Britain stole 25 million years of life and labour through slavery in Barbados, according to research by a team of international experts. Their report concludes that Barbados's population of African descent have suffered damages estimated at up to $2tn (£1.5tn) from 200 years of chattel slavery.
The head of the research team, Coleman Bazelon, said the total reflected the magnitude of the damage done, but emphasised that the figure was not a bill for damages but the factual foundation for dialogue. “This research is not creating an invoice for anybody to pay,” said Bazelon. “It is an accounting of the harm that was done … a recognition of the harm that was done that is the starting point for reconciliation.”
Barbados was the first major British colony to force enslaved people to work on its plantations from the early 1600s. Bazelon conducted the research through the non-profit organisation Public Interest Experts. He gave a detailed breakdown: the value of uncompensated labour is between $500bn and $700bn, while the short lifespan of enslaved people accounts for $1.1tn to $1.3tn, totalling $1.6tn to $2tn.
After Britain abolished slavery on 1 August 1834, £20m was paid in compensation to enslavers for loss of their “property”. The enslaved people themselves received nothing. Speaking at an event in Barbados, the minister for pan-African affairs and heritage, Trevor Prescod, said: “You can’t erase history … My job is to give an Afrocentric redress to the imbalances that occurred during the period of slavery.”
Prof Alan Lester from the University of Sussex commented: “It’s not surprising that – when you add up the value of lives appropriated to make money in Barbados, Britain’s oldest slave plantation colony – you get such an enormous figure. The inequalities entrenched by slavery have only been exacerbated since, as compensation was paid to slave owners rather than the enslaved and independence left Caribbean islands drained of capital and indebted to western institutions.”
The report forms part of a broader 2023 Brattle analysis estimating total harms from transatlantic chattel slavery in 31 territories at $100–131tn. Last month 123 nations at the UN general assembly voted that chattel slavery was unlawful.
