60199616-flight-to-freedom-african-runaways-and-maroons-in-the-americas

Chapter 9
Negotiations and Treaties
Collaboration between Enslaver
and Enslaved
We have noted already that marronage was both ideologically and practically
opposed to the slavery system. It would seem, therefore, that there could be
no middle ground between the two systems, and that their relations with
each other would always be antagonistic. In practice, however, Maroons and
slaveholders often found a middle ground that, if not entirely satisfactory to
either party, tended to resolve future conflicts through negotiation, arbitration
and compromise rather than by force. From the earliest days of Maroon
activities, negotiations took place to eliminate or contain the Maroons. For
convenience, we shall divide the negotiations into two broad categories: those
that did not involve Maroons directly but sought to subvert Maroon polities,
and those between Maroons and the slaveholding interests. The first category
involved the enslavers’ negotiations variously with enslaved persons, free
Blacks, free Coloureds and the governments of foreign countries. The second
category concerned negotiations with individual Maroons, specific people
within a given Maroon settlement and the Maroon community as a whole.
Within the context of slavery, and often outside the discourse on marronage,
there were always ongoing “negotiations” between the slaveholding
interests and enslaved persons who displayed various tolerance levels to
enslavement. They ranged from those who were prepared to accept freedom
if it was offered to them but showed no particular urgency to agitate for it, to
others who were disposed to pursue it actively through good works and
265