Escola Brasileira de Administrao Pblica e de Empresas

Advanced Topics in Organizational Theories

Professor Alexandre Faria
January 5th, 2016
Essay
Human Resource Management Lessons by a Southern Slaveholder
Gustavo Moreira Tavares, MSc Student

Cooke (2003), in his work The Denial of Slavery in Management Studies, has shown
that slavery was conveniently and wrongfully excluded from histories of management. Many
reasons could account for this exclusion such as the guilt and ugliness associated to this period
in American history (Hayek et al., 2010). According to Cooke (2003), it is sufficiently clear that
slavery indeed has left an ongoing imprint in management practice and thought (p. 1895), and
that a white supremacist racism underpinned the creation of the managerial identity (p.
1911). Following Cookes path, in this study I analyze Southern American publications from the
antebellum period to propose that modern human resource management (HRM) practices were
also present at slavery times, and that these early practices may have influenced the way
people is managed in organizations nowadays.
The present essay has as central piece a short article called The Negro (Anonymous,
1847), in which it is presented a letter by a citizen of Mississippi an experienced slaveholder,
showing his technical and economical view of how slaves should be treated, followed by the
reply of the journal editor. The article was issued in De Bows Commercial Review, a monthly
journal of trade, agriculture, commerce, manufacture, and political issues, published in the city
of New Orleans during the upper middle of the nineteenth century.1 The journal bore the name
of its first editor, James Dunwoody Brownson De Bow, an influential publisher and statistician,
also known for heading the U.S. Census from 1853 to 1857.
The correspondent, who claimed to have practiced medicine in many localities and
could observe the good or bad systems of others (p.419), starts his letter by showing his
concern about the fact that there were slaveholders who left out of view altogether the value
of negro property and its possible deterioration by unskillful usage, like any other property
(p.419), and continues: to say nothing about morality, this is a great pecuniary evil. Now I stop
and shortly analyze the any other property part. The words of the correspondent are very in
line with the modern practices of HRM, more specifically with the hard HRM (Storey, 1987),
which Legge (1997) consider to be underpinned by an utilitarianist ethical view, where people
can be treated as means to ends, or, in her words, treats the human resource as something to
be used like any other factor in production(p. 25). We are very familiar with statements such as
our human resources are our most important asset when talking about HRM (Hendry, 2012),
and I consider the word asset also deserve some attention. According to the Collins English
Dictionary (2013), asset is anything valuable or useful. A thing. A valuable or useful thing.
Perhaps our view of human resources did not evolve considerably since slavery times.

The issues of the De Bows Review are available at the website Making of America:
http://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/moajrnl/browse.journals/debo.html

In order to avoid this pecuniary evil resultant of the bad management of negroes, and
prolong the useful laboring period of the negros life (p. 420), the correspondent, after
asserting the inferiority of black people (Negro as a race can neither do as much work nor
continue at it as long as the whites p. 419), suggests the adherence of some good practices by
slave owners:
i)

ii)
iii)
iv)
v)
vi)
vii)
viii)

Slaveholders should reduce the work overload of negroes. a distribution of

labor here as everywhere would be greatly to their [the slaveholder]
advantage (p. 419).
Houses for negroes should be elevated, [] weather proof, and with capacious
windows and doors for ventilation [] (p.419).
A negro house should never be crowded [] and the master or overseer
should look weekly to its cleanliness (p.419).
Good water is far more essential than many suppose [] (p. 419).
Negroes are thriftless, thoughtless people, and have to be restricted in many
points essential to their constitutions and health (p. 420).
We can expect the negroes to be sick who have been exposed early or late, in
wet, in cold, in mud or water (p.420).
Send them into the field at daylight and no earlier. Let the breakfast occupy
half an hour and the dinner one hour [] (p. 420).
Cleanliness in cooking should be insisted on (p. 420).

The correspondent concludes the letter by claiming the advantage of adopting such
good practices: I advise my efforts have been attended with the best results (p. 420). His
results are not different from Huselid et al.s (1997) who have found empirical evidence that
some technical HRM practices such as providing Benefits and Services, and Safety and Health
have a positive impact in firms performance. Not by chance this paper of Huselid et al. has
1.974 citations2: finding an impact in firm performance is extremely appealing in management
studies. We can see, then, that the Managerialist Performativity agenda (Fryer, 2009) in HRM is
not new, as the southern slaveholder has shown. In the past, as well as in present times, HRM
practices only become a good deal insofar as it permits better financial returns although by a
nave perspective one may think that there is something humane in human resources
management.
Previous research that have analyzed HRM from a critical point of view say that an
ethical assessment of HRM practices depends on the ethical position you adopt (Fryer, 2009;
Legge, 1997). Following Legges (1997) framework I will support my analysis by using the
Deontological and Utilitarian theories. The Rawlsian theory (also used in Legge, 2009) will not
be brought into play, since Rawls egalitarian theory of justice (Rawls, 1971) per se is
completely incompatible with the legitimated idea of superiority of whites found in slavery
times.
The logic underpinning the deontological discourse is that individuals have certain
rights, and respecting them is everyones duty. In other words, individuals rights stablish some
rules to be followed, and it is by complying with them that we make our actions to be ethical,
regardless of the consequences (Fryer, 2009). According to Legge (1997), in the HRM domain,
the deontological position drives us to treat people with respect and as ends in their own right,
not solely as means to others' ends (p.23). In contrast, in utilitarianism, being ethical or not
2

According to Google Scholar in January 6, 2016.

depends only on the consequences of our acts. The right course of action must be the one that
brings the greatest good to the majority (Fryer, 2009). However, as Legge (1997) points out:
the greatest good to the greatest number allows people to be treated as means to ends
(p.23). It happens, for example, if we consider right Adam Smiths (1998 [1776]) argument that
the greatest good will only result from a profit maximizing attitude taken by firms in a free
market context. In sum, the deontological position may be considered closer to the welfare
humanist view of HRM (Fryer, 2009), which is a very appealing view since it radiates a
comforting, moral glow (p. 75), while the utilitarian position seems to be closer to the
managerialist performativity agenda, which reflects the steely glint of calculating
instrumentalism (Fryer, 2009, p. 75).
What I will argue next is that both positions (deontological and utilitarian) could be used
to support the HRM practices of the correspondent in the nineteenth century, in view of the
white supremacist racism characteristic of that time, a racism that found support on science,
history, and religion. Following Cookes (2003) argument that our current managerial thinking is
still being influenced by the early management practices of masters and overseers, I argue that
the rationalized and ethical use of humans as mere tools at that time also influenced the way
managers see and treat people in organizations nowadays.
Back to the article The Negro, after the correspondent made his point about the good
practices on the management of slaves, the editor, J. D. B. De Bow, wrote a note in order to give
his view on the issue. De Bow starts by saying that the economical question raised by the
correspondent in respect to the management of slaves is one worthy enough of discussion (p.
420). However, De Bow also pointed out that the good or bad treatment of slaves as of any
other created thing, is a question of morals and religion brought home upon us by the
imperative decrees of the Creator himself [] (p. 421). So now it looks like the good care
toward the slaves was also motivated by moral rules (specifically, religious ones), as expected by
the deontological theory. Then slaves had rights, you may think. And I would say yes, perhaps.
But they had rights in the extent it was economically interesting to the slaveholder, and to the
extent it was enough for him to not feel guilty toward god.
The contradiction is that the same religion that guaranteed the slave rights, also
guaranteed the enslaver rights to enslave. Robson (1849) in his article The Negro Slavery at
the South (also published in the De Bows Review) cites the Bible several times in order to
justify the legitimacy of the institution [] slavery was in Old testament times, an institution of
Gods own ordering []. Even old Abraham had servants, and Joshua made hewers of wood and
drawers of water of the conquered tribes of Canaan (p. 213). And he complements by saying
that A greater punishment could not be devised or inflicted upon the southern slave at this
day, than to give him that liberty which God in his wisdom and mercy deprived him of (p. 217).
Then we can see that enslaving the blacks was not only the right of the whites, but their duty.
Following a deontological logic, slaveholders would be unethical if they did not do this. This set
of moral rules was very convenient for them. At this point we may make a brief parallel with
the supreme rights that modern managers have to manage their human resources, which
derives from a managerialist ideology not less powerful than religion (see Clegg, 2014).
When my analysis moves to the utilitarian position, slaveholders keep safeguarded.
From this standpoint, being ethical or not depends only on the consequences of acts, and the
ethical option is the one that is to the advantage of the majority. But who should be included in
this majority? And who should be consulted when deciding what is to the advantage of the
majority? The so considered sub-humans from Africa? Probably not. Robson (1849) extends
his view of the inferiority of black people, now using a scientific narrative: For the knife of the

scientific anatomist in his deep research after this cause, has demonstrated that the brain
proper, is smaller in them [the negro] than in other races of men [] (p. 212). And he goes on
showing many other scientific facts to convince the reader that blacks were less human than
the whites. Therefore, I consider that, at that time, the slaves would not be qualified enough to
be taken into account in the composing of the majority. So, from a utilitarian and supremacist
perspective, it becomes easy to see that HRM practices would only be good for the slave, if
being good for them was also good for the slaveholder and for the economy. This utilitarian
view goes hand in hand with Milton Friedmans (1970) claim that, in the business context, the
only moral responsibility that is appropriate is managers responsibility to maximize financial
returns for shareholders. In this case, workers wellbeing will only be a concern for managers
when financial returns are to be influenced by it.
In sum, there is no scape. At slavery times, viewing negroes as objects and using them
as any other factor in production would never be unethical from the slaveholder standpoint,
either from a deontological or a utilitarian position. If, from the deontological perspective, being
ethical or not depends on complying with moral rules, what to do when these rules say that
blacks are inferior and must be enslaved? And from the utilitarian position, what to do if blacks
were not qualified enough to take part in the majority? Then, whites had no reasons to not have
a clean conscience. However, knowing that the same white supremacist racism that provided
the basis for this ethical exploitative logic also underpinned the creation of the managerial
identity (Cooke, 2003, p. 1911), we should question ourselves to what extent this enslaver logic
still impregnates our view of human resource management nowadays. And question also if
slavery is not still the most appropriate term to define some current work relations, such as
those in the clothing industry in Bangladesh (the probability that you are now wearing a piece of
clothing manufactured there is not that low). Maybe reflecting upon these issues is a good start
if we want to have someday a more humane management of humans.

REFERENCES
Anonymous. (1847). The Negro. De Bow's Review, 419-422.
asset. (n.d.) Collins English Dictionary Complete and Unabridged. (2003). Retrieved January 1
2016 from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/asset
Clegg, S. (2014). Managerialism: Born in the USA. Academy of Management Review, 39(4), 566576.
Cooke, B. (2003). The denial of slavery in management studies. Journal of Management Studies,
40(8), 1895-1918.
Friedman, M. (1970). The social responsibility of business is to increase its profits, The New York
Times Magazine, September 13.
Fryer, M. (2009). HRM: an ethical perspective. in Human Resource Management: A Critical
Approach. Routledge: New York, 75-91.
Guest, D. E. (1999). Human resource managementthe workers' verdict. Human Resource
Management Journal, 9(3), 5-25.
Hayek, M., Novicevic, M. M., Humphreys, J. H., & Jones, N. (2010). Ending the denial of slavery
in management history: Paternalistic leadership of Joseph Emory Davis. Journal of Management
History, 16(3), 367-379.
Hendry, C. (2012). Human resource management. Routledge.

Huselid, M. A., Jackson, S. E., & Schuler, R. S. (1997). Technical and strategic human resources
management effectiveness as determinants of firm performance. Academy of Management
journal, 40(1), 171-188.
Legge, K. (1997). The morality of HRM. in Experiencing Human Resource Management. C.
Mabey, D. Skinner, T. Clark.
Rawls, J. (1971). A theory of justice.
Robson, S. (1849). Negro Slavery at the South. De Bow's Review, 206-225.
Smith, A. (1998 [1776]). Wealth of Nations, K. Sutherland (Ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Storey, J. (1987) Developments in the management of human resources: an interim report.
Warwick Papers in Industrial Relations 17, IRRU, School of Industrial and Business Studies,
University of Warwick, November.