Question of the week: Plantation Society

The  Plantation is an organized process of production that operate as a community with a rigid system of social stratification. How has the social system under plantocracy resulted in the quality of work that descendants of slaves have to/are performing today? Given such restrictions and order of the plantation system itself, in what ways could labourers have taken advantage of the systems?

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- Word limit 250 - 300 words
- References should be made using The Chicago Manual of Style

The Long-Lasting effect: Plantation Economies

The Definition of Plantation Economies is quite straightforward. Much of what you learn is set in history and cannot be changed. Listen to this quick recap on Plantation Economies.

However, history has a long lasting effect on a nation's economy . There are plantation economies or similar societies that exist in the world today. For instance, one of the key features of plantation economies is monoculture meaning the mass production of one agricultural crop. In St. Vincent and the other Windward islands this practice was continued on to present day. Although many other crops such as sweet potato and dasheen are prevalent banana is the major crop. The Windward islands enjoyed good trade relations in the export of their banana crop. This refers to the 'Preferential treatment' they received from the European Union (EU), in that their agri product would be imported into the EU market before that of other competitors such as Costa Rica and Ecuador.  However with the onset of trade liberalization endorsed and encouraged by the World Trade Organization, this special treatment was revoked, leaving the economy of the Windward island depleted. With no available markets with which these Caribbean islands could compete in, the banana industry quickly receded and is struggling to survive today. 

This is as a result of  practicing aspects of the plantation economy. See the video below for another example with even harsher consequences.