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ASU historian's book on slavery's contribution to capitalism gets high marks


April 28, 2015

The Daily Beast has published a review of “The Business of Slavery and the Rise of American Capitalism, 1815-1860,” (Yale University Press, 2015) by Arizona State University associate professor of history Calvin Schermerhorn.

Eric Herschthal wrote, “'The Business of Slavery and the Rise of American Capitalism, 1815-1860' establishes its author, Calvin Schermerhorn, as among the best practitioners within this new group of historians … Schermerhorn exposes the links between capitalism and slavery with remarkable clarity, economy, and force.”

The book is a thorough investigation that exposes how the limitations imposed by the ending of the African slave trade in 1807 led to practices in capitalism that are still alive today, like the creation of an exchange that connected buyers and sellers.

Herschthal continued, "Schermerhorn is excellent on several other ways in which entrepreneurial creativity turned the slave trading business into a lucrative enterprise. Some are intended to show how modern business concepts like “vertical integration” and “start-up costs” existed at least as early as the slave trade."

Read the full review via the link below.

Article source: The Daily Beast

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