The Infernal Tambopata : British Slavery in Twentieth-Century Peru and Bolivia

Ebook available to libraries exclusively as part of the JSTOR Path to Open intiative. The Infernal Tambopata tells the story of a British-owned rubber enterprise on the Peruvian–Bolivian frontier in the early 20th century that, despite abolition decades earlier, systematically enslaved indigenous people. Drawing on extensive unpublished company records, diplomatic correspondence and contemporary eyewitness accounts, it reconstructs how the Tambopata Rubber Syndicate recruited, confined and exploited its workforce under conditions of extreme violence, deprivation and control. The book challenges persistent narratives that portray the “Rubber Boom” as socially benign, and reconsiders long-standing assumptions about British opposition to slavery. It reveals how British capital, commercial interests and diplomacy were all implicated in the creation and maintenance of brutally coercive labour regimes. Combining meticulous archival research with a compelling narrative, The Infernal Tambopata recovers the lived experience of enslaved people and offers a powerful reappraisal of the human cost of the rubber industry. It also shows how forms of slavery persisted into the modern world, and why this history matters for understanding exploitation in today’s extractive industries.