Modern Slaver y

William Peterson
Slavery has existed for thousands of years. Slavery has been recorded as occurring as
early as ancient Mesopotamia, where slaves were captured as city-states waged war on each
other. After that point slavery was used in practically every civilization at practically every point
in human existence. However, slavery has now been banned in every country in the world.
Despite this, slavery persists as one of the largest criminal enterprises in the modern world.
Slaves are gathered from all areas of the world, particularly from underdeveloped and developing
countries. Slaves are men and women, as well as children. Slaves are used for many varieties of
labor, ranging from simple physical tasks to sex trafficking. Slave labor affects nearly every
country and industry in the modern world, especially clothing and electronics used in the
developed world. Most modern slaves are forced to work under poor conditions, while suffering
abuse, and without any form of compensation their work. There are many anti-slavery and
abolitionist organizations that are currently active, which include Not for Sale, The Sold
Project, and many more. Many governments have also attempted to end modern slavery through
various country-wide projects. Modern slavery, despite this, is still a major world issue because
it removes basic human rights from humans of all varieties, while forcing them to work and live
in poor conditions without compensation in any form.
The injustice, the outrage, of human traffickingmust be called by it true name-modern
slavery. Barrack Obama, United States President (Not for Sale). Modern Slavery, or Human
Trafficking as it is more widely known, is the second-largest criminal industry in the modern
world, tied with arms dealing in its size. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime defines
human trafficking as the acquisition of people through improper means such as force, fraud, and
deception with the aim of exploiting them (UNODC). Modern Slavery affects nearly every
country developed, developing, and under developed in the modern world. It also affects and is a
part of nearly every business and industry that is currently active in the world today. The
clothing industry is one of the most notable in its, albeit indirect, association with slavery.
Modern Slavery can be relatively easily divided into three aspects, for the purpose of
understanding the issue to a greater extent. These are the means of trafficking, the action of
trafficking, and the purpose of trafficking. The means of trafficking is defined as the use of
power, force, deception, or a position of vulnerability to force someone into slavery. This means
the way that a recruiter is able to add another slave into the slave trade of the modern world. The
action of trafficking considered to be the process by which slaves are recruited, transferred,
transported, and harbored before the slaves are used for slave labor of any variety. The purpose
of trafficking is the final aspect of modern slavery, and is defined as the exploitation of people
for the benefit of an outside group or person. Slavery still remains in the modern world as a
horrifying truth, and this issue desperately needs to be solved.
In order to truly understand the issue of modern slavery, one must first understand the
history of slavery from its earliest forms in the ancient world. Slavery has existed since the
earliest civilizations in Mesopotamia. When other city-states were conquered, slaves would often
be conquered and given to those of an upper class, such as kings. The Roman Empire also used
slaves and slave labor for many reasons. These range from construction of practically any
building, as well as domestic slaves who would often be used as servers who would bring food
and drinks to those of a higher class, and even slaves used for production of products, especially
in terms of agriculture. Slavery has also existed in more recent history. Most notably, slavery
was legal in colonial America. Slaves were used in southern plantations used to grow cash crops
such as indigo and tobacco. Slaves were also present in Northern parts of the United States, but
they were significantly less common. Slavery gained popularity in America, yet again, in the
1850s with the invention of the cotton gin, which allowed a type of cotton, which did not
require a very humid environment, to be grown and produced in a much faster and more efficient
manner. At that point, slaves were worth approximately 40,000 modern United States dollars
(Potenza, Alessandra). Despite the fact that slavery has existed in nearly every region of the
world at some point in history, slavery has been declared illegal by every country in the world.
Despite being made illegal slavery still exists as a horrible truth. Modern slavery is
largely present in countries and regions that have a high population living in poverty. This is
particularly true in reference to countries in parts of Asia, Western and Central Africa, as well as
Western Europe. There are a variety of reasons that these areas are prone to be targets for
modern slavery. Arguably the most important of these reasons is the past of these areas. This is
to say, the events that previously took place in these areas to make them poor, and therefore
prone to be targets of slavery in the modern world. Most of these areas were previously occupied
by other groups or countries. For example much of Africa was occupied by many more powerful
European countries. While being used as colonies, these parts of Africa were stripped of their
resources in order to fuel European industrial growth. Africa was also divided with borders that
were totally arbitrary to African culture. In addition, Europeans treated some tribal groups as
superior to others that were under the same control. This caused resentment and conflicts to arise
when Europeans finally left Africa. One of the most notable of these is the Rwandan Genocide,
in which many Tutsis were killed by Hutus. These all weakened these countries, and also
removed all government. This lack of government led to many military dictators gaining power
and leading to further oppression in Africa. Many of these areas became poor due to these, or
similar to these, reasons. This poverty meant that many people would become poor, and
therefore, become easy targets for modern slavery.
Slavery still affects nearly every country in the world. A single slave in the modern world
is worth only about 90 United States dollars (Potenza Alessandra), compared to the price of a
slave in the peak of legal slavery in the United States, being $40,000. This is due to the value of
the work force and source of income of slavery has greatly decreased. While slavery was legal, a
slave was seen as being extremely important for someone such as a plantation owner to make a
living, but now a slave is simply a replicable piece of the system. This is one of many side-
effects of the massive size of modern slavery. There are approximately 27,000,000 slaves in the
modern world (Potenza, Alessandra). Approximately 76% of all slaves living in the modern
world live in India, China, The Democratic Republic of the Congo, Russia, and five other
countries (Potenza, Alessandra). However, there are still currently comparatively small amounts
of slaves in virtually every country in the world. Included in this group of countries with fewer
slaves is the United States, although there are still about 60,000 slaves that currently reside in the
United States (Potenza, Alessandra).
There are a number of people that are targeted to enter slavery in the modern world. The
people that are targeted generally lack the benefits of the fully developed world. For example,
people with low education are generally targets for modern slavery, as well as people that live in
low income households. Children, especially young girls, are also generally targets for slavery.
There are also four main ways that targets enter the slave trade. The first of these is local
contacts, which are local people that identify potential targets. The next of these is directs sale,
which is the process of people being sold to traffickers by family members or guardians. Deceit
is used to deceive people with the promise of wealth and work. Debt bondage is the last of the
ways that slaves enter slavery. Debt Bondage is the process in which financial loans are offered
to parents and children are used to pay off the debt. There are a variety of ways that targets of
modern slavery enter the slave trade of the modern world.
The conditions that people are forced to survive and work in while being enslaved. The
work conditions often involve living in prison like environments. This is to say that these
environments involve small living space, as well as working in an extremely structured manner.
Physical abuse is also used to encourage slaves to work harder, and therefore increase the profit
and gain of the owners. In addition to living in poor conditions, slaves are often denied access to
basic medical facilities. Slaves often live in extraordinarily poor conditions compared to life in
the modern world.
The poor treatment and living conditions of slavery in the modern world has led to many
attempts to end slavery in the modern world. There have been many attempts by governments
around the world to end slavery, specifically in their own countries. However, there have still
been attempts by governments to end slavery internationally. President Obama has pledged that
the United States will not purchase goods that use slavery at any stage of its creation. This
includes companies that use slavery to gain raw materials for the production of the products. In
addition, the United States has invested about $21,000,000 to end slavery globally (Potenza,
Alessandra). In addition to governments contributing to ending modern slavery, there are many
organizations that attempt to solve this issue. Among these is Not for Sale, which focuses on
helping areas such as Peru to help end forced labor in the amazon. There are many things that a
modern citizen can do to eliminate modern slavery from the world. Spreading awareness is
important to end modern slavery due to the fact that many people are unaware that slavery still
exists. Boycotting products that use slavery at any point in the creation of the product is also
important due to the fact that it will decrease the incentive to use slavery.
There are a variety of issues that also relate to modern slavery. Global poverty is one of
these issues. Poverty allows the promise of wealth and a job to become significantly more
important to a person, despite the fact that they would still become slaves and be without the
economic prowess that they had been promised. The increase in global population also
contributes to modern slavery. This relates by more people requiring products that use slavery, as
well as there being more people that could be potential targets to become slaves. In addition,
consumerism relates to modern slavery. This relates by products becoming cheaper through the
use of slave-labor, which will always be free.
A possible solution to modern slavery is to increase and, in some cases create, education
programs to help people, specifically women, in underdeveloped areas of the world. This would
help to end modern slavery for a variety of ways. Arguably the most important of these would be
that it would increase the likelihood that the person would be able to have employment. This
would be especially important with women due to the fact that women are more likely to
contribute to a family and community with their money, while men will be more likely to spend
it on their own. This would decrease the likelihood of them becoming slaves due to the fact that
they would be employed and have a steady income. This would mean that the promise of
employment, when they would really enter the slave trade, would no longer have any relevance.
Slavery has been an issue in the world for practically all of human history. From the
earliest forms of civilization, to slavery in the modern world, slave labor has practically always
been used. Slavery is still used, and does have an effect on practically every country in the world.
Slavery is an issue due to the mistreatment of humans and the lack of civil rights that should be
available to every human being present. Slavery still exists and must be stopped, specifically
through an increase in the education system in developing and underdeveloped areas.















Types of Slave Labor in the Modern World

Amount of Slaves in a Country


Sources
"Human Trafficking." Globalization101. The Levin Institute, 1 Jan. 2014. Web. 8 Apr.
2014.
"Human Trafficking." ICE. U.S. Government, 1 Jan. 2014. Web. 7 Apr. 2014.
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"Human Trafficking." The Federal Bureau of Investigation. U.S. Department of Justice,
n.d. Web. 8 Apr. 2014.
"Human Trafficking." United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. UNODC, n.d. Web. 7
Apr. 2014.
Potenza, Alessandra. "21st Century Slavery." Upfront 17 Mar. 2014: 8-11. Print.
"Slavery." Not for Sale. Not for Sale, n.d. Web. 1 Apr. 2014.
"The Causes of Trafficking." Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur. The Sisters of Notre
Dame de Namur, 1 Jan. 2010. Web. 12 Apr. 2014.
"Types of Human Trafficking." INTERPOL. INTERPOL, 1 Jan. 2014. Web. 8 Apr. 2014.
"Where is it Happening?." World Vision Australia. World Vision Australia, 1 Jan. 2014.
Web. 12 Apr. 2014.

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