Colonial Labor Systems in Colonial Latin America

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Carl Vosloh Latin American History Professor Fujigaki Oct 24, 2012 Colonial Labor Systems With the discovering of the New World in the 15th century, European powers took control over Colonial Latin America for over three centuries, especially the Spanish and Portuguese. With the formation of colonies the Europeans began to exploit and make greater use of the abundant natural resources and existing human power. Therefore Europeans created the colonial labor systems, which would help maintain control over their profits, businesses and workers. The colonial labor systems were strategically effective for European dominance among the New World. The colonial labor systems began taking shape during the first waves of settlers when they realized that the greater wealth and profits would come from the exploitation of agriculture and silver mining. These would provide such funds for the colonies, settlements and the Crown. However to fulfill the greedy needs of the Europeans they would need free or cheap labor and in large masses. That is when the Europeans implemented the “encomiendas”. The “encomiendas” granted the conquistadores a group of Indians to do manual labor solely for that encomendero, either working at the mines or agricultural settings. Encomenderos were supposed to protect and take care of their Indians offering them education, health and sufficient nutrition, however very few went trough this expenses. As a result King Charles abolished the “encomiendas” by the New Laws of 1542, because of the severe conditions the Indians had to go through that lead to the death of millions due to disease, malnutrition and mistreatment etc. Followed by the “encomiendas” came a similar system that would be used to replace and improve the working conditions for the Indians and not give encomenderos so much power, such as the “repartimiento”. The difference was that it

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