Additionally, besides the abolitionist movements within slaving empires, most 'primitive' cultures on Earth either had no slavery or had temporary forms of bondage that didn't reduce people to a tradable piece of property. Without great imperial wars and the international slave trade, slaves were members of the community with rights, rights which would be restored to full status after a time. Still wrong and exploitative, obviously, but in the grand scheme of things the more brutal forms of slavery were unique creations of the strongest and most advanced civilizations, the ones that claimed moral superiority.
The late anarchist anthropologist David Graeber in his book Debt, The First 5000 Years ties the trade in human beings to debt from interest bearing loans and conquest. But even in the societies where debt led to slavery, there were mechanisms like the jubilee, that canceled all debts and released all slaves every 50 years. So it was only conquest and violent seizure of human beings from their communities, the breaking of all social bonds, which permanently reduced them to pieces of property - something that most people most of the time did not practice.
TL;DR yes
Additionally, besides the abolitionist movements within slaving empires, most 'primitive' cultures on Earth either had no slavery or had temporary forms of bondage that didn't reduce people to a tradable piece of property. Without great imperial wars and the international slave trade, slaves were members of the community with rights, rights which would be restored to full status after a time. Still wrong and exploitative, obviously, but in the grand scheme of things the more brutal forms of slavery were unique creations of the strongest and most advanced civilizations, the ones that claimed moral superiority.
The late anarchist anthropologist David Graeber in his book Debt, The First 5000 Years ties the trade in human beings to debt from interest bearing loans and conquest. But even in the societies where debt led to slavery, there were mechanisms like the jubilee, that canceled all debts and released all slaves every 50 years. So it was only conquest and violent seizure of human beings from their communities, the breaking of all social bonds, which permanently reduced them to pieces of property - something that most people most of the time did not practice.