The Swedish Slave Trade Efforts at the Turn of the Nineteenth Century : Case Studies in Nordic Transimperial History

The relatively minor imprint Sweden had on the transatlantic slave trade has been seen as one of the consequences of Sweden being a 'failed empire'. This conception is misleading. By utilising a transimperial perspective on new research findings, the article shows that there was no lack of ambition among Swedish entrepreneurs in the context of the slave trade. The relative lack of Swedish slaving voyages rather had to do with specific circumstances such as Sweden's late entrance into the status of a colonial power, as well as patriotic politics in the wake of king Gustav III's death in 1792. By examining a range of case studies, specifically slaving voyages organised both from the Baltic and from Sweden's colony Saint-Barthelemy in the Caribbean, the historical record is clear that from the end of the eighteenth century onwards, there was an active Swedish engagement in the slave trade. Moreover, it was made possible by transimperial contacts and allowances. Reviewing this evidence, the article argues that all Swedish slaving voyages were complex and decentralised undertakings which were organised in spite of the lack of Swedish state policy, often with some form of foreign involvement, whether it consisted of mercantile networks, capital or knowledge