Moral Capital by Christopher Leslie Brown

Moral Capital by Christopher Leslie Brown

Revisiting the origins of the British antislavery movement of the late eighteenth century, Christopher Leslie Brown challenges prevailing scholarly arguments that locate the roots of abolitionism in economic determinism or bourgeois humanitarianism. Brown instead connects the shift from sentiment to action to changing views of empire and nation in Britain at the time, particularly the anxieties and dislocations spurred by the American Revolution. The debate over the political rights of the North American colonies pushed slavery to the fore, Brown argues, giving antislavery organizing the moral legitimacy in Britain it had never had before. The first emancipation schemes were dependent on efforts to strengthen the role of the imperial state in an era of weakening overseas authority. Brown connects disparate strands of the British Atlantic world and brings into focus shifting developments in British identity, attitudes toward Africa, definitions of imperial mission, the rise of Anglican evangelicalism, and Quaker activism. He shows that the abolitionist movement derived its power from a profound yearning for moral worth in the aftermath of defeat and American independence. Thus abolitionism proved to be a cause for the abolitionists themselves as much as for enslaved Africans.

Christopher Leslie Brown is associate professor of history at Rutgers University and coeditor of Arming Slaves: From Classical Times to the Modern Age.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780807856987
ISBN 10	0807856983
Title	Moral Capital
Author	Christopher Leslie Brown
Series	Published By The Omohundro Institute Of Early American History And Culture And The University Of North Carolina Press
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	The University of North Carolina Press
Year published	2006-03-30
Number of pages	496
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.