Slavery Rent

David Smiley

[Reprinted from Progress, May-June 2006]

In a single astonishing sentence Bernard Shaw (Fabian Essays) defines land monopoly, slavery and, by implication, land rent. "Imagine a small island to which castaways swim as ships are successively wrecked on a nearby reef; eventually the earlier occupants will be able to present new castaways with the choice: be our slave, or keep swimming."

In the country where I grew up, Guyana, slavery was officially abolished in 1807, practised unofficially for a while and then reinvented under the title of "Indentured Labour". Bengalis, impoverished by the Indian caste system, were shipped to Guyana as cheap labour for the colonial system. A descendant of this system, Cheddi Ja-gan, was the first prime minister, elected on a land reform platform. The British government immediately jailed him. A descendant of the original slave system, Forbes Burnham, who had taught me French at high school, was then approved by the British government and elected as the second prime minister. He went on to do very well out of real estate and the country lapsed into economic ruin.

David Pryce-Jones notes that slavery was not officially abolished in Saudi Arabia until 1962. He goes on to describe its reinvention -- "guest" workers shipped from one set of feudal countries to another. Old landed elites have impoverished these in their old countries. New landed elites now imprison them in the new countries. "None of the immigrants have rights of any kind; they are beasts of burden to be shipped in and out again in bulk." He quotes sample advertisements from the Yellow Pages of the Gulf Telephone Directory, such as: "Al Fateh Manpower Agency Services. We supply all kinds of skilled and unskilled labour to suit your requirements from: India, Pakistan, Philippines, Thailand, Bangladesh." (The Closed Circle, 1990, Paladin, London).