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Bezig met laden... Unfree Labor: American Slavery and Russian Serfdomdoor Peter Kolchin
All Things Russia (417) Bezig met laden...
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Two massive systems of unfree labor arose, a world apart from each other, in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. The American enslavement of blacks and the Russian subjection of serfs flourished in different ways and varying degrees until they were legally abolished in the mid-nineteenth century. Historian Peter Kolchin compares and contrasts the two systems over time in this magisterial book, which clarifies the organization, structure, and dynamics of both social entities, highlighting their basic similarities while pointing out important differences discernible only in comparative perspective. These differences involved both the masters and the bondsmen. The independence and resident mentality of American slaveholders facilitated the emergence of a vigorous crusade to defend slavery from outside attack, whereas an absentee orientation and dependence on the central government rendered serfholders unable successfully to defend serfdom. Russian serfs, who generally lived on larger holdings than American slaves and faced less immediate interference in their everyday lives, found it easier to assert their communal autonomy but showed relatively little solidarity with peasants outside their own villages; American slaves, by contrast, were both more individualistic and more able to identify with all other blacks, both slave and free. Kolchin has discovered apparently universal features in master-bondsman relations, a central focus of his study, but he also shows their basic differences as he compares slave and serf life and chronicles patterns of resistance. If the masters had the upper hand, the slaves and serfs played major roles in shaping, and setting limits to, their own bondage. This truly unprecedented comparative work will fascinate historians, sociologists, and all social scientists, particularly those with an interest in comparative history and studies in slavery. Geen bibliotheekbeschrijvingen gevonden. |
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Google Books — Bezig met laden... GenresDewey Decimale Classificatie (DDC)306.362Social sciences Social Sciences; Sociology and anthropology Culture and Institutions Economic institutions Systems of labor, industrial sociology SlaveryLC-classificatieWaarderingGemiddelde:
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Mostly living away from their estates and unconnected to their serfs, Russian serfowners lacked both ability and motivation compared to Southern enslavers. The fact that Russian estates were, on average, orders of magnitude bigger than Southern estates likewise meant that Russian serfowners were less personally connected to their serfs, which made the conditions of serfdom different from the conditions of American enslavement, although this was not quite as big a difference for house serfs. It also mattered that the South was so much warmer and more agriculturally rich than most of Russia, capable of feeding and housing the average enslaved person better—though that capacity was not always exercised. Though both sets of owners endorsed concepts of their “people” as childlike, lazy, and incapable of self-governance, the conditions of life were systematically different. While Russian serfowners believed that their serfs were responsible for their own livelihoods and basically just owed money or work to their owners, Southern enslavers were highly likely to live among enslaved people and thus had more opportunity to beat, rape, feed, and provide medical care to them. Advice to enslavers was, for example, that allowing enslaved people to cook their own food “promoted excessive independence.” This distribution also differentially affected people’s ability to foment large-scale rebellion or collective resistance, which occurred many more times in Russia.
Because Russian serfowners were close to rentiers who mostly sought income from their estates, they also had less incentive to oppose emancipation if they could be kept economically superior; their lives wouldn’t have to change very much, compared to the lives of Southern enslavers, and indeed they secured generous compensation for emancipation. The fact that serfs shared a history with nobles contributed to the bureaucratic treatment of their petitions for help to higher authorities, which though rarely granted did exert some control over bad behavior by owners; the American ethos of individualism/lack of government intervention combined with racial exclusion to largely preclude any such potential for enslaved Blacks. Flight was far more common among both groups, though again the Russian serfs were more likely to move en masse. ( )