Haiti is certainly a counterexample, as is Zanzibar, but “all but 3” is pretty close to “all but 1,” hardly deserving of “Huh?” Yes, Britain’s war on the slave trade weakened slavery, but did not immediately end it in any state. I believe the conquest of Zanzibar is the only example of Britain forcing another state to abandon slavery.
I’m more concerned about the difference between “nation” and “state,” which I think makes the original statement rather misleading. There are many states today, but most of them were parts of European colonial empires and their abolition was imposed from Europe. This was done peacefully by governments that gained their power through unrelated violence.
That was my attempt to express a model conflict, basically “this disagrees with my sense of history.” As I understand it, global abolitionism was basically a British phenomenon, and the motive force seems to primarily be private groups, not state actors. It may be a point in credit to governments that they mostly acceded to the abolitionist movement nonviolently, but I don’t think it’s reasonable to claim they were the primary actors, or to claim that most governments did it independently. (There are still modern proponents of slavery around the world, as well as ongoing illegal slavery which is mostly opposed by European / Anglosphere groups.)
Do you recognize that you are saying something completely different from your original comment? (completely different from and much better than) Your previous comment appears to be claiming substantial disagreement over facts. Also, you switched from talking about the British government to private actions.
Assigning credit is difficult. Yes, maybe Trevor’s example is bad, even if his facts are essentially correct. But if you credit British violence, you have to give that government credit for long term planning and cost-effective, minimal violence.
Yes, private writings, the Enlightenment, pushed slavery out of fashion. That was the important step, but there’s still the step of actually ending slavery, which was done by governments. It is impressive how many managed to expropriate rich people without violence. (But I don’t give them credit for being cheap, rather than paying off the rich people, as only(?) Britain did.)
Do you recognize that you are saying something completely different from your original comment?
They look comparable to me. I still think that the factual claim “Only the US fought a war to abolish slavery” is incorrect, as is “Every other nation on Earth abolished it by government passing laws”. Writing down that the slave trade is illegal is one thing, the West Africa Squadron is another. (I didn’t explicitly raise the disagreement with “within a few generations” like buybuydandavis, but disagreement on that point is also strongly relevant, as I’ll get to in a bit.)
It seems best to start by disagreeing on facts, because those are easier to resolve.
In the second comment, I elaborated on why I disagree on interpretation as well as disagreeing on facts. This thread is about what governments got right, and so I am reluctant to say “governments got slavery right” without a clear arrow pointing from the existence of governments to the consequence of slavery being resolved correctly. What it looks like to me is that in the time after the kingship descended from heaven, continuing on to the present day, governments have actively encouraged and perpetuated slavery, with Britain in the 1800s as the primary outlier, primarily because of the actions of private British citizens in altering the direction of the British government, and (current politics warning) most governments today banning private slavery while maintaining their slavery.
One of the other reasons why I focused on disagreements of fact first is because the sense of history plays strongly into how claims generalize. I know some about the history of global abolition, which I’ll call V_H, but if someone else makes the claim “abolition is a sign of government competence” then I need to know what their history of abolition, T_H, looks like because I can guess what other things they’ll think are similar enough to abolition to also fit the claim that those things are signs of government competence. And if T_H didn’t actually happen, then that seems like evidence against government competence.
Let’s stick to factual disagreements. Did Britain forcibly end slavery? I say no, outside of Zanzibar. What do you say? I think that there’s a big difference between forcibly ending slavery and forcibly ending the slave trade. What do you think?
Haiti is certainly a counterexample, as is Zanzibar, but “all but 3” is pretty close to “all but 1,” hardly deserving of “Huh?” Yes, Britain’s war on the slave trade weakened slavery, but did not immediately end it in any state. I believe the conquest of Zanzibar is the only example of Britain forcing another state to abandon slavery.
I’m more concerned about the difference between “nation” and “state,” which I think makes the original statement rather misleading. There are many states today, but most of them were parts of European colonial empires and their abolition was imposed from Europe. This was done peacefully by governments that gained their power through unrelated violence.
That was my attempt to express a model conflict, basically “this disagrees with my sense of history.” As I understand it, global abolitionism was basically a British phenomenon, and the motive force seems to primarily be private groups, not state actors. It may be a point in credit to governments that they mostly acceded to the abolitionist movement nonviolently, but I don’t think it’s reasonable to claim they were the primary actors, or to claim that most governments did it independently. (There are still modern proponents of slavery around the world, as well as ongoing illegal slavery which is mostly opposed by European / Anglosphere groups.)
Do you recognize that you are saying something completely different from your original comment?
(completely different from and much better than)
Your previous comment appears to be claiming substantial disagreement over facts.
Also, you switched from talking about the British government to private actions.
Assigning credit is difficult. Yes, maybe Trevor’s example is bad, even if his facts are essentially correct. But if you credit British violence, you have to give that government credit for long term planning and cost-effective, minimal violence.
Yes, private writings, the Enlightenment, pushed slavery out of fashion. That was the important step, but there’s still the step of actually ending slavery, which was done by governments. It is impressive how many managed to expropriate rich people without violence. (But I don’t give them credit for being cheap, rather than paying off the rich people, as only(?) Britain did.)
They look comparable to me. I still think that the factual claim “Only the US fought a war to abolish slavery” is incorrect, as is “Every other nation on Earth abolished it by government passing laws”. Writing down that the slave trade is illegal is one thing, the West Africa Squadron is another. (I didn’t explicitly raise the disagreement with “within a few generations” like buybuydandavis, but disagreement on that point is also strongly relevant, as I’ll get to in a bit.)
It seems best to start by disagreeing on facts, because those are easier to resolve.
In the second comment, I elaborated on why I disagree on interpretation as well as disagreeing on facts. This thread is about what governments got right, and so I am reluctant to say “governments got slavery right” without a clear arrow pointing from the existence of governments to the consequence of slavery being resolved correctly. What it looks like to me is that in the time after the kingship descended from heaven, continuing on to the present day, governments have actively encouraged and perpetuated slavery, with Britain in the 1800s as the primary outlier, primarily because of the actions of private British citizens in altering the direction of the British government, and (current politics warning) most governments today banning private slavery while maintaining their slavery.
One of the other reasons why I focused on disagreements of fact first is because the sense of history plays strongly into how claims generalize. I know some about the history of global abolition, which I’ll call V_H, but if someone else makes the claim “abolition is a sign of government competence” then I need to know what their history of abolition, T_H, looks like because I can guess what other things they’ll think are similar enough to abolition to also fit the claim that those things are signs of government competence. And if T_H didn’t actually happen, then that seems like evidence against government competence.
Let’s stick to factual disagreements. Did Britain forcibly end slavery? I say no, outside of Zanzibar. What do you say? I think that there’s a big difference between forcibly ending slavery and forcibly ending the slave trade. What do you think?