Two impressive studies have reexamined Eric Williams' conclusion that Britain's abolition of the slave trade in 1807 and its emancipation of slaves in its colonies in 1834 were driven primarily by economic rather than humanitarian motives. ████████ ██ ████████ █████ █████████████ ███ ███ ████████████ ██ ███████ ██████ █████ █████████ █████████ ██ █████████ ███ ██ ████ ██████ ██ ██████████ ██ ███████ ████████ █████████
Two Challenges to Williams' Conclusion ·That British abolitionist movement was primarily driven by economics.
Williams argues that the slave colonies were becoming a drag on the British economy. That's why Britain abolished slavery, not because they thought it was wrong. But two studies question that conclusion.
2. Eltis' conclusion ·Williams was partly right, partly wrong
It is economics that drove abolition; just not what Williams thought. The slave colonies' economies were fine. But slave labor wasn't good for the broader economy of the British empire.
Passage Style
Critique or debate
Phenomenon-hypothesis
27.
According to the passage, Eltis ██████ ███████ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ ████████████
Question Type
Implied
Other’s perspective
The right answer will be a something that Eltis’ argument contradicts. We should go in with a low-res view of Eltis’ argument, which is laid out in P3. Unlike Drescher, Eltis argues that Britain’s pro-liberty political activism doesn’t explain the abolition of slavery, and that the real explanation is that voluntary labor came to be seen as the economically better option.
a
Popular support for ███████████ ████████ ███████ ██ ███████ ██ ███ █████ ██████████ ████████
Eltis doesn’t argue against this. His entire argument is an answer to the question of why this is true: voluntary labor and higher wages led to “want creation” and stronger consumer markets, which appealed to employers and laborers alike.
b
In the early ██████████ ████████ ████████ ████ ████████ ██████ █████ ████ █████ ████████████ ███████
Eltis agrees with this. Williams is the one who argues against it—he thinks abolition came about simply because slave colonies weren’t viable anymore. Eltis disagrees with Williams, arguing that slave colonies were actually more viable than Williams thought.
Eltis argues against this explanation and in favor of a different hypothesis. His argument is that British views on liberty don’t explain the abolition of slavery; rather, abolition came about because voluntary labor came to be seen as more economically beneficial.
Eltis has no stance on this. This is part of Drescher’s argument, but not the part Eltis disagrees with. Drescher says that abolition resulted from “widespread literacy and a tradition of political activism.” Eltis only disagrees with the activism part. He doesn’t take a position on whether literacy played some part in abolition.
Eltis doesn’t argue against this. His entire argument is an answer to the question of why those antislavery measures were so widely supported: voluntary labor and higher wages led to “want creation” and stronger consumer markets, which appealed to people across political divides.
Difficulty
58% of people who answer get this correct
This is a very difficult question.
It is similar in difficulty to other questions in this passage.
CURVE
Score of students with a 50% chance of getting this right
25%152
163
75%173
Analysis
Implied
Other’s perspective
Critique or debate
Humanities
Phenomenon-hypothesis
Answer Popularity
PopularityAvg. score
a
8%
163
b
23%
162
c
58%
167
d
8%
160
e
4%
161
Question history
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