“WITHOUT BLACKS THERE CAN BE NO GOLD, SUGAR OR TOBACCO”: THE ROLE OF RACE IN THE ECONOMY OF THE MODERN INTERNATIONAL SYSTEM

Abstract

The present work aims to denote the role of race in the economy of the
modern international society, against the background of the mercantile and agricultural slave system. For this, it is understood that slavery and racial capitalism were factors used by the colonists to to mark the superiority of the white man through domination and exploitation. In that sense, the main argument of the work is that the race was used to foment the lucrative base for the colonial system through the commercialization of blacks, sugar, gold and tobacco to Europe. In order to develop its argument, the article is structured in two sections. The first section will outline on the symbiosis of the relationship between race, slavery and racial capitalism in the commercial system triangular shipping of slaves and products in transatlantic navigations and how the expansion took place of that system. The second section will highlight the operationalization of racial capitalism and its wealth concentrated in the black and in the Brazilian northeast region for the continuation of this economic system in the international system. The debate present in this work contributes to the process generated by the capitalism must be analyzed in a multidimensional way, demonstrating the viability of other emancipatory horizons.