The path of human past is marked by awful atrocities. Even so, examining the records of the impacts of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade on Africa is horrific even to the cynical of historians (M’bokolo). It is estimated that the trade took place from early fifteenth century through to mid-nineteenth century and that it involved the forceful shipping of approximately 12.5 million Africans to both North and South Americas (Murphy 1). This paper critically evaluates the impacts that the trade had in Africa.
It has proved to be a difficult task to elaborate the specific impacts of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade in Africa due to lack of statistical evidence. However, with the benefit of hindsight, the impacts can be empirically inferred from the evils that have continued to bedevil African continent to date. This paper takes the view that the impacts were both positive and negative. Nevertheless, the positive ones were short-term, on one hand, and the negative ones were long-term and significantly immense on the contrary.
According to Toby Green, there was no significant economic difference between the European and African continents in the fifteenth century when the first procurement of slaves in the coasts of West Africa by Europeans was done. However, in the nineteenth century when slave trade was abolished, the economic progress in these two continents was worlds apart (Green 3).
Additionally, the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade was, by and large, responsible for the intensification of inter-clan and inter-tribal conflicts and hostilities in Africa. In most cases, the Europeans did not directly go to the field and capture the slaves-to-be. Instead, they procured them from African chiefs, kings, and native slave traders. These slaves were obtained in the course of war and raids against inland clans, tribes and kingdoms by the said chiefs, kings, and slave traders. Due to increasing demand for slaves coupled with the fact that the slaves were exchanged for firearms and ammunition, the native slave dealers were forced to carry out more raids. Moreover, they were more equipped to wage more wars and carry out more raids. This undoubtedly led to destabilization of both economic and political situation in the continent (Rosof 27).
Furthermore, the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade rendered Africans more amenable to colonialism. It achieved this by draining Africa of its men and women at prime phases of their lives. Besides, it intensified inter-clan and inter-tribal wars as discussed above. As a result, Africa’s societal and political structures were destabilized. This made Africans incapable of adequately resisting colonialism. Therefore, it is no doubt that the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade inevitably paved way for colonization of African continent (Ojo 115).
Nevertheless, some authors argue that the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade potentially benefitted Africa. This argument is predicated on the fact that slave trade was not introduced to Africa by the Europeans and Asians but was part of African way of life. Proponents of this theory hold that there existed internal slavery where war captives, criminals, and outcasts were traded among African kingdoms (Mentan 128). It follows, therefore, that what the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade achieved was just to entrench what was taking place and if anything, Africans benefited through technology transfer, acquisition of goods from other continents such as firearms and ammunition which in turn help them fight against intrusions such as colonization (Mentan 129).
Moreover, there is empiric evidence pointing to the fact that the West African regions that bore the most of Trans-Atlantic slave trade burden turned out to be the most progressive and heavily populated. Hence, the trade was a blessing in disguise by stimulating population growth and civilization in such regions (Ohaegbulam). Therefore, without slave trade, Africa would have had nothing significant to exchange for other goods hence volumes of intern-continental trade would have diminished. Misappropriation of gains from slave trade is to blame for the stagnation of African economic progress as opposed to the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade (Mentan 129).
In conclusion, it is manifestly clear the Trans-Atlantic slave trade had deep economic, social, demographic, cultural and political impacts on Africa. Though a few impacts were potentially positive, most of them were detrimental and continue to haunt the continent to-date. It left Africans ran down in population, insuppressibly at odds amongst themselves, economically held back and, in the words of Patrick Manning; “despised as an inferior race in a world which had build a racial hierarchy based in the inspiration of their enslavement” (Murphy 2).
Works Cited
Green, Toby. The Rise of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade in Western Africa, 1300–1589. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012.
M’bokolo, Elikia. A Hundred and Fifty Years After France Abolished Slavery: The impact of the slave trade on Africa. April 1998. 1 March 2016 <https://mondediplo.com/1998/04/02africa>.
Mentan, Tatah. The State in Africa: An Analysis of Impacts of Historical Trajectories of Global Capitalist Expansion and Domination in the Continent. Mankon Bameda: Langaa Research and Publishing CIG, 2010.
Murphy, Laura T. Metaphor and the Slave Trade in West African Literature. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2012.
Ohaegbulam, Festus Ugboaja. Towards an Understanding of the African Experience from Historical and Contemporary Perspectives. New York: University Press of America, 1990.
Ojo, Emmanuel Oladipo. "The Trans Atlantic slave trade and Colonialism: Reasons for Africa's Underdevelopment?" European Scientific Journal (2015): 107-130.
Rosof, Patricia. Black History. New York: Institute for Reasearch in History and Haworth Press, Inc, 1983.
