British capitalism thrived on Brazilian slavery despite official abolitionism

Evidence

Eric Williams reported: “It was said that seven-tenths of the goods used by Brazil for slave purchases were British manufactures, and it was whispered that the British were reluctant to destroy the barracoons on the coast because they would thereby destroy British Calicoes. In 1845, Peel refused to deny the fact that British subjects were engaged in the slave trade.” Notwithstanding the British government’s persistent and public opposition to slavery and its efforts to compel Brazil to abolish the trade-to all of which historians have paid great attention-Williams observed: The British capitalists, however, remained unimpressed. — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 754

Categorization

• XREF: The hypocrisy of British anti-slavery rhetoric masking profiteering connects to the tradition’s critique of the West — Williams already cited by Robinson.