5.4 The Atlantic Slave Trade

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

• Explain the workings of the triangular trade
• Compare slavery in Africa and slavery in the Americas
• Discuss the way market forces influenced the development of labor-intensive agriculture in the Americas
• Describe the human toll of slavery

To extract the greatest possible wealth from their American colonies, the nations of Europe planted them with cash crops Europeans craved but could not produce at home. To maximize profit, they drove workers hard without regard for their health or safety. When Indigenous peoples and European servants could not satisfy their demands, they turned to enslaved labor taken from Africa. The latter decision affected the lives of millions of people for centuries to come.