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A plantocracy is a ruling class, political order or government comprised of (or dominated by) plantation owners.

A number of early European colonies in the New World were largely plantocracies, usually consisting of a small European settler population relying on a large non-European chattel slave population (as well as indentured slaves, both European and non-European), and later, sharecroppers for labour. These plantocracies proved to be a decisive force in the antiabolitionist movement. One prominent organization largely representing (and collectively funded by) a number of plantocracies was the West Indies Lobby in the British Parliament. It is credited (or conversely, discredited) in constituting a significant impetus in dealying the Abolition of the Slave Trade from taking place in the 1790s to being implemented in 1806-1808; and likewise, with respect to prospects of Emancipation being proclaimed in the 1820s (instead, a policy known as Amelioration was formally adopted throughout 1823-1833), to it being implemented in 1834-1838.

References:

• B.W. Higman. "The West India Interest in Parliament," Historical Studies (1967), 13: pp. 1-19.

• See the historical journal: Plantation Society in the Americas for a host of pertinent articles.

• Steel, Mark James (PhD Dissertation). Power, Prejudice and Profit: the World View ofthe Jamaican Slaveowning Elite, 1788-1834, (University of Liverpool Press, Liverpool 1988).

• Luster, Robert Edward (PhD Dissertation). The Amelioration of the Slaves in the British Empire, 1790-1833 (New York University Press, 1998).

• Butler, Mary. " 'Fair and Equitable Consideration:' the Distribution of Slave Compensation in Jamaica and Barbados," Journal of Caribbean History (1998), 22(1-2): pp. 138-152.

• Turner, Mary (ed.). From Chattel Slaves to Wage Slaves: the Dynamics of Labour Bargaining in the Americas (James Crrey, Ltd., London, 1995).

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