SEVEN STORIES OF MODERN SLAVERY

INTRODUCTION: WHAT IS MODERN SLAVERY?

In 1926, the League of Nations firstly signed the 1926 Slavery Convention, with the objective of advancing the suppression of slavery and the slave trade. The Article 1 of the Convention defines slavery as “the status or condition of a person over whom any or all of the powers attaching to the right of ownership are exercised”. As of 2017, ninety-nine countries have committed to the Convention. In 1948, the United Nations included slavery in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in its Article 4, stating that any form of slavery is contrary to human rights. In 2000, UN members also signed the so-called Palermo Protocols, which aims at preventing, suppressing and punishing trafficking in persons, especially women and children. Nowadays, slavery is abolished de jure in all countries. However, the situation de facto is much different as many forms of slavery are still spread everywhere in the world.

It is estimated that 40.3 million people are currently enslaved, of whom 10 million are children. Among them, 24.9 million people are forced to work through coercion, mental or physical threat, 15.4 million people are married against their will, often too young, and 4.8 million people are victims of some form of sexual exploitation. These individuals are owned or controlled by an “employer”, dehumanised, treated as a commodity, bought and sold as properties and often physically constrained or have restrictions placed on their freedom of movement.

Modern slavery takes different forms of which the most common are mixtures of the following elements:

• Sex trafficking – when an adult engages in paid sex as a result of force, threats, coercion or fraud, the subject is a victim of sex trafficking. A person is guilty of sex trafficking if involved in recruiting, harbouring, enticing, transporting, providing, obtaining, patronizing, soliciting, or maintaining a person for that purpose. Moreover, if individuals are compelled to continue to prostitute as a result of an incurred “debt”, which exploiters insist they must pay off before they can be free, they are also victims of trafficking. It is irrelevant if there was an initial consent on the part of the victim if later the same person is subject to any form of coercion.
• Forced marriage – when someone is married against their will and cannot leave the marriage. About the totality of child marriages are forms of slavery. People forced into marriage may be tricked into going abroad, physically threatened and/or emotionally blackmailed to do so, usually by their families. Females minors constitute the vast majority of victims, with consequences that range from social isolation to early pregnancy and domestic violence.
• Forced labour – any work or services which people are forced to do against their will under the threat of some form of punishment. It encompasses a range of activities, which involve the use of force, physical threats, psychological coercion, abuse of the legal process, deception, or other coercive means to compel someone to work. In the presence of such conditions, a precedent consent to the work on the part of the “employee” is irrelevant for the existence of slavery. Migrants are particularly vulnerable to this form of trafficking, while women coerced into labour are often sexually abused too.
• Unlawful recruitment and use of child soldiers – when minors are recruited through force, fraud, or coercion, by armed forces to combat or other forms of labour and sexual exploitation. Perpetrators may be governmental armed forces, paramilitary organizations, or rebel groups. Male children are often abducted to be used as soldiers, porters, cooks, guards, servants, messengers, or spies, while females are often forced to sexual intercourses with the commanders. In both cases the physical and psychological consequences on the kids are devastating.
• Debt bondage or bonded labour – many forms of slavery, including sex trafficking and forced labour, are based on the imposition of a debt on the victim. The person may inherit the debt from his or her ancestors (descent-based slavery) or incur in it. Migrants are frequently chained by the money they owe to the smugglers. Employers of temporary work programs may provide initial loans with exorbitant interest rates, making it impossible for the victims to pay them back.
• Organ trade – the recruitment, transport, transfer, harbouring or receipt of a person through the use of force, threat, abduction, fraud or deception, or abuse of power, with the purpose of exploitation by the removal of organs for transplantation. Victims often come from developing countries where they live below the poverty line. Moreover, they lack basic education and medical knowledge that would make them aware of the risks and consequences of organ removal (70% of which are kidneys).
• Domestic servitude – when a domestic worker is not free to leave his or her employment and is abused, not paid or underpaid. The fact that domestic workers are employed in private homes, usually of wealthy owners, increases their isolation and limits their movement, making victims even more vulnerable. Domestic servitude happens also when workers are subject to abuses, harassment, and exploitation, including sexual and gender-based violence.

While many people believe that slavery happens only in developing countries, the reality is that no country is completely free from slavery and 1.5 million people are in slavery in developed economies. The data report that 30.4 million people are in slavery in the Asia-Pacific region, 9.1 million people in Africa, 2.1 million people in The Americas, and 1.2 million in Europe. Moreover, slavery affects a cross-section of the population, even though some groups are more vulnerable than others. People who live in poverty and lack opportunities to work are more likely to end up in an exploitative situation. Also minorities, as Canada’s natives or African-Americans, are more at risk of enslavement. Finally, 99 percent of people trafficked for sexual exploitation are women and girls. The illegal profits generated per year by forced labour in the private economy amount to 150 billion USD. More than 4 million slaves are exploited by governments.