Why did, in colonial times, Spanish, Portuguese and French men marry native women while British men preferred to take British women with them?

This question comes up from time to time and has a section in the faq.

It’s also a big question, for which I'll highlight a few important points focusing more on Spanish America which I'm more familiar with including a summary below (updating this from various earlier answers) – hopefully others can add more on British America.

On a side note, I'm aware that certain topics have been getting more politiziced lately (in the US) - and as a historian would caution against drawing direct parallels from then to now. Rather in my view we can study the past on its own terms to expand our view of the present - keeping in mind that we always come at this from a perspective shaped by our own times.

Importantly, looking at demographics, a larger part of the pre-hispanic native population was concentrated in Central and South America in comparison to North America. This was influenced but not "reversed" by the demographic catastrophes that struck native people in Mexico and other places post-conquest. The two largest and most populous empires in the Americas at the time of European contact, the Aztecs and Incas, where in central and south America respectively. The Spanish would build on their structures and they would form their colonial centres, where Spanish control was most secure by the late 16th c. Of course there were also important states and highly developed cultures in North America – this is just to give a rough comparative idea of demographic density in both regions.

Economy & justifications for colonial expansion

In Spanish America, indigenous labor was at first crucial: the early conquistadors went in search of gold, and with the discovery of silver in Potosí silver became the main resource holding together the Spanish empire. The conquistadors’ other main incentive was to set up their own encomiendas, which overall not many of them achieved. The encomienda was the right for the labor of specific indigenous communities - and not for their land per se. While the encomienda system eventually declined, this focus on labor in order to extract silver and other resources to send to Europe continued. With the huge demographic crisis of native people in many parts of Spanish America, African slaves were increasingly brought in for work (which is another story).

For the English, at least early on, the focus was not so much on indigenous labor but more on the right over American land. John Locke famously made the argument that there was a right to take over "vacant land" not held by other people. This argument was so broad that it was regularly applied to land were Native Americans lived, who were not Christians and so did not exactly count as people at that time. In the British American case, this was also out of necessity: as mentioned, the pre-columbian population density of people was simply much lower in the modern-day U.S. than e.g. in the regions of the former Aztec (central Mexico) and Incan (Peru) empires. There were also no major silver or gold reserves like in those regions, so that other resources for revenue had to be found.

In the Spanish case then a stronger focus was on raw resources to be shipped over; which profited a small group of local elites in Spanish America (esp. Spanish and creole); which meant a system built on highly unjust institutions and accelerating corruption. Whereas the British American case had at least partially transformed product (incl. tobacco or sugar) for export to the metropole; plus by the 17th c. institutions that favored a more democratic development from which not only the elites could profit. I'm also drawing on "Why Nations Fail" by Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson here. They sum up some of those points:

It took the Virginia Company twelve years to learn its first lesson that what had worked for the Spanish in Mexico and in Central and South America would not work in the north. The rest of the seventeenth century saw a long series of struggles over the second lesson: that the only option for an economically viable colony was to create institutions that gave the colonists incentives to invest and to work hard.

Social organization

We can also note a more fluid approach at least in colonial Spanish America compared to the later stricter approaches in British America (e.g. with the One Drop Rule). In Spanish America, casta groups included the Spanish at the top of the pyramid, who held the highest posts including that of Viceroy; and "indios", who were under the Crown's protection if they converted, and if noble could continue to hold a certain influence. Others included the "creoles" or Europeans born overseas; "mestizos" of mixed European-native origin; people of African origin; and Asians (often from the Philippines). Then we have a large variety of casta due to mixing between the groups. The important thing to understand here is that this was an *ideal * system which did not actually work completely as envisaged by the Spanish.

Native Americans actually held a special status in the Spanish empire: the legitimization of Spanish expansion officially rested on their conversion of indigenous people to Christianity (they were considered to have no faith, of course). Another big development was the end of native enslavement following Bartolomé de las Casas' influence, starting with the New Laws of 1542. But Africans and people of African descent were not excempt from slavery and usually held the lowest rungs in the colonial hierarchy, as would Asians.

They were usually brought over as slaves, and in contrast to native people there were already centuries of negative stereotypes the Spaniards could build on and continue. In the Americas there was also sexual anxiety of Europeans towards Africans, as seen for example in harsh measures against supposed "slave revolts" - because in many places Africans and "mulattoes" largely outnumbered Spaniards.

Native people (and mestizos and other relates groups) did have possibilites for advancing their position, or even to hide their casta origin and pass for Spaniards in some cases. Recent research highlights how casta categories intersect with esp. class and ethnicity, which is an important point. This can mean e.g. that indigenous people from an elite background could hold many privilieges - incl. having a sword, horse (major rights for Spaniards), and at least into the 17th c. hold onto their traditional lands and rights.

For indigenous commoners however it would have been much more complicated to "switch" groups. Although even people from lower groups (like mestizos or mulattoes) would strategically claim to be from higher groups with success. Similarly, some indigenous groups esp. in central Mexico held more privileges than groups further away from the colonial centres.

So we have at least in earlier colonial times (ca pre 17th c.) still quite of lot of flexibility between these groups. We know of noble Indians and mestizos who described themselves and were perceived as "Spanish". On the other hand, noble Spaniards starting with conquistadors tried to marry into the native nobility in order to gain legitimacy and privileges. R.D. Cope has spoken of "the limits of racial domination" in this context, meaning that even commoners of lower castas had a certain agency and could swith between groups. Nonetheless, he argues that there were long-term effects to the casta system and its exertion of elite Spanish control; and that it would influence people's perceptions of these groups.

We can contrast this with less flexibility and intermarriage between ethnic groups in British America, also in connection with the economic reasons I laid out. This differences I would say even increased with hardening racial attitudes towards native people and African Americans (incl. the One Drop Rule) - would be glad for additions on this comparative aspect. I hope the economic, judicial and social difference between both cases I mentioned do make things a bit clearer. We should also keep in mind that despite such major differences, the British and French also looked closely at Spanish policies in order to avoid what they saw as Spanish mistakes.

Summary: This isn't a question with a clear answer of "A led to B", instead I've highlighted some differences in Spanish and British colonisation in the Americas. a) Pre-contact, modern-day Latin America had a higher population density than the modern-day US. Esp. where major political entities existed like the Aztecs (in central America) and the Incas (in the Andes).

b) Spanish colonisation focused on the right to indigenous labor, christianisation, and the extraction of primary ressources. In contrast, the British the focus was more on acquiring lands, with indigenous people increasingly expelled from them by force. This latter model led to stronger institutions but also stronger segregation in the long run.

And c) major differences in social organization: with the Spanish casta system leading to seperate social groups, but also more flexible (before the 18th c.) than British American systems. In Spanish America intermarriage was even encouraged at least early on with local elites to gain power; and large mixed groups between native, African and European descendants developed over time. Not to paint a too rosy picture though: the casta system continued to influence major discrimation against indigenous and Afro people until today.

In case people would like to read more about Spanish America on this I'm adding another earlier answer of mine on the related topic of female migration, with much fewer women migrating to Spanish than British America at first.

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