Bittersweet: Sugar, Slavery, Empire and Consumerism in the Atlantic World

2020 Series #3 of 4. What happens when you build an empire on sugar? Since the 18th century, sugar has been one of the most demanded commodities in the West. By the 1700s, technological advancements and production made sugar accessible to even some of the poorest Americans and Europeans, and imperial governments poured millions of dollars into the shaping of sugar colonies around the world. From the Caribbean to southeastern Africa to the Indian Ocean, sugar was king. But just as few today think on where their granulated white sugar comes from, those who consumed the White Gold between the 17th and 20th centuries knew little of the back-breaking, harsh, and unfree labor that went into producing that glorious sweetness, <em>or</em> the lengths to which their own governments went to float those potentially profitable sugar colonies. Empires built on sugar rotted away like teeth too long exposed to that sweetness. Find the complete transcript at digpodcast.org

Bibliography

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Pictures & Graphs from C.J. Robertson, “Cane-Sugar Production in the British Empire,” Economic Geography 6.2 (1930) 131-151

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