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Date: April 29, 2024 Mon
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Results for slavery
12 results foundAuthor: Darfur Consortium Title: Darfur: Abductions, Sexual Slavery and Forced Labour Summary: Research carried out by Darfur Consortium over the last two years, which included field research in three states of Darfur, has found that Government supported militia, like the Janjaweed and the Popular Defence Forces, together with the Sudanese Armed Forces, have systematically abducted civilians for the purposes of sexual slavery and forced labor as part of the Darfur conflict. This report concludes that there is an urgent need to protect civilians from abductions and other serious human rights violations. It calls on the Government of Sudan to disarm and disband the Janjaweed, the Popular Defence Forces and other militia and to fully cooperate with the United Nations and the African Union in order to address continuing human rights and humanitarian issues in Darfur. Details: Kampala, Uganda: 2009 Source: Year: 2009 Country: Uganda URL: Shelf Number: 115637 Keywords: AbductionsSexual ViolenceSlavery |
Author: Quirk, Joel Title: Unfinished Business: A Comparative Survey of Historical and Contemporary Slavery Summary: The history of slavery raises many uncomfortable political and moral questions. Until relatively recently, legal enslavement was widely regarded as a natural and all but inescapable feature of human existence, which appears to have been sanctioned, in one form or another, by every major civilization and religion. The key break with this enduring precedent occurred in the second half of the eighteenth century, with the emergence of an organized anti-slavery movement in some parts of Europe and the Americas. This fledgling movement would face tremendous political and economic obstacles. From the sixteenth century onwards, European traders had been supplying colonial settlements in the Americas with ever increasing numbers of slaves from Africa. This unprecedented investment in human bondage had proved to be a major commercial success, creating powerful vested interests that were heavily reliant upon slave labour. Over many decades, organized anti-slavery challenged this flourishing system on various fronts, leading to protracted contests over the status of slavery on both sides of Atlantic. After numerous setbacks, false starts and a series of often violent conflicts, slavery was legally abolished throughout the Americas, with the final act coming with the passage of a ‘Golden Law’ abolishing slavery in Brazil. The passing of Trans-Atlantic slavery is often viewed as an historical endpoint, which relegated slavery to the distant past. This is misleading. As this report makes clear, slavery remained legal in other parts of the globe well into the twentieth century, and in territories where slavery came to be legally abolished human bondage and extreme exploitation regularly continued under other designations. Many governments would rush to declare that slavery was no longer a problem, but these declarations rarely matched events on the ground. In the immediate aftermath of legal abolition, this was chiefly a question of the widespread use of forced, bonded and indentured labour in many jurisdictions. Over the last half century, the primary focus has gradually shifted towards practices which are analogous to legal slavery, with human trafficking, sexual servitude and child labour acquiring particular prominence. Interest in contemporary slavery has increased dramatically over the last ten years, but there remains a widespread tendency to view historical and contemporary slavery as independent fields of study. For most historians of slavery, current problems rarely enter into the picture, except perhaps as brief postscripts, which typically take the form of passing observations that the struggle against slavery has not entirely concluded. For those focused on the present, the bulk of whom are political activists and official agents, the history of slavery and abolition consistently takes a back seat to contemporary issues. While both approaches are perfectly legitimate and entirely understandable, they can indirectly foster an informal separation between past and present, which can obscure the historical roots of contemporary problems. This report moves beyond this artificial divide, providing the first ever comparative survey of both historical practices and contemporary problems. In doing so, it draws upon a wide range of literatures and source materials. The primary goal here is not to provide a comprehensive account of a specific issue or event in the history of slavery, but instead to integrate some of the key findings of existing treatments of many different events within a broader historical and political perspective. By concentrating upon important parallels between past and present, the report offers new ways of engaging with many of the key relationships and connections that have shaped the historical trajectory of slavery and abolition over the last five centuries. It is also important to recognize, however, that the report also operates at a high level of generalization. This has meant that a number of important developments have been passed over, or sketched in relatively brief terms. These shortcomings are hard to avoid in a survey of this type, especially given the scale of the global issues involved, so it is important to approach the information presented here as an open invitation to further analysis, rather than the final word on any particular topic. To assist additional inquiries, the report also includes a substantial number of references, which provide information on many key sources and authors for readers seeking further information on specific issues. The report is divided into five major chapters. The first chapter, ‘Defining Slavery in all its Forms,’ examines a number of definitions of slavery, both past and present. When it comes to the history of slavery, the main task facing any definition of slavery is developing a formula which separates slavery from related forms of servitude. When it comes to contemporary slavery, the main task facing any definition of slavery is specifying which activities are sufficiently similar to legal slavery that they deserve to be placed on the same footing. The second chapter, ‘The Question of Numbers’, examines a number of estimates of the scale of slavery, slave trading and other forms of human bondage. This starts with the history of Trans-Atlantic slavery, where a great deal of information is available. This wealth of material is unusual. In most cases estimates of slave numbers are confined to informed extrapolations, which can often be complicated by the illegal nature of many of the practices involved. The third chapter, ‘Human Bondage in Comparative Perspective’, identifies a number of differences and similarities between historical and contemporary practices. Four main themes are identified here; i) demand, acquisition and control, ii) transit and transfer, iii) slave roles, and iv) slave resistance. These themes follow a loose sequence of events, with demand for slaves providing a basis for various modes of enslavement, market-driven migration, and a series of commercial exchanges. Once slaves reach their destination, we confront the further question of slave roles, which have been characterized by a range of economic, reproductive, military and social considerations. The final theme of this chapter is slave resistance, which applies to every stage in this complex chain. Slave resistance is commonly associated with overt acts such as rebellion, flight and suicide, but it can also extend to long-term efforts to develop autonomous spaces under extremely difficult circumstances. By considering each of these themes in turn, this chapter identifies a number of key differences and similarities between various historical and contemporary practices, paving the way for further analysis of the history of organized anti-slavery and contemporary activism. The fourth chapter, ‘Legal Abolition’ starts by identifying three main paths through which the legal abolition of slavery has historically occurred. This finds expression in a series of brief case studies, starting with four countries which occupy key positions when it comes to the end of Trans-Atlantic slavery; the United States of America, Saint-Domingue/Haiti, Great Britain and Portugal. Each of these cases captures different aspects of a complex trajectory. The history of anti-slavery is often equated with social activism in Britain and the United States, but these countries are not representative of experiences elsewhere. These case studies are then followed by a survey of the history of the legal abolition of slavery in other parts of the globe, where anti-slavery measures were often closely connected with European imperialism and colonialism. This important relationship is explored through additional studies of the history of legal abolition of slavery in India, Nigeria, Ethiopia and Saudi Arabia. The fifth chapter, ‘Effective Emancipation’, explores some of the key limitations of the legal abolition of slavery. Although slavery has been legally abolished throughout the world, the serious problems associated with slavery have continued to this day in various guises. Something more is required: effective emancipation. The chapter begins with the aftermath of legal abolition, which can be divided into short and long term dimensions. The immediate component is concerned with the widespread use of other forms of human bondage as an informal substitute for slavery following legal abolition. The long term component is concerned with the enduring legacies of historical patterns of enslavement. The chapter then goes on to provide a further series of case studies of different aspects of contemporary slavery, focusing upon chattel slavery in Mauritania, debt-bondage in India, migrant domestic workers in Singapore, and human trafficking in Great Britain. The conclusion of the report, ‘Public Policy and Political Activism’, outlines a series of general strategies and recommendations for addressing contemporary problems. This platform draws upon the key insights of previous chapters of the report, making a case for both targeted action and sweeping socio-economic reform. This begins with four key themes; i) education, information and awareness ii) further legal reform, iii) effective enforcement, and iv) release, rehabilitation and restitution. These four themes can be viewed as the core of anti-slavery activism, offering a targeted platform that should command support from across the political and ideological spectrum. It is also clear, however, that the fight against both contemporary slavery and the long-term legacies of historical slave systems requires systemic efforts to address larger socio-economic problems. If we are serious about confronting contemporary slavery, we also need to be serious about larger questions of poverty, inequality, racism and discrimination. Details: Paris: The Slave Route Project, Division of Cultural Policies and Intercultural Dialogue, UNESCO, 2008. 141p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed November 15, 2011 at: http://www.unesco.org/culture/pdf/UnfinishedBusinessReport2008.pdf Year: 2008 Country: International URL: http://www.unesco.org/culture/pdf/UnfinishedBusinessReport2008.pdf Shelf Number: 123354 Keywords: Forced LabourHuman TraffickingSlavery |
Author: Leslie, Zorba Title: The Congo Report: Slavery in Conflict Minerals Summary: Slavery in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is nothing new. Central Africa was a site of slave raiding for the Red Sea and Indian Ocean slave trade long before the arrival of Europeans. But the Belgian colonial occupation, and especially the personal fiefdom of King Leopold II, brought a particularly brutal brand of slavery enforced through torture, limb amputation and murder by the mercenary Force Publique. This was slavery on a massive scale, and an estimated ten million people died over a fifteen-year period. The term “crimes against humanity” was first used to describe this slavery and genocide. The driving force behind this assault was the extraction of Congo’s riches, focused then on rubber and ivory. The loss of cultural memory was so great that few Congolese today have any knowledge of the genocide or mass enslavement. Congo’s people achieved independence from colonial rule in 1960, but were soon subjected to the predatory regime of Mobutu Sese Seko. Mobutu robbed the country of its riches while neglecting the government’s most basic functions for more than three decades. The jungle literally grew up over the country’s network of roads; unpaid soldiers turned to living off the people; and the people did whatever they could to survive. A corrupt informal economy flourished, fertile ground for modern forms of slavery. Mobutu was deposed in 1997, ending a short civil war in which the victorious rebels were supported principally by Rwanda. But the resulting instability ushered in a second and catastrophic war that left 5 million dead from the conflict, its aftermath, and related famine and disease. Abuses committed by all sides in the conflict are well documented. Demands for justice for the crimes committed during that era have been strengthened by a recent UN report on the most serious violations, including slavery, committed between 1993 and 2003. While peace came officially in 2002, the conflict between the army, armed groups composed in part of rebels from neighboring countries, and a number of homegrown, rag-tag militias in the eastern countryside never stopped. As of this writing, ill-prepared elections scheduled for November 2011 are generating fears of further instability and even a return to full-scale conflict. Meanwhile, the war against women and girls in particular, fought by both armed groups and civilians through means of sexual violence, has never ended. In a context in which the rule of law has collapsed, members of armed groups fight and—more often—prey upon civilians for several reasons. They secure their survival through looting. They fight for control over land that was once devoted to farming and ranching, sometimes along ethnic fault lines, and they fight for control over the mines. This report documents several types of slavery in Congo’s mines. Some forms of slavery are directly linked to the conflict, including the use of so-called “child soldiers” and the kidnapping of civilians for forced labor and sexual slavery by illegal armed groups and uncontrolled army units. Other forms of slavery are familiar around the world: debt bondage, forced marriage, slavery in the commercial sex trade, and child slavery that grows out of poverty and the lack of community-enforced norms respecting child rights. But while slavery is not new, neither are efforts to stop it. An anti-slavery campaign at the end of the 19th century broke Leopold’s grip on Congo. Today, human rights workers in Congo’s war-afflicted east, supported by activists in North America and Europe, work to end the widespread abuses of rape, slavery, and wanton killing. Nonetheless, the dynamics of slavery and how the slavery of eastern Congo fits into contemporary legal definitions of slavery are not well understood. There is no doubt, however, that this is slavery—the control of people using violence and its threat to extract work or sexual exploitation, a radical diminution of free will, intentional coercion to make the victims believe they cannot walk away, and no pay beyond subsistence, if that. Armed groups are the principal perpetrators, but they are not alone. Civilian middle managers, moneylenders, brothel owners, and even parents in some cases, are also responsible for these modern forms of slavery. This means that ending the conflict is only part of the solution. Nor is it possible for a modern-day abolitionist simply to step into the world of eastern Congo, with all of its history and complexity, and expect to rescue those in slavery one-by-one. Congolese abolitionists and human rights workers, joining with anti-slavery workers around the world, must and do operate at multiple levels. The necessary approaches include: active and courageous international diplomacy, pressure from all quarters on Congolese and neighboring governments including Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi; regulatory, consumer and investor pressure on companies to clean slavery out of their supply chains; and the strengthening of mining communities at the local level. Details: Washington, DC: Free the Slaves, 2011. 36p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed March 10, 2012 at http://www.freetheslaves.net/Document.Doc?id=243 Year: 2011 Country: Congo, Democratic Republic URL: http://www.freetheslaves.net/Document.Doc?id=243 Shelf Number: 124426 Keywords: (Democratic Republic of Congo)Conflict Minerals (Democratic Republic of Congo)Debt BondageIllicit Mineral TradeSlavery |
Author: Polaris Project Title: Combating human trafficking and modern-day slavery: ten years of impact 2002-2012 Summary: uring their senior year at Brown University, Katherine Chon and Derek Ellerman read a newspaper article describing the horrific conditions of a brothel located near their apartments. The brothel had been disguised as a massage parlor. But inside the building, police officers had found six Asian women with cigarette burns on their arms who were being held in a situation of debt bondage. “This was like slavery,” were the words of the officer who handled the investigation. This eye-opening case made it clear to Katherine and Derek that modern-day slavery existed in present-day America in ways that they were not aware of. They could not walk away. Instead, they devoted themselves to preventing such abuses from happening to more people. Inspired by the example of the Underground Railroad, Katherine and Derek developed a vision for an organization where everyday people could come together to do extraordinary things to overcome the scourge of slavery. Just as those who were escaping the slavery of the 19th century followed Polaris, the North Star, as they sought freedom, a similar spirit of hope, courage, and community infused Katherine and Derek’s work. They officially founded Polaris Project on February 14, 2002, a day dedicated to generating attention to stop violence against women and girls. The day after graduation, they packed up a U-Haul truck and relocated their lives to Washington, d.c., to launch Polaris Project’s first office on Capitol Hill. Polaris Project’s central goal was to create long-term solutions that would change the underlying systems that allow human trafficking to occur. Katherine and Derek’s programmatic strategy was grounded in an analysis of human trafficking as a market-based phenomenon driven by two primary factors: low-risk and high-profit. They believed then, as they do today, that modern-day slavery can be eliminated by reaching a tipping point where human trafficking becomes a high-risk, lowprofit endeavor. Over time, Katherine and Derek built an organization that successfully combines its work on the frontlines serving victims of human trafficking with the creation of long-term solutions that affect systemic and social change. Early on, they launched an innovative victim outreach program to uncover trafficking locations, directly target trafficking networks, identify victims and connect them to services. As the organization grew, staff members worked with coalition partners to help pass landmark bills through Congress and groundbreaking legislation in 48 states that protect victims and punish perpetrators. In 2007, Polaris Project expanded the National Human Trafficking Resource Center to operate as a national anti-slavery lifeline. And law enforcement officers, service providers, and other key first responders have sought out Polaris Project as a go-to agency for valuable trainings on how to recognize the signs of trafficking. Details: Washington, DC: Polaris Project, 2012. 28p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed March 11, 2012 at http://www.polarisproject.org/about-us/financial-information/2002-2012-report Year: 2012 Country: United States URL: http://www.polarisproject.org/about-us/financial-information/2002-2012-report Shelf Number: 124452 Keywords: Human TraffickingSlavery |
Author: Verité Title: Help Wanted: Hiring, Human Trafficking and Modern-Day Slavery in the Global Economy Summary: Verité’s HELP WANTED initiative – a research and advocacy effort described in this report – aims to clarify and publicize the ways in which current labor broker practices can create hiring traps; and to provide concrete approaches by which private sector, civil society, and governmental institutions can address this key point of leverage to reduce the risk of a worker ending up a victim of modern-day slavery. Labor brokers – middlemen in the recruitment, hiring and/or management of laborers – operate at the core of the global economy. Complex supply chains necessitate levels of coordination and expertise that are not easily found within a given company because the challenges are spread out over multiple countries and time zones, and workforces are in many instances comprised of workers from far-flung lands. Companies turn to labor brokers to manage many of these challenges, but the increasing use of labor brokers brings with it troubling issues of fragmented and opaque social accountability. For workers, labor brokerage increases migration and job acquisition costs and the risk of serious exploitation, including slavery. Verité is a global advocate for workers. Through our understanding of the perspectives of workers, we find solutions to human rights violations in good business practices. We work to remove dangers and abuses in workplaces around the world by providing knowledge, skills Workers are at heightened vulnerability to modern-day slavery when they have been brought to work away from their homes. This vulnerability is generated or exacerbated by the involvement of labor brokers. Labor brokers act as the middlemen, facilitating a connection between potential workers and their eventual employers. The system of labor brokerage is widespread, opaque, sometimes corrupt, and largely lacking in accountability. In some cases brokerages are substantial, well-organized companies. In others they are informal in their structure and outreach. In all cases their presence in the recruitment and hiring “supply chain” increases the vulnerability of migrant workers to various forms of forced labor once on-the-job. The debt that is often necessary for migrant workers to undertake in order to pay recruitment fees, when combined with the deception that is visited upon them by brokers about job types and salaries, can lead to a situation of debt-bondage – which, according to Anti-Slavery International, is “probably the least known form of slavery today, and yet it is the most widely used method of enslaving people.”1 When a migrant worker finds herself in a foreign country, with formidable recruitment debt and possibly even ancestral family land hanging in the balance, on a work visa that ties her to one employer and a job that doesn’t remotely resemble the salary and conditions that were promised to her by her labor broker, she has fallen into what Verité calls a HIRING TRAP. There are few global workplace problems in more urgent need of attention. This report begins by offering key findings from recent Verité research on the intersection of brokers, migrant workers and slavery. This research was performed in a variety of sectors and locales across the globe, including: the migration of adults from India to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) States of the Middle East for work in construction, infrastructure and the service sector; the migration of children and juveniles from the Indian interior to domestic apparel production hubs; the migration of adults from Guatemala, Mexico and Thailand to work in U.S. agriculture; and the migration of adults from the Philippines, Indonesia and Nepal to the Information Technology sector in Malaysia and Taiwan. This report then presents the factors that, in Verité’s view, constitute the major red flags for vulnerability of migrant workers to broker-induced forced labor. These red flags were present individually or in various combinations across all the sectors and locales of Verité’s research. A set of concrete activities and engagements to promote the fair hiring of migrant workers is offered at the close of the report. Details: Amherst, MA: Verité, Undated. 72p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed March 25, 2012 at http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2135&context=globaldocs Year: 0 Country: International URL: http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2135&context=globaldocs Shelf Number: 124750 Keywords: Adult VictimsForced LaborHuman TraffickingJuvenile VictimsMigrant WorkersSlavery |
Author: Perez Solla, Maria Fernando Title: Slavery and Human Trafficking International Law and the Role of the World Bank Summary: This paper reviews the international legal framework applicable to the World Bank and Member States on contemporary forms of slavery, in particular, trafficking. The Palermo Trafficking Protocol is specially analyzed. Moreover, the paper refers to the preventive framework constituted by human rights obligations, particularly those of international labor law. The World Bank’s mandate appears to permit preventive action. The Articles expressly refer to the goal of improving conditions of labor. On one hand, the Bank’s practice includes today work in areas linked to human rights, which reveals tacit agreement by Member States. In addition, human rights obligations have been widely accepted by the international community, though implementation is poor. Moreover, poverty causes vulnerability to slavery-like practices, and they perpetuate poverty. A modest set of recommendations and areas in which further research is needed are included. The paper encourages mainstreaming the issues analyzed strategically in the Bank’s core operations (concerning processes and results), with country-led and country specific efforts, identifying the issues important for poverty reduction and growth. Details: Washington, DC: Social Protection & Labor, The World Bank, 2009. 69p. Source: Internet Resource: SP Discussion Paper no. 0904: Accessed May 8, 2013 at: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/SOCIALPROTECTION/Resources/SP-Discussion-papers/Labor-Market-DP/0904.pdf Year: 2009 Country: International URL: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/SOCIALPROTECTION/Resources/SP-Discussion-papers/Labor-Market-DP/0904.pdf Shelf Number: 128677 Keywords: Forced LaborHuman RightsHuman TraffickingMigrationSlavery |
Author: Lyneham, Samantha Title: Human Trafficking Involving Marriage and Partner Migration to Australia Summary: In this report, what is known about human trafficking involving marriage and partner migration to Australia is described, drawing on primary information obtained from victim/survivor testimonies, stakeholder knowledge and expertise, and reported cases that progressed through the Australian justice system. While past research has focused on commercial labour and sexual exploitation, this report draws attention to trafficking that can occur in non-commercial contexts. Although forced marriage has increasingly gained attention over the past three years and a small number of legal proceedings have substantiated attempted or actual cases of forced marriage involving girls and young women, less attention has been paid to the exploitation of migrant brides in other ways. This research is the first in Australia to confirm that marriage has been used to recruit or attract women to Australia for the purposes of exploitation as domestic servants, to provide private or commercial sexual services and/or to be exploited in the home as wives. The lack of data and information on human trafficking generally, and on human trafficking involving marriage and partner migration specifically, has implications for the way the problem is conceptualised, measured and responded to. While current knowledge in related areas, such as violence against women in general, violence against migrant spouses, domestic violence and sexual violence, can provide information on the context and environment in which human trafficking involving intimate partner relationships can occur, this research provides the first evidence of this form of human trafficking in Australia. Although exploratory in nature, this research makes a significant contribution to the limited body of knowledge on exploitative marriages in the context of human trafficking, providing an initial insight into the nature of this crime. Further, more detailed assessment, is required to understand the extent of the problem and to inform prevention, detection and enforcement strategies. Details: Canberra: Australian Institute of Criminology, 2014. 83p. Source: Internet Resource: Research and Public Policy Series no. 124: Accessed June 14, 2014 at: http://aic.gov.au/media_library/publications/rpp/124/rpp124.pdf Year: 2014 Country: Australia URL: http://aic.gov.au/media_library/publications/rpp/124/rpp124.pdf Shelf Number: 132457 Keywords: Human Trafficking (Australia)ImmigrationMarriageMigrant BridesMigrant VictimsSex IndustrySlavery |
Author: Torres, Sol Title: Slavery and Human Trafficking in the 21st Century Summary: An estimated 30 million people are subject to modern day slavery, including forced labor and sexual exploitation. Moreover, the trafficking of human beings is one of the fastest growing transnational criminal activities. Not only is it an abuse of the human rights of the victims involved, but it also incurs social, political, and economic costs for the countries it most impacts. Providing first an overview of the global phenomenon of modern-day slavery, this paper proceeds to study the Greater Mekong Subregion for whose states human trafficking represents a serious challenge-one which requires a well-coordinated response to, among other measures, scrutinize labor contracts in risk economic sectors, enhance interstate cooperation, and more effectively identify and prosecute human traffickers. Details: Stockholm: Institute for Security and Development Policy, 2014. 10p. Source: Internet Resource: Focus Asia, No. 10: Accessed November 18, 2014 at: http://www.isdp.eu/publications/index.php?option=com_jombib&task=showbib&id=6487 Year: 2014 Country: Asia URL: http://www.isdp.eu/publications/index.php?option=com_jombib&task=showbib&id=6487 Shelf Number: 134132 Keywords: Forced LaborHuman Trafficking (Asia)Sexual ExploitationSlavery |
Author: Buonanno, Paolo Title: Inequality, Crime, and the Long-Run Legacy of Slavery Summary: Estimating the effect of inequality on crime is challenging due to reverse causality and omitted variable bias. This paper addresses these concerns by exploiting the fact that, as suggested by recent scholarly research, the legacy of slavery is largely manifested in persistent levels of economic inequality. Municipality-level economic inequality in Colombia is instrumented with a census-based measure of the proportion of slaves before the abolition of slavery in the nineteenth century. It is found that inequality increases both property crime and violent crime. The estimates are robust to including traditional determinants of crime (like population density, proportion of young males, average education level, quality of law enforcement institutions, and overall economic activity), as well as geographic characteristics that may be correlated with both the slave economy and with crime, and current ethnic differences. Policies aiming at reducing structural crime should focus on reducing economic inequality. Details: Washington, DC: Inter-American Development Bank, 2017. 35p. Source: Internet Resource: IDB WORKING PAPER SERIES No. IDB-WP-793: Accessed May 24, 2017 at: https://publications.iadb.org/bitstream/handle/11319/8248/Inequality-Crime-and-the-Long-Run-Legacy-of-Slavery.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y Year: 2017 Country: United States URL: https://publications.iadb.org/bitstream/handle/11319/8248/Inequality-Crime-and-the-Long-Run-Legacy-of-Slavery.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y Shelf Number: 145757 Keywords: Crime RateHomicidesInequalityPovertySlavery |
Author: Thompson, Darla Jean Title: Circuits of Containment: Iron Collars, Incarceration and the Infrastructure of Slavery Summary: This dissertation documents the development of New Orleans and Louisiana from 1805-1861. I argue that iron collars emerged in the nineteenth century as technologies of torture, control, coercion, commodity production, and distribution. The use of iron collars by enslavers, in conjunction with chains, jails, the state penitentiary, and forced labor on municipal and state public works shows how technologies shaped enslaved peoples lives as they were captured, contained, and forced to be productive units of labor. By combining insights from scholarship in the fields of US slavery and technology, I argue that enslavers innovative uses of these technologies made the process of extracting labor from enslaved people more efficient and productive. By focusing on the punishing labor practices enslaved people endured in iron collars, jails, chain gangs, forced public works labor, and penitentiaries I show how the old and the new were used to "improve" enslaved people in order to keep them productive and profitable. In Chapter One, I examine the material experience of slaves wearing iron collars, including those with obstructions such as prongs, branches and bells. In Chapter Two, I examine the practices of incarceration in relationship to legislators' rhetoric about constructing a seamless economic circuit exploiting slave labor from plantation to prison factory in order to clothe an independent South. In Chapter Three, I examine how enslaved people who were either privately or publicly owned were used for to build and municipal and state infrastructure. State and city owned slaves, captured and jailed runaway slaves, and convicts from the state penitentiary labored to build roads, levees and clear rivers and bayous. Through these practices, enslaved people's lives embodied hard labor, blurring lines between enslavement and incarceration, as they were loaned, rented, borrowed, and bought, captured, and recaptured through spaces of punishment and labor in support of building and maintaining the infrastructure necessary for the production and distribution of commodities. Together, a range of technical practices were socially and economically shaped and produced through networks of people, objects, knowledge and ideology forming a socio-technical system for the control and containment of enslaved people as they struggled to be free. Details: Ithaca, NY: Cornell University, 2014. 233p. Source: Internet Resource: Dissertation: Accessed February 27, 2018 at: https://ecommons.cornell.edu/bitstream/handle/1813/36009/djt36.pdf?sequence=1 Year: 2014 Country: United States URL: https://ecommons.cornell.edu/bitstream/handle/1813/36009/djt36.pdf?sequence=1 Shelf Number: 149265 Keywords: Chain GangsForced LaborHard LaborHuman Rights AbusesSlavery |
Author: Ruiz-Benitez de Lugo, Lucia Bird Title: Battling Human Trafficking: a Scrutiny of Private Sector Obligations under the Modern Slavery Act Summary: Modern slavery is a global problem estimated to affect over 40 million people, 16 million of those in forced labour in the private sector. Forced labour in the private economy is estimated to generate $150 billion in illegal profits per year, with recent research finding that 71% of companies believe modern slavery is likely to be occurring in their supply chains. Multi-nationals from Nestle to Costco have faced class actions in US courts and, even where the case has been unsuccessful, suffered significant reputational damage. The private sector is being held to account for human rights violations in their supply chains in an unprecedented manner. The Transparency in Supply Chains clause (TSC) in the Modern Slavery Act 2015 (MSA), which firmly placed obligations on a significant cross-section of the private sector for mitigating the risk of human trafficking in their supply chains (HTSC), is the UK's landmark legislation effecting this shift of responsibility onto business. The MSA is groundbreaking legislation, and a number of other jurisdictions are already following suit. Consequently, an analysis of the MSA yields a clearer understanding of the current trend in global regulation of human trafficking in supply chains. The TSC requires companies falling within specified financial and geographic thresholds to publish an annual statement outlining the steps they have taken to mitigate the risk of HTSC (the "TSC Statement"). The aim of the TSC is to 'prevent modern slavery in organisations and their supply chains' by increasing the transparency and accountability of companies to both shareholders and consumers, thereby driving best practice in HTSC risk mitigation. The TSC came into force in 2015, and most companies falling within scope have been required to publish the first TSC Statement in 2017 to cover the 2016 fiscal year. This is consequently a key moment to take stock and analyse the efficacy of the TSC against its stated purpose, to assess compliance and review how the structure of the TSC requirement could be tweaked to enhance impact. Details: Geneva, Switzerland: The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2018. 36p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed September 8, 2018 at: http://globalinitiative.net/battling-human-trafficking-a-scrutiny-of-private-sector-obligations-under-the-modern-slavery-act/ Year: 2018 Country: International URL: http://globalinitiative.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Battling-Human-Trafficking-A-Scrutiny-of-Private-Sector-Obligations-under-the-Modern-Slavery-Act-Global-Initiative-RESPECT-2018.pdf Shelf Number: 151448 Keywords: Forced LaborGlobal AffairsHuman TraffickingModern SlaveryPrivate SectorSlavery |
Author: Inter-American Commission on Human Rights Title: Captive Communities: Situation of the Guarani Indigenous People and the Contemporary Forms of Slavery in the Bolivian Chaco Summary: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1. In this report the Inter‐American Commission on Human Rights (hereinafter "Inter‐American Commission" or "IACHR") analyzes the situation of the Guarani indigenous people in the region known as the Bolivian Chaco, focusing particularly on the situation of Guarani families subjected to conditions of debt bondage and forced labor. This phenomenon, which affects approximately 600 families, is known by reference to "captive communities," and it clearly involves contemporary forms of slavery that should be eradicated immediately. In addition, this report analyzes the situation these captive communities face in order to gain access to their ancestral territory. 2. The report was preceded by a working and observation visit conducted June 9-13, 2008, by Commissioner Luz Patricia Mejia Guerrero, in her capacity as Rapporteur for Bolivia, and by Commissioner Victor E. Abramovich, in his capacity as Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. 3. The Commission deplores the existence in Bolivia of practices of bondage and forced labor, which are absolutely prohibited by the American Convention on Human Rights and other international instruments to which Bolivia is a party. The Commission also observes that the situation of bondage and forced labor in which the captive communities live is an extreme manifestation of the discrimination that indigenous peoples have suffered historically and continue suffering in Bolivia. 4. Despite the efforts made by the Bolivian State (hereinafter "the State," "Bolivia," or "the Bolivian State") to address the situation of bondage and forced labor and to facilitate the reconstitution of the Guarani territory, there are still captive communities whose members are subject to performing forced labor for debts supposedly contracted and who most of the time do not receive any salary for their work. 5. The report concludes with recommendations aimed at cooperating with the Bolivian State in its efforts to eradicate these contemporary forms of slavery and to guarantee and protect the human rights of the Guarani indigenous people, especially their collective property, their right of access to justice, and their right to a dignified life. The recommendations include actions to: (1) prevent, investigate, and punish contemporary forms of slavery; (2) reconstitute the territory of the Guarani indigenous people; and (3) guarantee access to justice for the Guarani indigenous people and all other indigenous peoples in Bolivia. Details: S.L., 2009. 73p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed January 30, 2019 at: https://www.oas.org/en/iachr/indigenous/docs/pdf/captivecommunities.pdf Year: 2009 Country: Bolivia URL: http://www.cidh.org/countryrep/ComunidadesCautivas.eng/toc.htm Shelf Number: 154314 Keywords: BondageForced LaborHuman RightsIndigenous PeopleModern SlaverySlavery |