Title Accounting for slavery : masters and management / Caitlin Rosenthal

Published Cambridge, Massachusetts : Harvard University Press, 2018 ©2018

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Description 1 online resource (xiv, 295 pages) : illustrations, facsimiles Contents Hierarchies of life and death -- Forms of labor -- Slavery's scientific management -- Human capital -- Managing freedom -- Conclusion: Histories of business and slavery -- Epilogue: Forward to scientific management Summary Accounting for Slavery offers a history of business and management practices on slave plantations in the British West Indies and the American South, covering the century from approximately 1780-1880. Far from lagging behind Northern manufacturers, the most sophisticated Southern planters used complex management techniques, measuring and monitoring their human capital with precision. More broadly, the book explores the complex relationship between slavery and capitalism in American history. The traditional story of modern management focuses on the factories of England and New England, largely ignoring plantation economies. Drawing on extensive archival research into plantation accounting practices, the author argues that the harsh realities of slavery were compatible with a highly quantitative, calculating style of management. Planters allocated and reallocated slaves' labor from task to task, precisely monitored their productivity, and depreciated their "human capital" decades before depreciation became a common accounting technique.-- Provided by publisher Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 208-276) and index Notes Online resource; title from digital title page (ProQuest Ebook Central, viewed October 3, 2018) Subject Slavery -- Economic aspects -- United States -- History -- 18th century Slavery -- Economic aspects -- United States -- History -- 19th century Slavery -- Economic aspects -- West Indies, British -- History -- 18th century Slavery -- Economic aspects -- West Indies, British -- History -- 19th century Human capital -- United States -- History Human capital -- West Indies, British -- History Plantations -- United States -- Accounting -- History Plantations -- West Indies, British -- Accounting -- History Plantation owners -- United States -- History Plantation owners -- West Indies, British -- History BUSINESS & ECONOMICS -- Labor. POLITICAL SCIENCE -- Labor & Industrial Relations. HISTORY -- United States -- 19th Century. Human capital Plantation owners Plantations -- Accounting Slavery -- Economic aspects United States West Indies -- British West Indies Genre/Form History Form Electronic book ISBN 9780674988590 0674988590 9780674988576 0674988574

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