Conflitos pela propriedade e reordenamento do trabalho em Alagoinhas e Inhambupe (1860-1890)

Abstract

This thesis aims to discuss conflicts over property in rural areas of Alagoinhas city and Inhambupe city, in the period between the years 1860 and 1890, taking into account the need, for the authorities, to have a strict control of workers in the process of abolition of slavery and reorganization of work. Analyzing, among other historical sources, criminal cases of theft and letters of authorities, we investigate how some of the poorest people, who lived dependent on a lord or a farmer, acted to survive, to have autonomy and freedom, when the property became more valued and the world of work was being redefined. While owners and authorities were committed to fight against any action that might have compromised the dependency relationships, many free and poor people and some slaves, acted to enforce their own notions of law, resorting to theft as a reckoning or allying with his fellow or a colonel, when necessary.