Britain's Slavery Debt

The exploitation of 2.5 million west Africans, and their descendants born into slavery, in the sugar plantations of the Caribbean enriched generations of Britons and the British nation. Reparations Now! offers a concise, reasoned, practical case for why Britain should pay reparations for these historic wrongs to present Caribbean inhabitants.

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A concise, reasoned, practical case for why Britain should pay reparations for historic wrongs to present Caribbean inhabitants.

Britain owes reparations to the Caribbean. The exploitation of generations of those trafficked from Africa, or born into enslavement, to work the immensely profitable sugars plantations, enriched both British individuals and the British nation. Colonialism, even after emancipation, perpetuated the exploitation. The Caribbean still suffers, and Britain still benefits, from these historic wrongs.

There are some fairly standard objections to reparations -- 'slavery ended a long time ago'; 'Britain should be celebrating its role in abolishing slavery'; 'slavery was legal back then and we shouldn't judge the past by the standards of the present'; 'you shouldn't visit the sins of the fathers on the sons'; and so on. And there is a sense that the practical problems of who should pay what to whom are immensely difficult.

Michael Banner carefully considers and answers these objections. He argues that reparations are not about punishment, but about the restoration of wrongful gains. In Reparations Now! he makes a specific and practical proposal regarding reparations, picking up on the programme suggested by Caribbean countries (through CARICOM), and taking as a starting point the nearly £20 million paid as compensation by the British government at abolition, not to those who had suffered slavery, but to those who lost enslaved labourers.

Reparations Now! discusses what can be done, here and now, by individuals and institutions, to advance the case for reparations between national governments.