Caribbean Studies Homework

8/3/2019 Caribbean Studies Homework

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THE PLANTATION SYSTEM AND ITS

INFLUENCE ON THE CARIBBEAN SOCIETY

AND CULTURE.

Group Five (4)


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The Plantation System

The classic plantation was a politicoeconomic invention, acolonial frontier institution, combining non-European slaves andEuropean capital, technology, and managerial skill with territorialcontrol of free or cheap subtropical lands in the mass, mono-cropproduction of agricultural commodities for European markets.

The plantation system shaped Caribbean societies in certainuniform ways: (a) the growth of two social segments, bothmigrant, one enslaved and numerous, the other free and few innumber; (b) settlement on large holdings, the choicest lands(mainly coastal alluvial plains and intermundane valleys) beingpreempted for plantation production; (c) local political orders

excluding the numerically preponderant group from civilparticipation by force, law, and custom; and (d) a capitalistrationale of production, with the planter a businessman ratherthan a farmercolonist, even though the investment of capital inhuman stock and the code of social relations lent a somewhatnon-capitalistic coloration to enterprise.


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Type 3 plantations were launched in Jamaica by Britainafter 1655, in Martinique and Guadeloupe at about the

same time by the French, and in French Saint-Domingueafter 1697. By then the lucrativeness of plantations and theslave trade had stimulated other competitors: the Dutchand the Danes sought island colonies; the Swedes obtaineda temporary foothold in tiny Saint-Barthelemy; the Knights

of Malta briefly claimed parts of the Virgin Islands; even theDuchy of Courland made an abortive attempt to holdTobago. Only after 1800by which time the Caribbeaneconomic contribution to the growth of European

capitalism had been immensedid this intense Europeaninterest wane.


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Tenets of the Plantation System Theory

(George Beckford)

From the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries, slavery setthe stage for the evolution of a political and social system inthe Caribbean that was structured principally along raceand class lines. However, the racial and class considerations

coincided so closely with each other that something closelyapproximating a caste system developed in early Caribbeanhistory. In this system an exclusive white owner-planterclass dominated over darker-skinned races or classeswiththe mixed (Mulatto) population just below the whites, andthe majority black population (both freed and slaves)

occupying the lowest rungs of the racial formation. This wasthe plantation system, which the Caribbean scholar GeorgeBeckford (1972) claimed was a peculiar institution thattotally controlled all of economic, political, and social lifewithin it and throughout the region.


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The plantation system played a dominant role in theeconomic, social, political and cultural life of the

Caribbean. George Beckford (1972) saw the plantationsystem as a total economic institution , where the theinternal and external dimensions of the plantationsystem dominate the countries economic, social andpolitical structure and their relation with the rest of theworld.

Plantations have not only been a product of themetropolitan capital, but they have also produced mono-crop cultivation for the markets.


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The plantation system was an all pervasive design, whichgoverned the lives of all members who were engaged in

production. Horowitz (1971) sees a as a societal designthat perpetuates a society dived into segments dividedinto segments: one large and unfree and another that issmall and free, and which controls power in the society.


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White Supremacy and Black

Inferiority Whites constituted the top of the social hierarchy , they were

considered the the Planter class, they delegated tasks to theblacks on large plantations. Blacks were the composites of the lowerclass thus owning little wealth, prestige and political power.

The whites dictated the status quo of the society, it was theirculture all blacks tried to assimilate to.

The life of the Black Man was one held with contempt, abhorrenceand repulsion.

TheWhite Man

enjoyed a life recognized as venerable andadmirable.


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The Culture of the Whites


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The Occupations of the Whites

(Then) The plantation owners

Overseers

Property owners


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The Culture of the Blacks


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Almost everywhere slaves were systematicallydenied political rights, education, most religious

instruction, opportunities to accumulate or toinvest capital, and the rights to socialize orinterbreed with their masters as equals. Henceplantation regions were markedly deficient in

democratic political institutions, schools,churches, hospitals, stores, and theprofessionals, entrepreneurs, artisans, teachers,

and service suppliers to staff them. A probablemajor contemporary consequence of the systemis the persisting lack of strong communitycohesion in plantation areas.


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The Occupations of the Blacks

(Then)

Skilled workers: Masons, blacksmiths,carpenters.

Domestics

Field workers


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The Influence of the Plantation System on

the Caribbean society and culture today

Retentions of the Plantation System present in the Caribbean

Today

The prevalence of mono-crop cultivation. The marginalization of the Peasantryand focus on large

producers. Dependency on foreign investors to aid Caribbean

development. Little control of the price at which crops are sold on the

internal markets, since internal forces influence prices. Demand for foreign products at the expense of locally

produced goods. Social stratification based on factors such as race and colour.


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The plantation system played the principal role in thedevelopment of Caribbean culture. The islands weredeveloped where the demand for foreign products dominated,and vast amounts of goods were brought in from abroad tosatisfy the needs of the needs of the people. Even technologywas imported and today we continue to see a high demand formany aspects of the foreign culture.

Beckford (1972) notes that the twentieth century, long afteremancipation, Caribbean society was still modelled along thelines of the plantation.

Best (1968) comments on the lack of social integration andsees the populations, as a divided whole propelled from the

plantation system ideologies.


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References

Despres, Leo A. 1964 The Implications of Nationalist Politics in BritishGuiana for the Development of Cultural Theory.American AnthropologistNew Series 66: 10511077.

Guerra y Snchez, Ramiro (1927) 1964 Sugar and Society in the Antilles: An

Economic History of Cuban Agriculture. New Haven: Yale Univ. Press.

Firstpublished asAzcar y poblacin en las Antillas.

Jayawardena, Chandra 1962 Family Organisation in Plantations in BritishGuiana. International Journal of Comparative Sociology3:4364.

Mintz, Sidney W. 1953a The Culture History of a Puerto-Rican Sugar CanePlantation: 18761949. His-panic American Historical Review33:224251.

Mustapha, 2009. Sociology for Caribbean students. pp 45 Jamaica: IanPublishers


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What have you learnt?

What are some the ways the plantationsociety has influenced the Caribbean societyand culture?

Who is the main proponent of the PlantationSociety Theory?

Do you think Skin-bleaching is reminiscentof the plantation society? (opinion)

Documents

Caribbean Studies Homework