Slavery and Abolition in Early Republican Peru

This volume examines Peru during the years from independence to abolition, focusing upon the changing fortunes of slavery and of the slave population. At that time, the only legally enslaved people in Peru were African-born blacks and their American descendants. Their continuing enslavement indicated the importance of slavery to the new republic as well as the strength of the slaveholders and their supporters, and slaveholders made a determined effort to ensure that slavery did not follow the path of colonial rule, using their influence in the new republic to make certain that the institution survived. In this volume, the author examines why slavery managed to survive for more than three decades after Peru declared its independence despite anti-slavery legislation passed by the liberators at that time.