Bitter Canaan: the story of the negro republic

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Book

Title:	Bitter Canaan: the story of the negro republic
Author:	Johnson, Charles S.
Year:	1987
Language:	English
Series:	Black classics of social science
City of publisher:	New Brunswick, NJ
Publisher:	Transaction
ISBN:	0887380530
Geographic term:	Liberia
Subjects:	political conditions slavery forced labour 1930-1939
Abstract:	The black American sociologist Charles Spurgeon Johnson served in 1930 as the American representative on the League of Nations International Commission of Inquiry into the Existence of Slavery and Forced Labor in the Republic of Liberia. This book, based on that experience, is a historical sociological assessment of the Amero-Liberian elite's development of a caste-ridden society. Although it was ready for publication in 1945, it was never published. It was anti-Amero-Liberian elite in its premises, data analyses, and conclusions; it was pro-native in its sympathetic portrayal of native life and its destruction by Amero-Liberian labour practices and societal organization. In his recommendations, Johnson urged that the structure of Amero-Liberian rulership be reformed and that natives be allowed more participation in the settler society. The introductory essay explains that this was one of the reasons why the book was not published at the time.