Beyond Massa-Sugar Management In The British Caribbean Summary

The book entitled “Beyond Massa - Sugar Management in the British Caribbean, 1770-1834” written by Dr. John F. Campbell seeks to examine the workings of the plantation life of both the enslaved and the European whites who were known as masters. It delves deeper into the truth about slavery and revisionism, as this book contradicts many past events and judgements on slavery with supporting evidence. Dr. Campbell focused on the British Controlled Caribbean territory of Jamaica and specifically on the Golden Grove plantation which was owned by Chaloner Arcedekne, an absentee owner and managed by his close friend, Simon Taylor. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, difficulties faced by masters on the sugar plantations and the social
Golden Grove great house, for instance, was seen as the “centre of plantation life and from it emanated the will and directives of plantation management” (Campbell 5). All directives and commands were given from the great house and its manager and absentee owner with respect to the Golden Grove estate. However, as a result of revisionism, it was seen that the plantation has now been redefined as a centre of power, rather than a power centre. This is so because managers such as Simon Taylor were not the only persons who had the power to make decisions on the estates. Therefore, it is clear that “the stakeholders within this centre of power included but were not confined to the categories of attorneys, managers, overseers, slave drivers, confidentials, field slaves, house slaves, white wives, black mistresses and freed coloureds. In this sense, the great house was a negotiated seat of power (centre of power) that gave power to often unintended power holders, rather than being a defined physical space (power centre) having defined white power holders only” (Campbell
These previous research can be described as only a part what really happened during the seventeenth and eighteenth century on these British Caribbean sugar estates. The social relationships between the people who inhabited the sugar estates are now a lot more precise. The arguments and ideas presented by Dr. Campbell were well supported and verified by evidence through the many letters written between Simon Taylor and Chaloner Arcedekne. It is definite that Human Resource Management was a major factor within the sugar estates of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The centres of power also prove that women and the enslaved were in fact empowered and held authority. Revisionism was well portrayed throughout the