Countries with classical slavery. Was there slavery in Russia? (Pages of history). Those who fight
Six Significant Examples of Slavery in the Modern World
Human rights activists distinguish the following characteristics of slave labor: they are engaged in against their will, under the threat of force and with negligible wages or without it at all.
December 2nd- International Day for the Abolition of Slavery. The use of slave labor in any form is prohibited by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Nevertheless, in today's world, slavery is more widespread than ever before.Very profitable business
International organization experts Free the Slaves argue that if during the 400 years of the existence of the transatlantic slave trade about 12 million slaves were taken from the Black Continent, then in the modern world more than 27 million people live as slaves(1 million in Europe). According to experts, the underground slave trade is the third most profitable criminal business in the world, second only to the arms and drug trade. Its profit is 32 billion dollars, and the annual income brought by forced laborers to their owners is equal to half of this amount. "Quite possible, – writes sociologist Kevin Bales, author of The New Slavery in the Global Economy, – that slave labor was used to make your shoes or the sugar you add to your coffee. Slaves laid the bricks that make up the wall of the factory that makes your TV ... Slavery allows you to reduce the cost of goods around the world, which is why slave ownership is so attractive today.
Asia
IN India exist to this day entire castes, supplying gratuitous workers, especially children working in hazardous industries.
in the northern provinces Thailand sale into slavery of daughters has been the main source of livelihood for centuries.
« Here, – writes Kevin Bales, – a special form of Buddhism is cultivated, which sees in a woman a being incapable of achieving bliss as the highest goal of the believer. Being born as a woman indicates a sinful life in the past. This is a kind of punishment. Sex is not a sin, it is only a part of the material natural world of illusions and suffering. Thai Buddhism preaches humility and humility before suffering, because everything that happens is karma, from which a person cannot escape anyway. Such traditional ideas greatly facilitate the functioning of slavery..
Patriarchal slavery
Today there are two forms of slavery - patriarchal and labor. Classical, patriarchal, forms of slavery, when a slave is considered the property of the owner, are preserved in a number of countries in Asia and Africa - Sudan, Mauritania, Somalia, Pakistan, India, Thailand, Nepal, Myanmar and Angola. Officially, forced labor has been abolished here, but it remains in the form of archaic customs that the authorities turn a blind eye to.
New world
A more modern form of slavery is labor slavery, which appeared already in the 20th century. Unlike patriarchal slavery, here the worker is not the property of the owner, although he is subject to his will. " This new slave system, - says Kevin Bales, - assigns economic value to individuals without any responsibility for their basic survival. The economic efficiency of the new slavery is extremely high: economically unprofitable children, the elderly, the sick or the crippled are simply culled(In patriarchal slavery, they are usually at the very least kept in lighter jobs. - Note. "Around the world"). In the new system of slavery, slaves are a replaceable part added to the production process as needed and have lost their former high cost.».
Africa
IN Mauritania slavery special - "family". Here the power belongs to the so-called. white moors – Hassan Arabs. Each Arab family owns several Afro-Mauritanian families – kharatins. The charatin families have been passed down in the families of the Moorish nobility for centuries. Slaves are assigned a variety of jobs - from caring for livestock to construction. But the most profitable type of slave business in these parts is the sale of water. From morning to evening, water carriers carry carts with large flasks around the cities, earning 5 hours a day. – $10 is a lot of money for these places.
Countries of victorious democracy
Labor slavery is spread all over the world, including the countries of victorious democracy. It usually includes those who have been abducted or illegally immigrated. In 2006, the UN Commission published a report entitled "Trafficking in Human Beings: Global Patterns". It says that people are sold into slavery in 127 countries of the world, and in 137 states the victims of traffickers are exploited (as for Russia, according to some sources, more than 7 million people live in the position of slaves). In 11 states, a “very high” level of activity of kidnappers was noted (more than 50 thousand people annually), among them - New Guinea, Zimbabwe, China, Congo, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Lithuania And Sudan.
Men, women and children
For those workers who themselves want to leave their homeland, some firms are usually first promised high-paying jobs abroad, but then (on arrival in a foreign country) their documents are taken away and simpletons are sold to holders of criminal business, who deprive them of their freedom and force them to work. According to experts from the US Congress, annually 2 million people are transported abroad for resale. Most of them are women and children. Girls are often promised a career in the modeling business, but in fact they are forced to engage in prostitution(sexual slavery) or work in clandestine garment factories.
into labor slavery men also get. The most famous example is the Brazilian charcoal burners. They are recruited from local beggars. The recruits, who were first promised high wages and then taken away their passport and work book, are taken to the deep forests of the Amazon, from where there is nowhere to run. There, only for food, not knowing rest, they burn huge eucalyptus trees into charcoal, on which they work. Brazilian steel industry. Few of the coal burners (and their number exceeds 10,000) manage to work for more than two or three years: the sick and injured are ruthlessly kicked out ...
The UN and other organizations are making a lot of efforts in the fight against modern slavery, but the result so far is rather modest. The fact is that the punishment for the slave trade is many times lower compared to other serious crimes such as rape. On the other hand, local authorities are often so interested in shadow business that they openly patronize modern slaveholders, receiving a portion of their excess profits.
Photo: AJP/Shutterstock, Attila JANDI/Shutterstock, Paul Prescott/Shutterstock, Shutterstock (x4)
“Slavery is historically the first and most crude form of exploitation, in which the slave, along with the instruments of production, was the property of his slave owner. ... "
“Slavery is a state of society in which the possibility of finding some people (called slaves) in the property of other people is allowed. The master fully owns the personality of his slave on the basis of property rights. Being the property of another, the slave does not belong to himself and has no right to dispose of himself. (Wikipedia)
But first things first.
A bit of history
Slavery, historically the first and most crude form of exploitation, in which the slave, along with the instruments of production, was the property of his slave owner. A person who fell into slavery had no rights, and, moreover, deprived of an economic incentive to work, he worked only under direct physical coercion. Very often, the “special” position of slaves was emphasized by external signs (brand, collar, special clothes), because. slaves were equated with things and no one assumed that a “thing” could change its status and, thereby, get rid of these attributes.
Slavery in the modern world
Born at the stage of decomposition of the primitive communal system, Slavery. formed the basis of the slave system.
Basically, there were several "stable" sources of slaves - foreigners captured during the war or raids undertaken for this purpose; tribesmen enslaved for non-payment of debts or as punishment for crimes committed; natural growth of slaves; slave trade.
The initial form of slavery was the so-called “patriarchal slavery”, when the slaves were included in the family that owned them as its disenfranchised members: they usually lived under the same roof with the owner, but did harder work than the rest of the family, most often it was associated with natural type of economy. "Patriarchal slavery" existed to one degree or another among all the peoples of the world during their transition to a class society.
It prevailed in the societies of the Ancient East, as well as in the ancient Greek states and Rome until a certain period, when the rapid pace of economic development contributed to its transformation from patriarchal to ancient. For the late Roman Republic, patriarchal slavery developed into classical ancient slavery associated with a commodity economy, with the maximum degree of expropriation of the slave's personality, which is tantamount to his complete lack of rights, turning him into a "talking tool". In addition, it often happened, especially in rich houses, that the tongues of the slaves were deliberately cut out, thus turning them into a silent tool.
The heyday of "classical" slavery was relatively short-lived. the very nature of slave labor laid down the reasons for its inevitable decline and rebirth: the aversion of slaves to their labor and oppression could not but lead to the economic inefficiency of slavery and inexorably demanded, at best, a radical modification of slave dependence.
Historical factors, such as the reduction in the influx of slaves, the ongoing slave uprisings, etc., acted along with economic ones, which in turn prompted slave owners to look for new forms of exploitation. It became obvious the need to some extent to interest the direct producer-slave in his work and in order to increase the efficiency of exploitation. Many slaves are attached to the ground and gradually merge with the columns. Historically, this change, due to economic reasons, has led to the actual erasure of the distinctions between columns and slaves.
In the period of the early Middle Ages, in the “barbarian” states that arose on the territory of the Roman Empire, especially in the state of the Ostrogoths in Italy and the Visigoths in Spain, slavery, as such, played a noticeable, but no longer leading role in the economy. A significant part of the slaves sat on the ground, paying the master dues, and gradually merged with the impoverished layer of communal peasants into a group of feudal-dependent peasantry. By the 13th century, in most countries of Western Europe, slavery actually disappeared, but in the cities of the Mediterranean, a wide trade in slaves (their resale from Turkey to North Africa) continued until the 16th century. In Byzantium, the process of eliminating slaveholding relations was much slower than in Western Europe, so in the 10-11 centuries slavery still retained economic importance there. But at the end of the 11th - 12th centuries. and in Byzantium, the process of merging slaves with the dependent peasantry is practically completed. Among the Germans and Slavs, slavery was distributed mainly in a patriarchal form; in Rus', it existed as early as the 9th-12th centuries. in the depths of a developing feudal society. Gradually, slaves (in Rus' they were called kholops) filled the ranks of the feudal-dependent peasantry, turning mainly into courtyards; at the same time, the position of some groups of serfs (employed in heavy industries - those who worked in the mines) differed little from the position of slaves. In the most ancient states of Transcaucasia and Central Asia, slavery existed until the 4th-6th centuries. Survival of its forms were preserved in the Middle Ages.
In the largest countries of the East - China, India and others - slavery, in its patriarchal form, survived until the development of capitalist relations there, and sometimes existed along with them. The main source of slavery in the Middle Ages here was debt slavery. In China, the sale of family members into slavery by impoverished peasants was widespread. In addition, one of the sources of slavery in China throughout the Middle Ages was the conversion of criminals or members of their families into state slaves. Slavery also acquired a fairly wide scope in the Muslim countries of the Near and Middle East. Since Islam forbade the enslavement of Muslims, the main sources of slaves entering Muslim countries were their capture during wars with "infidels" and their purchase in the markets of Europe, Asia and Africa. Slaves in Muslim countries were used for hard work - in mines, in the troops of Muslim sovereigns (Mamluks were completely from slaves, after this service they could be “granted” freedom, but, as a rule, no one lived up to this point), in the household and personal service (including harems and their staff).
A new stage in the widespread expansion (from the 16th century) of slavery in the countries of Asia, Africa, and America is associated with the process of the so-called primitive accumulation of capital, the colonial enslavement of these countries. Slavery acquired its widest scope and greatest economic importance in the colonies on the American continent. This was due to the peculiarities of the development of the colonies in America: the lack of labor and the availability of free land, largely suitable for large-scale plantation farming. And also by the fact that, as a rule, pilgrims and criminals went to the New World, who, in turn, wanted only to own the land, and not work on it.
The resistance of the Indians, as well as their extinction, along with the formal prohibition by the kings of Spain and Portugal of turning the Indians into slaves, led to the fact that the Spanish and Portuguese, and then the North American planters began to import black slaves from Africa. The slave trade reached its greatest extent in the 17th-19th centuries. The total number of Negroes imported into the countries of America was, apparently, over 10 million people. In the areas of large plantations in the southern states of the USA, in the West Indies, as well as in Brazil and Guiana, Negro slaves by the end of the 18th century. made up the majority of the population. The Negroes on the plantations were treated very cruelly; they were reduced to the position of working cattle. In a somewhat better position were only groups of slaves serving the household of planters. Marriage ties between slave owners and Negro concubines led in a number of countries to the emergence of a large layer of mulattoes. A new impetus to the development of plantation slavery in the United States in the late 18th - first decade of the 19th century. gave rise to an industrial revolution, which caused a sharp increase in demand for cotton and other industrial crops.
As capitalist relations developed, the low productivity of slave labor came to light more and more clearly, hindering the further development of the productive forces. Under these conditions, under the pressure of the ever-increasing resistance of the slaves and with the growth of a broad social movement against slavery, the abolition of slavery began.
The French Revolution proclaimed the abolition of slavery. However, in the French colonies, this act was carried out in essence only in the 40s. 19th century Britain legally abolished slavery in 1807, but in fact slavery continued in the British colonies until 1833. In the 50s. 19th century announced the abolition of R. Portugal, and in the 60s. slavery was abolished by most states of the American continent. In the United States, slavery was abolished as a result of the Civil War of 1861-65 between the Northern and Southern (slave) states. However, forms of forced labor continued to exist, not much different from slavery. In a number of colonial and dependent countries, the institution of slavery continued to persist for a long time. Slavery was especially widespread in the Portuguese colonies of Africa, both in the plantation and in the household. Slavery persisted among the Arabs of Central and South Arabia and in some countries of Africa until the 50s. 20th century
International legal regulation of the struggle against slavery began as early as the 19th century; however, most of the documents that condemned slavery were formal, even more informative. Essentially, the first international convention against slavery was concluded in 1926 in Geneva within the framework of the League of Nations. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the UN in 1948 proclaimed (Article 4) that slavery and the slave trade are prohibited in all forms. In 1956, a conference of representatives of 59 states was held in Geneva on the question of combating slavery, which adopted an additional convention on the abolition of slavery, the slave trade, and institutions and customs similar to slavery. Forced labor was also equated to it.
According to the United Nations, the US State Department and the EU Commission on Illegals, there are 27 million people in the world today. These are the results of a study conducted by these departments and employees of the human rights organization Anti-Slavery International.
I think many still remember the procession of more than a million illegal immigrants through the streets of Los Angeles, when the US government decided to equate all illegal immigrants to criminals.
What pushes people to become illegal immigrants, and sometimes slaves?
It is believed that in the modern world, fertile ground for slavery is created by:
- poverty - I am sure that many remember how three adult men, for the sake of a reward of 1,000 Kenyan shillings (the average salary is 1 shilling per day), drowned in a pit with excrement, and then after police intervention;
- imperfection of the legal system - there are countries where such a concept as "slavery" is not enshrined at the legislative level;
- traditionalism - there are also places (more often in Muslim countries) where a wealthy family is obliged (!!!) to have at least one slave, this despite the fact that the slave does not have to be of the same faith with the owner;
- lack of political will among the leaders of a number of countries - there are cases when the presidents of super-presidential republics were directly involved in the organization and control of channels for the transportation of slaves and illegal immigrants.
- Men - to perform hard work - builders, loaders.
- Women - as a rule it is prostitution, but also in the employment of house workers;
- Children - prostitution, begging, selling children for organs.
In addition to forced slavery, there is also relatively "voluntary" slavery:
- Labor - associated with obtaining the extraction of resources in the modern world. Very developed in the West. When an employee, even a professional in his field, works for a long time in the same company and does not have the opportunity to carry out neither horizontal nor vertical mobility, i.e. the employee does not move up the career ladder, nor from department to department, which turns him into the notorious "office plankton", a professional, but at the same time unnecessary workforce. Also, when one of the dependent relatives (most often the elderly) does housework, etc., because. they can no longer participate in receiving material benefits due to their age and physical abilities, but they also cannot participate in receiving and processing information, due to the weakening of mental activity and other factors, thus they unwittingly become hostages, in fact slaves - living behind a roof overhead and go.
- Domestic sexuality also dominates in the West for the most part, but its signs are already observed in our society - a situation where a man (less often a woman) forbids a partner to work (directly participate in obtaining resources), guided by an imaginary concern for the mental, physical condition of a partner , thereby posing as a "earner" in the family, which in turn entails the humiliation of a partner, "indication" of his place in life and in a particular society, as a result of the emergence of violence in families.
- Conscription slavery - common in the territory of the former USSR and the current CIS - performing hazing tasks, while commanders receive material rewards, it often happens that a soldier is sold into slavery, and a soldier is declared missing or a deserter.
- Penitentiary slavery - found everywhere - the use of prison labor, because. persons in “places of deprivation of liberty” are only partially citizens of the state (the rights are “withdrawn” for the time of correction), which in turn allows cheap and free use of labor force. There was a precedent when the head of the prison for several years “sold” all the prisoners into slavery, after which, with the amount received from the transactions, he disappeared.
The slave system died out many years ago, after which history has seen tyranny, empires, and republics; anarchy, democracy, socialism, fascism, capitalism. Has humanity developed to such an extent that it returns to its roots again. The only thing is that, given the dynamics of the world and the transience of time, slavery can take threatening consequences. Apparently history actually moves in a spiral.
Bound in one chain: 10 countries where slavery still reigns
Currently, about 30 million people in the world are in slavery, with 76% of modern slavery occurring in 10 countries. This is stated in the recently published Global Slavery Index.
Slavery includes "practices such as debt bondage, forced marriage, child trafficking and exploitation, and the slave trade and forced labour." Among the factors contributing to the prosperity of slavery are extreme poverty, lack of social protection and war. In countries such as India and Mauritania, where the proportion of slaves among the population is the highest, the history of colonialism and hereditary slavery also matter. Most often, women and children become slaves.
No. 1. Mauritania
Mauritania has the largest percentage of slaves in the world - 4-20% of the population, or 160,000 people. Here the status of a slave has been passed down from generation to generation, and the slave owner has full power over his slaves and their children. Most of the slaves are women who do both domestic and agricultural work and are also subjected to sexual abuse.
No. 2. Haiti
In Haiti, slaves make up about 200,000 of the country's ten million population. The most famous type of slavery is called restavek (from the French rester avec - to stay with someone - approx. Per.), It is a form of child labor in which children are forced to help around the house. Not all Restave children are slaves, but many are exploited: between 300,000 and 500,000 Haitian children are deprived of food or water and subjected to physical or emotional abuse. The report says that the 357,785 people who are still in internally displaced camps after the 2010 earthquake are "more at risk than others of becoming victims of sex trafficking and forced labor."
No. 3. Pakistan
According to the Asian Development Bank, about 1.8 million people in Pakistan are engaged in forced labor - they are forced to work off debts to the employer. This bondage is often passed down from generation to generation, with workers working for little or no pay. Pakistan has about 3.8 million child laborers between the ages of five and fourteen. Children and families from the "lower classes" are especially often involved in forced labor in the production of bricks.
No. 4. India
India has between 13 and 15 million manufacturing slaves in a variety of industries, and there is widespread sexual exploitation of Indian men, women and transgender people. Child prostitution is especially rampant in places of religious pilgrimage and cities popular with Indian tourists. An estimated 20 to 65 million Indian citizens are in debt bondage.
No. 5. Nepal
Nepal is both a source and an importing country of modern slaves. Slavery takes the form of both brick kiln labor and forced prostitution. Some 250,000 of Nepal's population of 27 million are enslaved, often in debt to the employer. Some 600,000 Nepalese children are forced to work, including in mines and factories, and sexually exploited.
No. 6. Moldova
In 2012, the International Organization for Migration reported that Moldovan men, women, and children are being exploited in Ukraine, Russia, the UAE, Turkey, and Kosovo, where they work in the sex industry, in construction, or work for families. More than 32,000 Moldovans live the life of slaves in various countries.
No. 7. Benin
More than 76,000 people from Benin are engaged in forced labor in homes, on cotton and cashew farms, in quarries and as street vendors. UNICEF estimates that most child slaves in the Congo were brought from Benin, and the International Organization for Migration estimates that more than 40,000 children in the country as a whole have been sold into slavery.
No. 8. Ivory Coast
Côte d'Ivoire is the source and destination of enslaved women and children. As a result of the recent conflict, forced labor threatens more children. the country is the world leader in cocoa production, and in this industry many children are subject to the most brutal forms of hard labor. Over 30,000 children work in rural areas and 600-800,000 work on small family farms.
No. 9. Gambia
The most common forms of slavery in the Gambia are forced begging, prostitution and domestic slavery. UNICEF estimates that more than 60,000 children may be slaves, especially orphans and street children.
The victims of forced begging are usually boys who are sent by poor families to study in madrasahs where they are exploited by teachers. Such children are called "talibe". If they return in the evening with insufficient money, they are beaten or starved.
No. 10. Gabon
Children are brought to Gabon from West and Central Africa. Girls are given into domestic slavery or sexually exploited, while boys are forced to do manual labor. Forced marriages and marriages with children are also common. Sometimes young people from neighboring countries come to Gabon themselves to earn money, but end up in slavery. It is also common to sell young girls as servants to relatives or wealthy families. Since Gabon is richer than neighboring countries, the victims of this traditional practice are usually brought there.
Slavery has not gone away, but instead has become a big and profitable business. We may not notice it, but today there are several tens of millions of people in the world who work against their will. It is possible that every day we buy goods in stores that are made by their hands - new shoes or even smartphones. Apparat studied the report of the human rights organization Walk Free and compiled several maps that explain the phenomenon of modern slavery.
What is labor slavery? The world has changed somewhat, although there are still examples of classical slavery in the manner of Ancient Rome on the planet. But the authors of the Walk Free report understand modern slavery as any control over people, because of which they are deprived of their basic freedoms - the freedom to change jobs, the freedom to move from one place to another, the freedom to independently dispose of their bodies. Obviously, this is usually done in order to make a profit. The number of labor slaves includes children extracting "blood diamonds" in the mines of the Congo, prostitutes from Eastern Europe who have lost their passports, or guest workers from Central Asia held in inhuman conditions.
How big of a problem is this? Huge. Nearly 36 million people around the world are now working against their will, according to a Walk Free report. Slavery has become a large and profitable, albeit hidden in the shadows, business. It is possible that every day you use things that were created with the help of slaves - it can be your last smartphone or frozen shrimp bought at the supermarket. The International Labor Organization estimates the annual income from illegal forced labor at $150 billion.
How much can you trust these data: It is impossible to accurately determine the number of labor slaves on the planet - criminals who traffic in women and businessmen who use children in factories do not keep statistics, which are accurately transferred to the tax office every quarter. Therefore, researchers rely on anonymous sociological surveys and extrapolation of the data obtained. But the reports of other international organizations also estimate the scale of modern slavery at several tens of millions of people. Walk Free is a recently launched fund backed by many high-profile businessmen such as Virgin founder Richard Branson and Australian billionaire Andrew Forrest.
Russia, Ukraine and Central Asia
The situation in the region: About 2.5 million modern slaves live here - less than 10% of their total number on the planet. Russia, as the richest country in the region, is referred to by the report as a "hub of forced labor" in Eurasia - imagine a huge airport where illegal workers from all nearby countries gather. The problem of modern slavery is best solved by the Georgian authorities, according to Walk Free.
Uzbekistan. In the autumn of each year, cotton harvesting begins in Uzbekistan - the country's main export item. Thousands of people - students, officials and farmers - are taking to the fields under pressure from the state: they are threatened with expulsion from the university or fired from their jobs. Every year people die while picking cotton. Recently, under pressure from international partners, Tashkent began to gradually abandon the use of child labor in the fields. But this has led to an increase in the burden on adults.
North Africa and the Middle East
The situation in the region: The abundance of natural resources brings large numbers of people from Africa and Asia to the Middle East. Many of them are engaged in low-paid hard work - working on construction sites or serving local residents. Often, the employer deprives them of their documents and forbids them to leave the country. The situation has been exacerbated by the civil war in Syria and the Islamic State campaign in Iraq, with hundreds of thousands of refugees flocking to neighboring states in search of safety.
Country to watch out for: Qatar. In eight years, in a small but very rich in oil and gas state on the Persian Gulf, the next World Cup is to be held. For this event, the authorities of the absolute monarchy are erecting spectacular futuristic stadiums and entire cities in the desert. This is being done by hundreds of thousands of immigrant builders from India, Nepal and other developing countries. The Guardian newspaper in its investigation describes the conditions in which visitors are forced to work: their passports are taken away from them, they are kept in unacceptable conditions and they are poorly fed. As a result, more than a thousand people have died since the beginning of construction. Partly to blame for this is the so-called Kafala system, a Middle Eastern variation on serfdom whereby a guest worker is not allowed to leave the country without the permission of their employer. The authors of the Walk Free report note that, given the almost limitless economic opportunities, Qatar could do more to combat labor slavery.
Tropical Africa
The situation in the region: Poverty and famine, civil wars, climatic disasters, political instability - all this contributes to the constant migration of the population of "Black Africa" from the countryside to the cities. Often people who set off in search of a better life find themselves in slavery.
Country to watch out for: Mauritania. This state in West Africa was the last in the world to ban slavery - only in 1980. However, more than a hundred thousand people are still deprived of free will: slavery is too much intertwined with local culture and built into the mechanisms of Mauritanian society. The slave owners are usually white Berbers and the slaves are usually black Berbers. The country's government is trying to change the situation that has developed for centuries, but not too actively. And earlier this month, Biram Dah Abeid, one of Mauritania's most prominent anti-slavery fighters and a candidate in the country's previous presidential elections, was arrested under mysterious circumstances. You can read more about Abeid in an article in The New Yorker magazine.
Southeast Asia and Oceania
The situation in the region: Asia is the Mecca of forced labor. Almost two-thirds of all people on the planet, who can be considered modern slaves, live here. A large number of slaves is due to the fact that the region is the main production base of the world economy, providing factories from all over the world with cheap labor.
Country to watch out for: India. Here, a person opens up vast opportunities to fall into slavery. Forced marriages, sexual exploitation, child labor, illegal human trafficking - every form of modern slavery that comes to mind is available. Women and members of the lower castes are especially susceptible to them, and in total the number of bonded people exceeds fourteen million. In the past few years, the Indian government has been trying to fight what is happening, but given the scale of the problem and the relative poverty of the country, this could take a very long time.
South and North America
The situation in the region: Relatively prosperous region: a little more than one million people are in labor slavery. The United States, Canada and other developed American countries are making great efforts to combat the problem.
Country to watch out for: Haiti. In one of America's poorest countries, the restavek custom is still popular, when parents give their children to rich families in order to provide them with food and a minimal education. In practice, such children often do dirty housework (the Russian Reporter has a huge cycle of photo reports on this topic). The situation deteriorated noticeably after the 2010 earthquake and the humanitarian catastrophe that followed: Haitians gave the children of their dead relatives into labor slavery, because they could not support them. More than 200,000 slaves now live in Haiti, according to Walk Free. Most of them are children.
Western Europe
The situation in the region: Europe in the context of forced labor is the most prosperous region on the planet, according to the authors of the report. Although hundreds of thousands of people are in modern slavery, the countries of the European Union are fighting its manifestations most actively. The most effective policies are Sweden and Holland.
Country to watch out for: Türkiye. The country with the maximum number of modern works in Europe - almost two hundred thousand people. One of the main problems is forced child marriage and sexual exploitation.
Cover art: Fred Wilson
The Australian Walk Free Foundation, created by billionaire Andrew Forrest with the support of actor Russell Crowe, annually measures the state of slavery on planet Earth. It was they who, after a survey of forty-two thousand people in twenty-five countries of the world, found out that they are living in the world right now. Self-publishing "My friend, you are a transformer" contacted Katharine Bryant, scientific director and European representative of the organization, and discussed whether slavery in the 21st century surpasses the golden age of the slave trade.
Your 2016 study says there are about forty-six million slaves in the world; do you have more recent data?
This is indeed the most recent report to date, and we are still noticing that there are 45.8 million people in the world living in modern day slavery. However, towards the end of September, we are going to release new reports in collaboration with the International Labor Organization, so we will provide updated figures, but at the moment we are still relying on the number of 45.8 million: there are slaves in every country on the planet.
What forms of slavery do you include in this figure? What phenomena do you understand as slavery?
Modern slavery for us is a general term that includes various forms of extreme exploitation, including slave labor, forced marriage and commercial sexual exploitation. By slave labor, we mean situations where a person is forced to work and he is not able to avoid this situation. Under forced marriage, we consider children and adults who are not able to give voluntary consent to marriage. All types of slavery have one common feature - it is exploitation to the highest degree, from which the individual cannot rid himself or voluntarily leave.
The most common type of slavery is forced labor, which includes various aspects: commercial, sexual exploitation, forced prostitution, state forced labor - for example, in prisons or the army. There are also many examples of forced labor in the private sector of the economy.
If we compare the number of modern slaves as a percentage of the total population of the Earth, what do we see - is the number of slaves increasing or decreasing compared to the heyday of slavery?
This question is hard to answer. If we look at the 19th century transatlantic slave trade, we believe that the number of people in slavery today is actually much higher. However, our judgment is limited, because prior to the 19th century the records of the slave trade were not so clear, so it's hard to say if more people are in slavery today than ever before, but yes, they are definitely more than during the time of the transatlantic slave trade.
The most common form of slavery is forced labor.
Describe the portrait of a modern slave.
Modern slavery looks different in every country. It is important to remember that slavery does indeed occur in any one of the 167 countries that make up our Global Slavery Index. There are men who are forced to fish on fishing boats. We found a lot of evidence of men being kidnapped from Burma, smuggled across the border into Thailand, and forced to work on fishing boats that never entered port. In the European part, there are cases of refugees who fled the war from Syria or Libya, were subjected to human trafficking and were turned into sexual slavery. We are particularly concerned about refugee children who have been exploited throughout Europe and disappeared from refugee programmes. In Russia and Central Asia, we also see cases of forced labor and marriage. In Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, forced labor is state-sanctioned: people are forced to collect coal, brides are kidnapped, and they are forced to marry a certain person. So there are many types of slavery, but again: the common factor is that the individual cannot escape this situation.
And what does a modern slave owner look like?
In the cases of missing emigrants in Europe, these slave owners are members of organized crime, they benefit from the sale and purchase of slaves because they perceive them as an affordable and disposable commodity. More traditional forms, historical forms of slavery where there is a "master" and his children inherit slaves, in places like Mauritania in West Africa. In other countries, slave owners can make quick profits at the expense of slaves, either in the supply chains of multinational corporations or in more informal structures: for example, in South Asia there are many cases of indentured labor in the brick industry, where a person is forced to work for free until he pays off a debt. Sometimes these debts are passed down from generation to generation.
Modern slavery affects corporations around the world. Fortunately, in Europe, as well as in the UK, US, Australia and Brazil, governments are beginning to take steps to require merchants and multinational corporations to monitor their own supply chains, looking for evidence of modern-day forced labor. We also welcome the requirement for businesses to publish reports and statements outlining what they are doing to prevent forced labor. We support and encourage other countries to take similar action.
What is the current situation with slavery in former colonial countries?
There is information confirming the existence of slavery in every country in the world, including the former countries of the English Empire. In Australia, where the Walk Free Foundation is headquartered, we estimate that about 3,000 residents experience various forms of modern-day slavery. In countries such as Australia and the UK, it is mainly emigrants and displaced workers who are exploited. This can be seen in various areas: for example, a person who came to the country to get married is forced into domestic slavery, or a person is there on a temporary visa that does not provide him with sufficient labor protection. In India, the population is exploited in informal structures, such as fishing enterprises, which do not have a large number of legal acts, unlike other organizations.
in 2012 the income from modern slavery was $165,000,000,000
Which country has the worst situation with slavery?
In 2016, the highest percentage of the population subject to modern slavery was recorded in North Korea - where 4% of the population is in slavery, engaged in forced labor in prisons and camps. The situation is also bad in Poland and Russia, with a high percentage of slavery observed in countries such as Uzbekistan, Bangladesh, India and conflict zones around the world.
How much money is spinning in this area?
According to our data, in 2012 the income from modern slavery was 165,000,000,000 dollars - obviously, this is an incredibly profitable business. On the other hand, what is interesting is that very few financial resources are used to fight slavery. So for the time being, slavery brings in a lot of income, and on average only $120,000,000 a year is spent on fighting it.
How can you fight slavery?
In our assessment of the work of the governments of one hundred and sixty-one countries in the world in combating slavery, we include many different aspects of good and effective methods of struggle, such as victim assistance programs, criminal justice measures, the existence of anti-slavery laws, mechanisms for coordination and accountability, rapid response to risks, as well as the role of trade enterprises. Therefore, we argue that the best government response to modern slavery should cover all of these aspects. The government should train law enforcement agencies to combat slavery, study all forms of modern slavery, pass laws, cooperate with other governments to ensure a transnational approach to this problem. The government should also make sure that it provides security for its population and employees. Assistance can take the form of correct labor laws and inspections to detect any cases of forced labour. Finally, we strongly encourage businesses and governments to work together to try and explore modern day slavery.
Based on our research, the state of North Korea is the most loyal to slavery. There are many cases and examples of forced labor in labor camps, and forced labor is used as a punishment for political prisoners. Even more interesting is the use of forced labor by North Koreans in Europe. Leiden University research in 2015 found that North Koreans were exported to Europe, where they were forced to work and paid meager wages, with little or no freedom while working. In North Korea, the state does little to nothing to prevent slavery and forced labor, and in some cases even actively promotes slavery.
Does the Walk Free Foundation only keep statistics or does it somehow contribute to the improvement of the situation in the world?
Our foundation was founded in 2012 by Australian businessman Andrew Forrest after his daughter, Grace Forrest, volunteered at an orphanage in Nepal where she learned that most of the children in that orphanage were victims of the sex trade and were trafficked from Nepal to India. Grace raised this issue with her family, and they decided to study what was going on in the anti-slavery and anti-slavery sectors around the world and identify where they could make the most difference. As a result, they realized that anti-slavery organizations lacked funding, trade enterprises were not very interested in fighting this issue, and there was very little research on this topic. As a result, they founded the fund and the Global Slavery Index, where I work. We are trying to determine the number of people around the world subject to modern slavery and find out what governments are doing to combat it; we also cooperate with many UN agencies.
We mainly focus on estimating the number of people in slavery, but also provide very specific policy advice on what governments should do to respond. So, in addition to identifying and raising awareness of the extent of the problem, we are also trying to provide the tools to deal with it. We are now preparing our new report, and in it we will devote a separate chapter to the role of business in the rise of modern slavery and explain what business can do now to expose the exploitation of labor in their ranks.
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