Decades have passed since the official ‘end’ of slavery, the pain and devastation it has created still remains.
December 2nd is the official international day for the abolition of slavery, set by the General Assembly of the United Nations. The focus of this day is on “eradicating contemporary forms of slavery, such as trafficking in persons, sexual exploitation, the worst forms of child labor, forced marriage, and the forced recruitment of children for use in armed conflict” (UN). Hence, this day is still important because it is a reminder of modern-day slavery that still occurs, despite the world’s official shun of the horrid practice. The International Labour Organization (ILO) has stated that over 40 million people worldwide are victims of slavery today.
Slavery today can take on many different forms, including forced labor, child labor, trafficking, forced and early marriages, and even some traditional forms of slavery such as descent-based slavery. Victims end up in modern slavery by being tricked, exploited, and lied to; resulting in exclusion and pain. Private citizens are given the power to control their workers’ legal statuses, rather than the State, which creates serious power imbalances which allow for exploitation to thrive. As a result, these private citizens ‘own’ their workforce and can confiscate their passports, visas, and other privately owned items to stop domestic workers from fleeing, especially in cases where the ‘owner’ verbally/physically abuses the domestic worker.
In addition to this, extremely worrying statistics provided by the ILO share that a shocking 1 in 4 victims of modern slavery are children. Additionally, it has been found that women and young girls are disproportionately impacted by forced labor, accounting for 99% of victims in the commercial sex industry, and 58% in other sectors (ILO, 2017).
As such, the egregious acts of slavery still echo today and are very prevalent, despite being somewhat hidden- highlighting the importance of December 2nd.
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