more concerned with former slaves’ ability to help the army than with their welfare.

scholarly journals Problem of Statelessness in Nepal

NUTA Journal ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 64-69
Author(s):  
Rameshwor Upadhyay
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
The State ◽  
Fundamental Rights ◽  
The Other ◽  
Universal Principle ◽  
Legal Obligations ◽  
The World ◽  
Women And Children ◽  
The Government ◽  
International Instruments

This paper highlighted Nepalese statelessness issue from Nationality perspective. Nationality is one of the major human rights concerns of the citizens. In fact, citizenship is one of the major fundamental rights guaranteed by the constitution. According to the universal principle related to the statelessness, no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his or her nationality. In this connection, on one hand, this paper traced out the international legal obligations created by the conventions to the state parties in which state must bear the responsibility for making national laws to comply with the international instruments. On the other hand, this paper also appraised statelessness related lacunae and shortcomings seen in Municipal laws as well as gender discriminatory laws that has been supporting citizens to become statelessness. By virtue being a one of the modern democratic states in the world, it is the responsibility of the government to protect and promote human rights of the citizens including women and children. Finally, this paper suggests government to take necessary initiation to change and repeal the discriminatory provisions related to citizenship which are seen in the constitution and other statutory laws.

South Africa’s hybrid care regime: The changing and contested roles of individuals, families and the state after apartheid

2018 ◽  
Vol 66 (4) ◽  
pp. 602-616 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kirsty Button ◽  
Elena Moore ◽  
Jeremy Seekings
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Access To Care ◽  
The State ◽  
Ordinary People ◽  
Social Democratic ◽  
Patriarchal Ideology ◽  
Family Balancing ◽  
The Family ◽  
Widespread Belief ◽  
Women And Children

The post-apartheid state in South Africa inherited a care regime that historically combined liberal, social democratic and conservative features. The post-apartheid state has sought to deracialise the care regime, through extending to the African majority the privileges that hitherto had been largely confined to the white minority, and to transform it, to render it more appropriate to the needs and norms of the African majority. Deracialisation proved insufficient and transformation too limited to address inequalities in access to care. Reform also generated tensions, including between a predominant ideology that accords women and children rights as autonomous individuals, the widespread belief in kinship obligations and an enduring if less widespread conservative, patriarchal ideology. Ordinary people must navigate between the market (if they can afford it), the state and the family, balancing opportunities for independence with the claims made on and by kin. The care regime thus remains a contested hybrid.

scholarly journals Historiography and Research Problems of Slavery and the Slave Trade in a Global-Historical Perspective

2012 ◽  
Vol 57 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-111 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Zeuske
Keyword(s):  
Historical Perspective ◽  
Slave Trade ◽  
Historical Thinking ◽  
Roman Law ◽  
The World ◽  
Slave Women ◽  
Research Problems ◽  
Women And Children

SummaryThis article takes a global-historical perspective on all slaveries and slave trades (and contraband trading of human bodies) in relation to today's state of capitalist accumulation. It follows the different “national” schools of slavery research in different imperial traditions, as well as the sections of historical thinking stimulated through slavery research. Although legal ownership over humans does not exist any more, more women and men are in conditions of slavery today than in any other period of history since 1200. Against this background, the article criticizes the concentration in historiography on “hegemonic” slaveries (antique, Islamic, and American plantation slaveries) and proposes a focus on smaller “slaveries” all over the world (first of all of women and children), and on the agency of slaves and slave women, rather than on “great” slavery in a tradition of “Roman Law”.

Hegel and Marx on the Necessity of the Reign of Terror

2017 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 202-223
Author(s):  
David James
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Freedom ◽  
Modern State ◽  
The World ◽  
Reign Of Terror

AbstractBoth Hegel and Marx appear committed to the idea that the Reign of Terror was in some sense necessary. I argue that Hegel explains this necessity in terms of the concept of ‘absolute freedom’, together with the associated self-conception and normative picture of the world. It will be argued that Marx also views the Reign of Terror as necessary because of an abstract conception of political freedom and the citizen which conflicts with a determinate individuality that is characterized by particular interests and identities. In connection with Marx’s critique of Hegel’s theory of the modern state I draw attention to a puzzle, the discussion of which will lead to a brief account of how Marx’s attempt to overcome the opposition between the state and civil society differs from Hegel’s.

Political Inclusion and the Dynamics of Democratization

1996 ◽  
Vol 90 (3) ◽  
pp. 475-487 ◽  
Author(s):  
John S. Dryzek
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
The State ◽  
Strategic Choices ◽  
Political Equality ◽  
Citizenship Rights ◽  
State And Society ◽  
Political Inclusion ◽  
Progressive Inclusion

Once universal adult citizenship rights have been secured in a society, democratization is mostly a matter of the more authentic political inclusion of different groups and categories, for which formal political equality can hide continued exclusion or oppression. It is important, however, to distinguish between inclusion in the state and inclusion in the polity more generally. Democratic theorists who advocate a strategy of progressive inclusion of as many groups as possible in the state fail to recognize that the conditions for authentic as opposed to symbolic inclusion are quite demanding. History shows that benign inclusion in the state is possible only when (a) a group's defining concern can be assimilated to an established or emerging state imperative, and (b) civil society is not unduly depleted by the group's entry into the state. Absent such conditions, oppositional civil society may be a better focus for democratization than is the state. A flourishing oppositional sphere, and therefore the conditions for democratization itself, may actually be facilitated by a passively exclusive state, the main contemporary form of which is corporatism. Benign inclusion in the state can sometimes occur, but any such move should also produce exclusions that both facilitate future democratization and guard against any reversal of democratic commitment in state and society. These considerations have substantial implications for the strategic choices of social movements.

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