Slavery apologies and reparations payments

[CirclesandSpirals]

This is an emotive and sensitive topic so I hope everyone can be respectful. It’s also not a topic I am as well versed in as I would wish to be, so please don’t assume I have lots of knowledge about this when putting forward your views.

I’ve been reading in the news about the calls at the Commonwealth summit for apologies and reparations for the trans-Atlantic slave trade.

What are your views on this and why?

Personally, I agree there should be a formal apology and recognition of the harm done. Britain was involved in the perpetuation of the slave trade, as well as being involved in its abolition. An acknowledgement and apology for past wrongs would be a way of showing respect and our moral beliefs as a society.

Reparations in the form of cash…here I am unsure, and for the following reasons.

1. Given the time that has passed, it’s likely to be impossible to accurately track down the family members of those individuals who were trafficked. So who would reparations go to? Countries instead of individuals? Is that fair?
2. Again, given the time that has passed, who should pay for the reparations and how? If funds were raised through general taxation, that feels unfair on the current British population who were not involved. If we try to target those prominent families who made millions and millions….would those assets ever get seized or would they all swiftly disappear into offshore accounts never to be seen again. Would it be possible to seize money from those who had directly profited?
3. Given the cost of living crisis in the uk (whilst not to be compared with poverty experienced in the Caribbean) and what feels like deteriorating race-relations, I worry how a programme of reparations would affect UK society as a whole and if racism would worsen or more extreme right wing governments would be voted in.
4. I can see a case for reparations as Germany has done to survivors and victims families of the Holocaust. Survivors and victim’s immediate families who were materially affected are still living. This makes sense to me. But how many generations on should reparations be relevant? The last living survivors of slavery died nearly 100 years ago. I do believe that their descendants are impacted by the legacy of slavery, but they themselves were not enslaved and nor were their immediate family (spouse/parent).
5. In terms of lost wages for work/compensation for what happened, if that had been given to the affected individuals at the moment slavery had been abolished, how much of that would have actually come to the descendants living today? The majority of people around the world and throughout history have lived hand-to-mouth, not building up big inheritances for the next generation. How do you value the reparations?

I don’t support reparations in any form other than money / cancelling debt as I do agree that it would be disrespectful for Britain (or any of the other countries who were involved in the slave trade) to decide the form of reparations given when money is what is being asked for.

In case it’s relevant: I’m white British/Irish from a historically very poor background. My family never even owned property until 50 years ago so I can’t imagine any of them ever owned slaves or profited from investments in businesses that used slave labour. We never had anything material to pass down the generations bar the odd photograph and wedding ring. All of this has of course impacted on my views.

Whats the point? No one alive can apologise for something that happened in the past to dead people. It's meaningless and performative. And also has already been done by Tony Blair along with debt restructuring.

Interestingly saudi arabia only abolished slavery in the 60s so an apology and reparations from them would be more meaningful as it would be an apology from people who actually enslaved people to actual slaves.

Edit..apology to sticklers for quoting the original post. In error. Force of habit.

I don't believe in apologising for the sins or errors of others or of the past.

I agree. Reparations are not appropriate given the extreme length of time which has passed.
To ask an entire people, the vast majority of whom are already struggling, to pay for the historical wrongs of the most privileged is a wrong in itself and will certainly cause enormous resentment and increase division.

I think it is right to acknowledge how bad slavery was and that the British state and ruling class had a part in it. If the families of the people who benefitted want to pay some reparations then they’re welcome to. My family were (like most) not involved
In the democratic process until well after slavery was abolished and were frankly under the heels of their “betters” for the period of time that the slave trade existed. Were they treated as badly as those
poor souls in the Caribbean, absolutely not, but they certainly weren’t in charge of their own destiny and frankly didn’t benefit from the North Atlantic slave trade.

Let's leave the Commonwealth over this nonsense.

Slavery was bad and so was burning witches and hanging homosexuals. None of which happen now. Let's move on.

The whole thing is utterly ridiculous. No more apologies, definitely no reparations.

I absolutely agree about Saudi Arabia apologising and paying reparations. Slavery is abhorrent.

For myself, I would prefer to see money going towards stopping the modern slave trade than for reparations for the historical trans-Atlantic slave trade.

No. It would set an unhelpful precedent for reparations being made for an avalanche of historical wrongdoing.
It is already acknowledged that slavery was wrong and terrible.
Is enough being done to stop modern day slavery and human trafficking?

No, and to put it in numbers, approximately 45-50 million people are thought to be in a form of modern slavery today.

It’s difficult to get exact numbers for the trans-Atlantic slave trade, top estimates put it at 15 million leaving Africa over 350+ years and around 11 million surviving to their destination. Then you have those people who were born into slavery, which number in the millions.

The number of people in modern slavery today is at least as big as the total enslaved by the trans-Atlantic slave trade.

I agree about the potential for causing resentment and division. It feels absolutely explosive given the current economic and political climate.

Some of the estimates on an amount of reparations are in the trillions - I saw £24trn being asked for by one calculation.

That is a mind blowing statistic. And frightening how little it is talked about.
The world turns a blind eye for the most part.

Every single country has been involved in slave trading at some point over the centuries. Should a representative from every country stand in one room and then we can have one huge mass apology and finally get this off our chests?

The countries where slaves were shipped from also bear some responsibility as the local black people trapped and sold slaves to the white traders.

Sold their own countrymen into slavery because they could make money from it.

To quote a bit of the OPs opening post:

"My family never even owned property until 50 years ago so I can’t imagine any of them ever owned slaves or profited from investments in businesses that used slave labour. "

Not technically true. Masses has been written on it. About how the slave trade contributed to the Industrial Revolution etc. And there is the compensation that was paid to compensate slave owners to consider too.

Here is a quick article on that:

Slavery and the British Industrial Revolution | CEPR

And here is the conclusion of that article :

"Taken together, our findings suggest two important conclusions. First, involvement in the slave trade and wealth derived from slaveholding had an important effect on the geography of economic development during the British industrial revolution. While the sudden re-ordering of economic prominence in the period after 1750 has long seemed puzzling (Crafts 2014), our evidence offers a clear explanation for why some locations suddenly took off economically. Second, our results strongly suggest that Marx was right: slavery wealth accelerated Britain’s industrial revolution."

And here is an Aricle from the Adam Smith institute about how UK taxpayers are were paying the debt from the compensation paid the slave owners til 2015. It's an older article.

Britain still hasn't paid off the slavery compensation debt — Adam Smith Institute

And here is confirmation that the debt was not paid off til 2015.

This is what we know about the government loan to pay slave owners compensation after slavery was abolished in 1833 – Full Fact

I am not stating an opinion here on reparations. Just adding some info for the thread.