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Posts in Human Rights
Vigilantism against Migrants and Minorities

Edited By Tore Bjørgo, Miroslav Mareš.

This edited volume traces the rise of far right vigilante movements – some who have been involved in serious violence against minorities, migrants and other vulnerable groups in society, whereas other vigilantes are intimidating but avoid using violence. Written by an international team of contributors, the book features case studies from Western Europe, Eastern Europe, North America, and Asia.

Routledge (2019) 370 pages.

Labour Exploitation And Work-Based Harm

By Sam Scott.

“This book argues that it is time to define, and in the process identify solutions to, the problems of labour exploitation and work-based harm. The book is clear that extant legal frameworks are a necessary but not a sufficient condition for the successful completion of this task. Put simply, there is a tendency to look at exploitation and harm through a criminological lens. This is fine in so far as it tends to identify extreme forms of coercive exploitation and abuse. However, there are highly complex sets of employment relationships and experiences between the extremes of slavery, on the one hand, and decent work on the other.”

Policy Press (2017) 298p.

Precarious Lives

By Hannah Lewis, Peter Dwyer, Stuart Hodkinson and Louise Waite

Forced labour, exploitation and asylum. “Based on international law, forced labour involves a situation in which a person is forced to work or provide a service under the ‘menace of any penalty’ and for which they have not offered themselves ‘voluntarily’ (ILO, 1930, Article 2). Forced labour cases are deemed to be distinguishable from more generalised forms of labour exploitation by the existence of various forms of coercion by one or more persons on the worker who at the same time lacks a ‘real and acceptable alternative’ to the abuse involved (ILO, 2005, p 21). As this book will demonstrate, while forced labour is often conflated or confused with human trafficking…..”

Policy Press (2019) 234p.

Refugees and the Violence of Welfare Bureaucracies in Northern Europe

Edited by Dalia Abdelhady, Nina Gren, and Martin Joormann.

Given the significant similarities and differences between the welfare states of Northern Europe and their reactions to the perceived 'refugee crisis' of 2015, the book focuses primarily on the three main cases of Denmark, Sweden and Germany. Placed in a wider Northern European context – and illustrated by those chapters that also discuss refugee experiences in Norway and the UK – the Danish, Swedish and German cases are the largest case studies of this edited volume. Thus, the book contributes to debates on the governance of non-citizens and the meaning of displacement, mobility and seeking asylum by providing interdisciplinary analyses of a largely overlooked region of the world, with two specific aims.

Manchester University Press, 2020. 244p

Refugees Welcome? Understanding the Regional Heterogeneity of Anti-Foreigner Hate Crimes in Germany

By Horst Entorf and Martin Lange.

In this article, we examine anti-foreigner hate crime in the wake of the large influx of asylum seekers to Germany in 2014 and 2015. By exploiting the quasi-experimental assignment of asylum seekers to German regions, we estimate the causal effect of an unexpected and sudden change in the share of the foreign-born population on anti-foreigner hate crime. Our county-level analysis shows that not simply the size of regional asylum seeker inflows drives the increase in hate crime, but the rapid compositional change of the residential population: Areas with previously low shares of foreign-born inhabitants that face large-scale immigration of asylum seekers witness the strongest upsurge in hate crime. Economically deprived regions and regions with a legacy of anti-foreigner hate crimes are also found to be prone to hate crime against refugees. However, when we explicitly control for East–West German differences, the predominance of native-born residents at the local level stands out as the single most important factor explaining the sudden increase in hate crime.

Mannheim: ZEW – Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research, 2019. 54p.

The Organisation of Human Trafficking: A Study of Criminal Involvement in Sexual Exploitation in Sweden, Finland and Estonia

By Cecilia Englund, et al.

In recent years, trafficking in human beings for the purpose of sexual exploitation has become a major issue for politicians, practitioners and researchers. Knowledge and sensitivity have increased and there have been national and international initiatives on various levels, including in the field of crime prevention. However, there are still gaps in our understanding of human trafficking. One main area that may need further study is that of organisations and networks and how they relate to the market in order to maintain the trade. Another issue is whether there is a convergence of legal and illegal markets and whether legal actors are facilitating the trade. For this reason, the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention, in partnership with the European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control (HEUNI) and the Institute of Law at the University of Tartu in Estonia, initiated a study aimed at further examining the structures of criminal networks and organisations involved in trafficking in human beings for the purpose of sexual exploitation, as well as the conditions and factors of the market and the trade in Sweden, Finland and Estonia. The process of trafficking was also studied from recruitment in the source country to the transport of women and girls to the destination country where procuring has occurred. The study was mainly financed by the AGIS programme of the European Commission. This is the final report presenting the results from a survey carried out in the three countries and is intended to describe these issues.

Stockholm: Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention, 2008. 192p.

Confronting root causes: forced labour in global supply chains

By Genevieve LeBaron, Neil Howard, Cameron Thibos and Penelope Kyritsis .

It is by now widely recognised that effectively tackling forced labour in the global economy means addressing its ‘root causes’. Policymakers, business leaders and civil society organisations all routinely call for interventions that do so.1-2 Yet what exactly are these root causes? And how do they operate? The two most commonly given answers are ‘poverty’ and ‘globalisation’.3 Although each may be foundational to forced labour, both terms are typically used in nebulous, catch-all ways that serve more as excuses than explanations. Both encompass and obscure a web of decisions and processes that maintain an unjust status quo, while being used as euphemisms for deeper socio-economic structures that lie at the core of the capitalist global economy. The question thus becomes: exactly which aspects of poverty and globalisation are responsible for the endemic labour exploitation frequently described with the terms forced labour, human trafficking or modern slavery? Which global economic processes ensure a constant and low-cost supply of highly exploitable and coerced workers? And which dynamics trigger a demand among businesses for their exploitation, making it possible for them to profit from it? This 12-part report is an attempt to answer these questions in a rigorous yet accessible way. With it, we hope to provide policymakers, journalists, scholars and activists with a road map for understanding the political economy of forced labour in today’s “global value chain world”.

Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Political Economy Research Institute, 2018. 100p.

Women trafficking in Ethiopia and its mitigation; The case of Arsi Zone, Oromiya

By L.M. Wako.

Human trafficking is a persistent global social and economic problem, and part of international organized crime, involving local regional, national, and global agents and networks, and victims whose social characteristics traverse age (as they can be children, youths, or adults) and gender (women and men). Ethiopia is not an exception in this regard, and many disadvantaged Ethiopians have fallen victim to human trafficking. This study focuses on the trafficking of Ethiopian women to the Middle East to work as domestic workers. It documents how some of these trafficked women are recruited and transported, and often subjected to severe abuse, including denial of salary, sleep deprivation, passport confiscation, confinement, and physical and sexual assault. It is recognized that some women actively aim for irregular migration and try their luck, i.e., not all are by definition trafficked. They thereby aim to stay clear of trafficking agents and dependency but most become entangled…

Leiden: Leiden University, 2020. 205p.

Chinese human smuggling in transit

By M.R.J. Soudijn.

Introduction. Although human smuggling is not exclusive to one particular ethnic group, a few notorious incidents have focused much attention on the smuggling of Chinese nationals for years. In June 1993, for example, the cargo ship “Golden Venture” ran aground off the US coast near New York. It carried 286 Chinese illegal immigrants on board. Several drowned when they tried to swim ashore but were overcome by the cold water. The ensuing investigation revealed that conditions on board were abominable and accounts of the horrors the passengers suffered during the journey found their way to the media. In later years similar transports were discovered (Wang, 1996). This drew attention to the smuggling of Chinese people in particular in the United States. The so-called Dover tragedy caused a similar uproar in Europe. On 19 June 2000 a cargo truck was found in Dover containing the bodies of 58 Chinese nationals who had died of suffocation. Only two survived the journey. The investigations and prosecutions that followed exposed a large group of human smugglers in the Netherlands.

Leiden: Leiden University, 2006. 179p.

A Media Analysis of Changes in International Human Trafficking Routes from Nepal

By A. Kharel, S. Bhattarai, P. Aryal, S. Shrestha, P. Oosterhoff, P. and K. Snyder.

This study examined the media portrayal of different actors involved in human trafficking from Nepal to understand the reported changes in international routes of human trafficking from Nepal after 2015. The findings of the study are based on content analysis of 480 news articles published in six national newspapers in Nepal in a five-year period from 2016 to 2020, along with existing literature and interviews with newspaper reporters and editors.

Brighton: Institute of Development Studies, 2022. 96p.

The Prodigal Daughter: the white slave evil, and the remedy

By Clifford Griffith Roe.

There is not a life that this social evil does not menace. There is not a daughter, or a sister, who may not be in danger. The startling details with which this book must deal and tell the truth may seem revolting, and yet our unwillingness in the past to discuss these very things and our attempt at concealment has unwittingly allowed this horrible business to grow to monstrous proportions. In mentioning specific immoral places we have advisedly omitted their names and locations that such places may not be advertised through us. Likewise the surnames of girls who have been victims of the slave traders are omitted and fictitious given-names substituted for very obvious reasons. Therefore, earnestly believing that only through education can the procurers of girls be finally exterminated and the foulest slavery the world has ever known be blotted out, we have in the following pages written fearlessly and honestly the truth concerning the white slave traffic, and have brought out clearly and thoroughly the schemes and artifices of the panders.

Chicago: L.W. Walter, Co., 1911. 448p.

Report of the Commission for the Investigation of the White Slave Traffic, So Called

By Walter Elmore Fernald.

The first duty placed upon the commission was to investi- gate the "white slave traffic, so called/' and to determine, so far as possible, by what means and to what extent women and girls are induced or compelled by others to lead immoral lives. Such an investigation would necessarily lead to a study of all forms of commercialized prostitution, for any man or woman who traffics in the sexual life of any woman or girl for financial reward or gain is a trafficker in women, and therefore is a " white slaver." In the more restricted meaning the " white slaver " is a man who by means of coercion or bodily punishment com- pels a woman or girl against her will to sell herself to some other man for money which he, the "white slaver," takes- from her for his own benefit. The commission has used the broader as being the more correct interpretation, — the interpretation embodied in the federal law in the so-called Mann White Slave Act, and in our State law in chapter 424 of the Acts of 1910, the so- called Massachusetts White Slave Act. The commission has endeavored to obtain the fullest in- formation possible upon the subject outlined in the resolve creating it. Many meetings have been held. Conferences in various cities and towns have been held with police officials, judges, probation officers, district attorneys, physicians, charity workers and other citizens. Stories and rumors that have excited the public mind have been investigated. The members of the commission have personally investigated street conditions, cafes, hotels, etc., in different communities.

Boston: Wright & Potter Printing Co., 1914. 100p.

Horrors of the White Slave Trade

By Clifford Griffith Roe and B. S. Steadwell.

The mighty crusade to protect the purity of our homes. "And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” ' That the truth may be known throughout the world con- cerning the traffic in girls and women, and that these poor fel- low beings may, through the knowledge of truth, be set free from bondage is the hope of the writers of this book. To protect the purity and sanctity of the home, to open the door of forgiveness to the prodigal daughter, as well as the prodigal son, to warn young womanhood against the snares of girl slave traders and to raise clean, honest manhood to the golden pinnacle of youth's ambition is the reason facts are here set forth often times unvarnished, ungilded and unpainted. Because in the past truth has been clothed in a mantle of mystery and facts have only been whispered in secret, traders in human souls have thrived and grown rich. These arch-enemies to society, the lowest of the lowly creatures on this earth, dwell in darkness; they welcome secrecy, ignorance and false modesty; they abhor light; they stifle truth and trample upon innocence. There is just one way to solve the social evil problem, and that is the way of education. A great campaign of education against the girl traffic, the blackest cloud overhanging civilization today, is under way in many countries. Education in the home, the school, the municipality, the state and the government.

London: Roe,1911. 490p.

The White Slave Market

By Mrs. Archibald MacKirdy and W. N. Willis.

No one to whom Eate or Providence has been kind cares to step from pleasant everyday ways of life into treacherous and dangerous paths which lead to suffering and unpopularity. No man or woman who has within grasp means of following a pleasant way in life would accept a grievous charge and painful labour, save for conscience' sake, and with the hope of waking public opinion to its duty in a matter of national importance.written about, but the part of it relating to the East has not been previously dealt within a volume of this kind. Even in this country the fearful trade has not much diminished. It is quite true that some very notorious houses or rendezvous have beenclosed, and that one restaurant which washaunted by the unhappy women who have nomeans of getting a living but by selling themselves to men, has been raided and shut up.But this was chiefly done by the work of theSalvation Army, as I know, for I went outwith the midnight workers and saw what washappening.

London: Stanley Paul and Co., 1912. 346p.

The White Slave Traffic in America

By O. EdwardJanney.

There seems to be need for a description of the white slave traffic in this country, and for some account of the movement that has arisen for its suppression, together with a discussion of the methods that may be employed to accomplish that end. There are multitudes of parents, teachers and other persons having charge of young people, who are unaware of the dangers that threaten young women through the adroit agents of this traffic. These need to be informed.

New York: National Vigilance Committee, 1911. 203p.

The Shame of a Great Nation: The Story of the ''White Slave Trade"

By E. Norine Law.

Immorality not only clouds and destroys the intellect, It brings physical disease and decay, as well as spiritual death. The conditions of social vice and sexual impurity in exist- ence to-day in the United States are horrible, pitiable andalarming. We must try to cause an arrest of thought and teach a higher grade of ideals or no one can foresee what the awful results will be. Indeed, the sickening tales of impurity and sexual vice that can be told are enough to frighten every person really interested in saving the people from destruction. Not only the present but the future welfare of our people are at stake.

Harrisburg, PA: United Evangelical Publishing House, 1909. 199p.

The White Slave Trade

By the National Vigilance Association.

Transactions of the International Congress on the White Slave Trade....held in London, 1899. The White Slave Trade is the traffic in girls for immoral purposes, which is unhappily carried on not only in the East, where slavery is avowed, but more or less throughout Europe, For such girls there is a constant demand in the markets of vice, on the part of the infamous persons who keep houses of ill-fame with resident inmates. In all such houses the position of the miserable women is one of servitude. Their isolation, their friendlessness, the contempt with which they are usually regarded by respectable society, keep them under the control of the keepers of the houses ; who by charging them extortionate prices for everything supplied, and retaining the ownership of even the clothes they wear, keep them always nominally in their debt, a debt which is recovered when they sell the girl to another house. For the girl is often procured and bought at great expense, and as she becomes less and less valuable for the corrupt purpose, she is sold to lower and lower houses. This trade is of course comparatively little known in England, owing to the publicity of proceedings, and the high rate of wages, though the societies which concern themselves with such matters are continually coming across cases of young girls decoyed, or persuaded away to foreign parts; and even in England it is not always easy, in practice, to get a girl out of a brothel. But the poorer parts of Europe are visited by travelling agents, who have their local purveyors, and conduct their victims to the East and West, where they are lost in the bad houses. One large branch of the trade goes through Constantinople, another has its destination in the South American ports, chiefly Buenos Ayrea.

London : Printed by Wertheimer, Lea and Co., 1899. 174p.

Fighting the Traffic in Young Girls

By Ernest A. Bell.

Or War on the White Slave Trade. “ A complete and detailed account of the shameless traffic in young girls, the methods by -which the procurers and panders lure innocent young girls away from home and sell them to keepers of dives. The magnitude of the organization and its workings. How to combat this hideous monster. How to save YOUR GIRL. How to save YOUR BOY. What you can do to help -wipe out this curse of humanity. A book designed to awaken the sleeping and protect the innocent.”

Chicago: G.S. Ball, 1910. 482p.

Sex, Slavery and the Trafficked Woman

By Ramonna Vijeyarasa..

Myths and Misconceptions about Trafficking and its Victims. Sex, Slavery and the Trafficked Woman is a go-to text for readers who seek a comprehensive overview of the meaning of ’human trafficking’ and current debates and perspectives on the issue. It presents a more nuanced understanding of human trafficking and its victims by examining - and challenging - the conventional assumptions that sit at the heart of mainstream approaches to the topic. A pioneering study, the arguments made in this book are largely drawn from the author’s fieldwork in Ukraine, Vietnam and Ghana. The author demonstrates to readers how a law enforcement and criminal justice-oriented approach to trafficking has developed at the expense of a migration and human rights perspective. She highlights the importance of viewing trafficking within a broad spectrum of migratory movement. The author contests the coerced, female victim archetype as stereotypical and challenges the reader to understand trafficking in an alternative manner, introducing the counterintuitive concept of the ’voluntary victim’. Overall, this text provides readers of migration and development, gender studies, women’s rights and international law a comprehensive and multidisciplinary analysis of the concept of trafficking.

London; New York: Routledge, 2015. 284p.

The Routledge Handbook of Smuggling

Edited by Max Gallien and Florian Weigand.

The Routledge Handbook of Smuggling offers a comprehensive survey of interdisciplinary research related to smuggling, reflecting on key themes, and charting current and future trends. Divided into six parts and spanning over 30 chapters, the volume covers themes such as mobility, borders, violent conflict, and state politics, as well as looks at the smuggling of specific goods – from rice and gasoline to wildlife, weapons, and cocaine. Chapters engage with some of the most contentious academic and policy debates of the twenty-first century, including the historical creation of borders, re-bordering, the criminalisation of migration, and the politics of selective toleration of smuggling. As it maps a field that contains unique methodological, ethical, and risk-related challenges, the book takes stock not only of the state of our shared knowledge, but also reflects on how this has been produced, pointing to blind spots and providing an informed vision of the future of the field. Bringing together established and emerging scholars from around the world, The Routledge Handbook of Smuggling is an indispensable resource for students and researchers of conflict studies, borderland studies, criminology, political science, global development, anthropology, sociology, and geography.

London: Routledge, 2021. 484p.