Slavery in Brazil

Brazil was the American society that received the largest contingent of African slaves in the Americas and the longest-lasting slave regime in the Western Hemisphere. This is the first complete modern survey of the institution of slavery in Brazil and how it affected the lives of enslaved Africans. It is based on major new research on the institution of slavery and the role of Africans and their descendants in Brazil. Although Brazilians have incorporated many of the North American debates about slavery, they have also developed a new set of questions about slaveholding: the nature of marriage, family, religion, and culture among the slaves and free colored; the process of manumission; and the rise of the free colored class during slavery. It is the aim of this book to introduce the reader to this latest research, both to elucidate the Brazilian experience and to provide a basis for comparisons with all other American slave systems.

Herbert S. Klein is Director of the Center for Latin American Studies, Professor of History, and Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, as well as Gouverneur Morris Professor Emeritus of History at Columbia University. Klein is the author of some 20 books and 155 articles in several languages on Latin America and on comparative themes in social and economic history. Among these books are four comparative studies of slavery, the most recent of which are African Slavery in Latin America and the Caribbean (coauthor), The Atlantic Slave Trade, and Slavery and the Economy of São Paulo, 1750–1850 (coauthor). He has also published on such diverse themes as The American Finances of the Spanish Empire, 1680–1809 and A Population History of the United States and is coauthor of Brazil since 1980 and Mexico since 1980.

Francisco Vidal Luna was Professor of Economics at the Universidade de São Paulo until his retirement in 1997. Aside from his academic career, he was Chief da Assessoria Econômica da Secretaria da Fazenda do Estado de São Paulo (1983–1985), Head of IPLAN-IPEA (1985–1986), and Secretário de Planejamento of the Secretaria do Planejamento of the Presidência da República (1986–1987). Luna was also socio gerente, vice president, and president of the Banco Inter-American Express (1987–2002). In 2005, he became the Secretary of Planning and Budget of the Municipality of São Paulo, and in 2008, he took on the role of Secretary of Economy and Planning of the state government of São Paulo. Luna is the author of some fifty articles and papers and eleven books on Brazilian economic history and the Brazilian economy, among which are Minas Gerais: Escravos e Senhores, Minas Colonial: Economia e Sociedade (coauthor), Slavery and the Economy of São Paulo, 1750–1850 (coauthor), and Brazil since 1980 (coauthor).