Encomiendaor Slavery? The Spanish Crown's Choice of Labor Organization in Sixteenth-Century Spanish America

When the Spaniards conquered the New World, they resorted to a form of native labor organization called theencomienda. Theencomiendadiffered from slavery in that the Crown imposed inheritance, trading, and relocation restrictions onencomenderos. Such restrictions cost the Crown revenue by providing incentives for colonists to deplete more quickly the stock of native labor and by keeping native labour in areas of low-revenue productivity. This loss of revenue makes the Crown's Preference for theencomiendacurious. The Crown opted for theencomienda, however, to secure its rule and to satisfy an ideological bias against slavery.