Filipa Ribeiro da Silva, Ph.D. (2009) in History, Leiden University, is Post-doctoral fellow at the Wilberforce Institute for the study of Slavery and Emancipation, University of Hull. She has published on Iberian and Dutch Colonial History in several collections and journals.

[...] the clarity of the book's narrative enables the reader to gain a bird's eye view of a highly complex issue, namely the reasons for the rise and fall of "maritime empires" and their "monopolies, and how they interrelated over time. Philip J. Havik, Anais de História de Além-Mar, No. 12, 2011, pp. 388-398

• List of Diagrams, Graphs, Maps, and TablesAcknowledgmentsList of AbbreviationsGlossaryIntroduction1. Institutions2. Labour Migration and colonial societies3. Intra- and inter-continental trade in, to and via Western Africa4. Private investment, agency and networks5. Source Material6. StructurePart I: Building Atlantic empires: The Dutch and the Portuguese models of settlement in Western Africa1. Building institutions1. Administrative institutions2. Military institutions3. Judicial institutions4. Commercial and fiscal institutions2. Sending people: Labour migration and forced labour1. European migrants1.1. Free migrants1.2. Forced migrants2.Forced African migrants: Enslaved and manumitted Africans3. Locally recruited personnel3.1. Free Africans3.2. Mixed descent workers and European settlers4. European labour markets and Western Africa5. Policies of settlement and Western Africa3. Three: Shaping colonial societies1. Europeans2. Africans2.1. Enslaved and manumitted Africans2.2. Free Africans3. Mixed descent population4. Impact of social organization in the building of the Atlantic empiresPart II: Western Africa in the Dutch and the Portuguese Atlantic economies4. Sailing in African Waters: Coastal areas and hinterland1. Routes2. Coastal trade, inter-racial relationships and settlement3. Trading practices4. Western African supply markets5. Western African consumption markets5. Struggling for the Atlantic: The inter-continental trade1. Routes2. Shipping3. Supply markets4. Products and enslaved Africans4.1. Gold4.2. Enslaved Africans5. Consumption markets6. Integration of the markets6. Doing business with Western Africa: Private investors, agency and commercial networks1. European entrepreneurs2. European businessmen3. Agents4. Trans-imperial networks5. Cross-cultural interactionsConclusion: New insights on Dutch-Portuguese rivalries in the AtlanticBibliography1. Primary sources2. Published sources3. Secondary literatureIndex