The Ideas behind American Slavery | John Harpham and Javier Mejia

How did one of history's greatest moral crimes come to be seen as legitimate?

In this episode, I speak with historian John Samuel Harpham about his remarkable new book The Intellectual Origins of American Slavery. Rather than focusing on plantations or nineteenth-century defenses of slavery, Harpham takes us back to sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England to uncover the ideas that made slavery thinkable long before it became central to the American economy.

We discuss:

• Why an intellectual history of slavery matters
• Roman law and the rejection of Aristotle's theory of natural slavery
• The paradox of English liberty and the rise of the slave trade
• How seventeenth-century English writers viewed Africa
• Whether racism preceded slavery—or developed alongside it
• What this history tells us about moral blind spots in every society

Whether you're interested in American history, political thought, intellectual history, or the history of ideas, this conversation offers a fresh perspective on one of the defining institutions of the modern world.

John Samuel Harpham is the author of The Intellectual Origins of American Slavery: English Ideas in the Early Modern Atlantic World.

If you enjoy conversations on history, economics, political theory, and the history of ideas, consider subscribing to the channel.

------

Javier Mejia is a Stanford University lecturer who specializes in the intersection of social networks and economic history. His research interests also include entrepreneurship and political economy, with a particular focus on Latin America and the Middle East. He holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Los Andes University. Mejia has previously been a Postdoctoral Associate and Lecturer at New York University-Abu Dhabi and a Visiting Scholar at the University of Bordeaux. He is also a frequent contributor to various news outlets, currently serving as an op-ed columnist for Forbes Magazine.

Twitter (X): https://twitter.com/JavierMejiaC

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/javier_mejia_c/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/javier-mejia-cubillos-64504562/

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3WqEZXavqg3qstoLKwtllF?si=589f4216d414448f

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-economic-and-political-history-podcast/id1708348817