Abstract
Most of the developed countries in the present era were once slave owners and slave traders, whereas many current developing countries represented potential sources of coerced labor force. Slave trade and the triangular trade might help to understand some evolutions that have occurred during the last four centuries among different continents. For instance, one can observe that the centers of power in the Americas have shifted from the Latin or central part of the continent to the northern and temperate areas. Whereas powerful empires such as the Inca or the Aztec ones were the leading societies of the continent and the wealthiest ones a few centuries ago, however the current American centre of gravity is no longer Mexico but the United States.
