Gender, modern slavery and labour exploitation: experiences of male Polish migrants in England

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
William Shankley
Keyword(s):  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
Polish Migrants

scholarly journals Bringing the problem home: The anti-slavery and anti-trafficking rhetoric of UK non-government organisations

Politics ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 026339572096240
Author(s):  
Nick Turnbull ◽  
Rose Broad
Keyword(s):  
Human Trafficking ◽  
Policy Framing ◽  
Female Victims ◽  
Policy Problem ◽  
The Past ◽  
Problem Framing ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
Problem Frame ◽  
Historical Rhetoric

Rhetoric is a way to explain policy problem framing by recognising the practical necessity to persuade audiences in contextual situations. Modern slavery and human trafficking is a complex and emotive problem, simplified through rhetorical demands to motivate an audience of supporters. This article analyses rhetoric by 212 UK anti-trafficking and anti-slavery non-government organisations (NGOs) to uncover rhetorical practices and their effects on policy framing, supplemented by archival research to compare past and present anti-slavery oratory. Our data show NGOs use rhetoric to motivate supporters and promote a humanitarian problem frame, in opposition to a state-driven security frame. Findings confirm other research in identifying an emphasis on female victims and on sexual over labour exploitation. Past and present rhetoric are equivalent in terms of liberal, Christian values (ethos) and appeals to pathos through sympathy for victims. Historical rhetoric is distinctive in arguing for the equal human status of slaves, whereas contemporary activists argue victims are denied agency. Contemporary rhetoric represses the question of migration, whereas past rhetoric is more deliberative. Rhetoric varies with the requirements of persuasion related to contextual distance, between unlike humans in the past, but in regard to geographical distance today.

scholarly journals Human Trafficking and Heroic Consumerism

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 51-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erin O'Brien
Keyword(s):  
Human Trafficking ◽  
Unintended Consequence ◽  
Political Consumerism ◽  
Awareness Campaigns ◽  
Ethical Consumerism ◽  
World Vision ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery

Consumers are the new activists in the fight against modern slavery, with awareness campaigns urging citizens to use their consumer power to demand an end to labour exploitation. The contribution of political, or ethical, consumerism campaigns to the trafficking narrative is examined in this article through an analysis of the characterisation of consumers and corporations in campaigns from SlaveryFootprint.org, Stop the Traffik UK, and World Vision Australia. This article argues that campaigns urging political consumerism depict consumers as the heroic rescuers of enslaved victims, and embed solutions to modern slavery within a culture of unquestioned capitalism. This approach may have the unintended consequence of sidelining victims from the trafficking story as the focus of the narrative becomes the product, rather than the victim, of labour exploitation.

Understanding the Global Business of Forced Labour: An Introduction

2018 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Genevieve LeBaron
Keyword(s):  
Global Economy ◽  
The Political ◽  
Ethical Challenges ◽  
Global Business ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
Forced Labour ◽  
Rights Issue

This introductory Chapter provides an overview of the political, methodological, and ethical challenges of researching forced labour in the global economy tackled in this Volume. It argues that in spite of these challenges, researchers are pioneering fresh approaches to understanding the business of forced labour that are anchored in strong empirical methods, rather than outdated theoretical propositions or sensationalist newspaper headlines. This burgeoning and interdisciplinary body of research challenges conventional narratives about the nature and role of modern slavery. It reveals that rather than an individualised, randomly occurring human rights issue caused by the moral shortcomings and greed of unscrupulous employers, severe labour exploitation is a coherent and predictable feature of many sectors and regions within the global political economy. The methodological reflections contained within this Volume offer a resource for academics and practitioners seeking to understand forced labour, the factors that shape vulnerability to this phenomenon, and the variegated mechanisms through which businesses systemically profit from labour exploitation.

scholarly journals Utilising ‘modern slave’ narratives in social policy research

2019 ◽  
Vol 40 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-49
Author(s):  
Coretta Phillips
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Policy Research ◽  
Secondary Analysis ◽  
Slave Narratives ◽  
Limited Attention ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
Narrative Interview ◽  
Forced Labour

Modern slavery has received somewhat limited attention in social policy. Partially responding to this gap, while acknowledging the contested nature of the term ‘modern slavery’, this article makes the case for the primary and secondary analysis of ‘slave narratives’ which provide experiential and agential accounts by those directly harmed by forced labour, coerced sex work and other forms of exploitation. Analysis of a narrative interview with Sean, a (citizen-)victim of forced labour proved under s.71 of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009, demonstrates the multifaceted nature of labour exploitation and its multiple, severe and long-lasting harms. That the form and structure of Sean’s narrative of forced labour resembles those used in the abolitionist cause against antebellum slavery points to a certain timeless essence to forced labour exploitation. The article concludes with implications for intervention.

scholarly journals Australia’s Modern Slavery Act: Challenges for a post-COVID world?

2020 ◽  
Vol 45 (3) ◽  
pp. 209-214
Author(s):  
Jamie Fellows ◽  
Mark David Chong
Keyword(s):  
Necessary Conditions ◽  
Sexual Exploitation ◽  
Economic Recession ◽  
Forced Marriage ◽  
Current Form ◽  
Address Forms ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
Commonwealth Government ◽  
Domestic Servitude

When the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) struck in early 2020, the Commonwealth government eased reporting deadlines and extended the date for firms required to submit modern slavery statements under Australia’s Modern Slavery Act 2018 (Cth). The economic recession caused by COVID-19 has produced the necessary conditions for further exploitation and enslavement of vulnerable individuals. This article asserts that, even without COVID-19, the Modern Slavery Act 2018 (Cth) in its current form will do little to address forms of modern slavery such as sexual exploitation, forced marriage, trafficking and domestic servitude. This is because the Modern Slavery Act 2018 (Cth) primarily targets labour exploitation and requires suppliers to voluntarily disclose their involvement with modern slavery.

Migrant illegality, slavery and exploitative work

2019 ◽  
pp. 219-242
Author(s):  
Hannah Lewis ◽  
Louise Waite
Keyword(s):  
Migrant Workers ◽  
Labour Markets ◽  
Immigration Policies ◽  
Family Status ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
And Migration ◽  
The Uk

This chapter considers the position of migrants in the UK who experience severe labour exploitation. It addresses how — or whether — the emerging ‘modern slavery complex’ can adequately respond to the production and continuation of unfree labour relationships that produce conditions now grouped under the umbrella of ‘modern slavery’. It starts from the point of understanding severe labour exploitation as emerging within a set of multidimensional processes embedded in the operation of labour markets and economies. This includes employer relationships with employees, migrants' work and migration trajectories, and socio-economic and family status. For migrant workers, the backdrop of hostile immigration policies and politics is an important framer.

scholarly journals Self-education and Collective Learning: Forming a critical ‘modern slavery’ study group

2021 ◽  
pp. 133-139
Author(s):  
Maayan Niezna ◽  
Pankhuri Agarwal
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Production ◽  
Collective Learning ◽  
Study Group ◽  
Critical Perspective ◽  
Online Study ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
Production And Distribution ◽  
Online Setting ◽  
The Creation

This article describes the authors’ experience in forming an interdisciplinary online study group dedicated to collective learning on modern slavery and trafficking from a critical perspective. It proposes ideas for discussions and readings along with three main principles concerning the method and approach of creating such a group that can be relevant to researchers and practitioners. First, the creation of a safe and inspiring space, the dialogues it can enable, and the approach required to create such a space in an online setting; second, attempts to tackle the big questions rather than conclusions or completed work; and third, reflexivity concerning challenges of knowledge production and distribution that critical scholars of trafficking face. A discussion on labour exploitation and the concept of ‘work’ is used to demonstrate these principles.

scholarly journals Fighting or fuelling forced labour? The Modern Slavery Act 2015, irregular migrants and the vulnerabilising role of the UK’s hostile environment

2020 ◽  
pp. 026101832090431
Author(s):  
Stuart N. Hodkinson ◽  
Hannah Lewis ◽  
Louise Waite ◽  
Peter Dwyer
Keyword(s):  
Hostile Environment ◽  
International Policy ◽  
State Action ◽  
Irregular Migrants ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Forced Labour ◽  
The Uk

Abolishing ‘modern slavery’ has now achieved international policy consensus. The most recent UK initiative – the 2015 Modern Slavery Act (MSA) – includes amongst other aspects tougher prison sentencing for perpetrators and the creation of an independent anti-slavery commissioner to oversee its implementation. However, drawing on research into forced labour among people seeking asylum in England, this article argues that when considered alongside the UK government’s deliberate creation of a ‘hostile environment’ towards migrants, not least in the Immigration Acts of 2014 and 2016, state action to outlaw modern slavery is flawed, counter-productive and disingenuous. We show how the MSA focuses only on the immediate act of coercion between ‘victim’ and ‘criminal’, ignoring how the hostile state vulnerabilises migrants in ways that compel their entry into and continued entrapment within severe labour exploitation.

Trafficking in Human Beings for the Purpose of Labour Exploitation

2016 ◽  
Vol 34 (4) ◽  
pp. 318-339 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Planitzer
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Supply Chain ◽  
Supply Chains ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
Trafficking In Human Beings

This article gives an overview of current legal initiatives for enhanced transparency regulations for corporations and the actions they take against trafficking in human beings (THB). The California Transparency in Supply Chains Act (CTSCA) has an influence on legal initiatives in Europe, in particular in the United Kingdom. The UK's Modern Slavery Act includes the obligation for corporations to report on actions taken against THB and slavery. In addition, at the European Union level, measures to enhance obligatory reporting on non-fnancial matters, such as human rights matters, are to be implemented in national legislation in the next years. This article compares the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act with the UK's Modern Slavery Act. In order to decrease exploitation along the supply chain, the article concludes that legislation should not only require obligatory reporting but also oblige corporations to implement measures to prevent THB related to their activities.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document