 In December of 2007, with the support of the Law School, I undertook a summer study program on Modern Day Slavery and Human Trafficking in Zanzibar, Tanzania. The program, run by Seton Hall University of New Jersey, offered an ABA-approved course focusing on the twin problems of modern day slavery and human trafficking, and was taught by a distinguished international law faculty.
The Curriculum
 While undertaking this program we had the opportunity to expand our knowledge of this important and rapidly developing area of international law and to gain that knowledge in one of the places where the modern globalized attitudes toward the slave trade and trafficking began. The beautiful idyllic island of Zanzibar offered us a rich and exciting academic and cultural environment while also offering the opportunity to explore the island’s extraordinary history, sights and beaches.
The Miami Declaration of Principles on Human Trafficking (February 10, 2005) reports that 600,000 to 2 million people are trafficked across international borders annually and millions more are trafficked within borders, even though slavery is now declared to be illegal in every nation on the planet. The declaration further asserts that human trafficking has become the third-largest source of profits for organised crime, generating billions of dollars in revenue each year. An estimated 27 million people toil under bondage-like conditions around the world.
 In spite of the illegality of trafficking and its condemnation by a broad cross-section of influential governmental and non-governmental voices, the practice of slavery seems to be exploding on an international scale. The program encouraged us to question why this is so and to consider the role of the law in exposing and combating this evil. We were given an introduction to the international, regional, and domestic legal rules, principles, policies, and administrative practices relevant to current efforts to end human trafficking. We also reviewed a broad variety of legal sanctions, investigative techniques, and enforcement strategies used to eliminate trafficking and related crimes, particularly focusing on why some have succeed while others have failed. We examined current policies and proposals designed to increase the protection and successful reintegration of victims of human trafficking.
Location
Zanzibar, a small archipelago that includes the islands of Unguja and Pemba, is located just off the coast of East Africa. Zanzibar, in 1964, joined with mainland Tanganyika to form the United Republic of Tanzania. It boasts a wonderful Arab and Swahili ambiance and is popular with tourists because of its narrow alleys and beautiful coral stone buildings. Zanzibar is now the world’s largest exporter of cloves, and also produces many other spices, justifying its nickname as the “Spice Island”. Stone Town, located on the island of Unguja, has been designated a World Heritage site.
History
 Zanzibar's history is extraordinary. For 3,500 years, Egyptian, Chinese, Roman, Greek, Persian, Indian, and Arabian traders and explorers stopped at Zanzibar on their voyages. Starting in about the 12th century, the Persian, Indian and Arabian empires began to utilise Zanzibar as a trading post and jump-off point for other Eastern African exploration and adventure. The island continued to flourish, and by the mid-19th century Zanzibar was a critical part of the slave trade. A reported 25,000 African slaves passed through Zanzibar every year. The slave trade was officially abolished in Zanzibar in 1873 although a clandestine trade continued for some years after that.
Lecturers
Throughout the program, lectures were delivered by Seton Hall law faculty. Simone Monasebian of the NY Office of UN Office on Drugs and Crime and Judge Taghrid Hikmet of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda also gave lectures. Judge Hikmet was the first female judge in Jordan and was appointed to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, in 2003. Having such distinguished lecturers available to us was an absolute highlight of the program, and chatting to Judge Hikmet over coffee was, although a little daunting, an experience I will never forget.
Tours
Numerous tours on Tanzania and Zanzibar were included in the program; these provided us with an opportunity to get the most out of the experience, while learning a great deal about the history, modern day culture, and politics of the region. Two of the more compelling experiences included our tours of the town of Bagamoyo and also the Old Slave Market.
Bagamoyo is located on the mainland and is the oldest town in Tanzania, founded at the end of the 18th century. “Bagamoyo” means “the place where I lost my heart” in Swahili and it was the place where the horrific transit into slavery began for many East Africans. It has been described as “one of the most historically compelling towns in East Africa.” We toured Bagamoyo and visited the historic sites that marked and commemorated the origins of the East African Slave Trade. The Old Slave Market was a haunting place to visit. Located in Stone Town in Zanzibar, it finally closed down in 1873, after slavery had long been abolished in most of the world. The Slave Market in Zanzibar operated for over 60 years, with an approximate 60,000 slaves passing through the market each year. Seeing the cramped rooms with the chains where the slaves were held was an experience that will stay with me forever.
History of Anti-Slavery Legal Measures
International law has been criticized over the years because of the lack of enforcement mechanisms and the fact that there is no general law making body. The question of how to end slavery and human trafficking has therefore always been problematic because sentiment and rules often ring hollow without adequate enforcement behind them.
 The 1815 Declaration Relative to the Universal Abolition of the Slave Trade had a significant impact as the first international instrument to condemn slavery. It has been estimated that between 1815 and 1957 some 300 international agreements were implemented to suppress slavery, with varying degrees of success among them.
In 1919 the Treaty of Versailles ended World War I and led to the formation of the League of Nations. The League of Nations was very active in its work to promulgate treaties which abolished slavery and as a result international attention focused on the elimination of slavery and slavery-related practices following the World War I. After World War II, the United Nations continued to work toward the elimination of slavery resulting in the adoption of well established principles of international law. The prohibitions against slavery and slavery-related practices have now achieved the level of customary international law and have attained the status of jus cogens.
The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has identified protection from slavery as one of two examples of obligations owed by a state to the international community as a whole and it is unequivocally clear that the practice of slavery has been universally accepted as a crime against humanity, and the right to be free from enslavement is considered so fundamental that all nations have standing to bring offending states before the Court of Justice. One major flaw of the ICJ however is its limited jurisdiction and inability to hear cases without the consent of both states. It also cannot hear cases brought by individuals. Therefore its downfall lies in the lack of enforceability.
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights contains a prohibition against slavery and servitude in Article 8 similar to that contained in the Universal Declaration. Today, treaties are the most effective forms of international law as the consent of states is not an issue.
A definition of slavery appeared in an international agreement in the League of Nations Slavery Convention of 25 September 1926. It defined 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” (art 1(1)). It further defined the slave trade as “all acts involved in the capture, acquisition or disposal of a person with intent to reduce him to slavery; all acts involved in the acquisition of a slave with a view to selling or exchanging him; all acts of disposal by sale or exchange of a slave acquired with a view to being sold or exchanged, and, in general every act of trade or transport in slaves” (art1(2)).
The Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery, the Slave Trade and Institutions and Practices Similar to Slavery of 1956 (the ‘supplementary convention’) expanded the conventional notions of slavery as defined in the 1926 convention. It obliged states parties to abolish, in addition to slavery, institutions and practices identified as servile status including among others, debt bondage.
The prohibitions set out in the Slavery Convention and the Supplementary Convention were given significant legal support by the international Bill of Human Rights. The Commission on Human Rights produced the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 4 of the UDHR prohibits slavery stating that that “no one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms” (art 4). However, the UDHR was a declaration of the GA and despite being passed without dissent, it is not legally binding on the member states and enforcement is once again lacking.
The most recent reference to slavery in an international instrument is in the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children (Trafficking Protocol) supplementing the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime, which criminalizes trafficking in persons “for the purpose of exploitation” including “at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others, or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs”. This instrument will also be an important step along the path to ending slavery and human trafficking as it covers a broad scope and will hopefully be more effective in dealing with the plague that has taken over our society.
The Economics of Slavery
Eric Williams was a historian who is well known for analysing the contribution of the Atlantic slave trade and Caribbean slavery to the development of capitalism in England. In his 1944 work entitled Capitalism and Slavery Williams explored a number of hypotheses that have since been the topic of much scrutiny. One of the fundamental concepts expounded by Williams was that economics rather than racism were the fundamental driving force behind the transatlantic slave trade and the enslavement of Africans in the Americas. Another major hypothesis for Williams was the conjecture that socio-economic and political conditions created by expanding industrialism in England, and not humanitarianism, were the principal factors in the abolition of the slave trade.
Williams’ thesis is in fact quite relevant in explaining the rise of the “New Slavery” in modern times. According to Williams the abolition of slavery had little to do with the good will and morals of the people and more to do with the belief that it would be economically advantageous for Britain. History has of course shown that it was in fact not such a prosperous decision to support abolition. Williams’ thesis is valuable in explaining the rise of ‘new slavery’ in purely economic terms. The new slavery is not about superiority over a certain race or ‘other’ but simply all about economic gain.
Despite the fact that today slavery is internationally outlawed and moral sentiment is against it, slavery has developed into a booming business. Slaves are used as cost cutters, ensuring high returns on investment. The new slavery is not about owning people as was the case with the old form of chattel slavery but more about complete control over people. It includes categories of people not previously considered ‘slaves’ such as bonded labourers. It is clear that the new slavery has developed through the pursuit of economic gain. Essentially, one of Williams’ central concepts is that if slavery is economically profitable and people know that it is – then it will thrive. He contends that it has little to do with morals and everything to do with profits and income.
With the massive increase in the number of impoverished people throughout the world the new slavery has seen the value of lives decrease and the concept of ‘disposable people’ surface. This disposability has increased the amount of profit to be made and decreased the length of time a person would normally be enslaved. The major difference between old and new slavery is the increased economic profits gained by enslaved labour. Under the old slavery, a slave from the American South would commonly generate 5% profit over a year. However, labourers in India today can generate over 50% profit per year for the slaveholder.
The new slavery has thrived, despite being illegal and commonly accepted as morally wrong, simply through the economic gains it offers. And it is not just a handful of slaveholders who are profiting from this lucrative business. The economic effects of slavery are so pervasive and far reaching that it is almost impossible to tell which consumer products may or may not have involved slavery at some stage. Slavery lowers a factory’s production costs, and savings are ultimately passed on to retailers and consumers.
How can we end slavery and human trafficking?
In modern society human trafficking has developed into a plague that is destroying lives the world over. It is not limited to one race or ethnicity, and instead victimises the weak, the vulnerable and the helpless. There are four major areas that we can look to in the fight against modern day slavery and human trafficking including, prevention, protection, prosecution and policy.
Prevention
The key to fighting human trafficking is to prevent it from happening before it occurs and this can only be done through public awareness of the issues and dangers. The first audience includes people ‘at risk’ of being subjected to human trafficking, particularly young girls. The second audience to be considered are the potential consumers of the trafficking industry. These include, the men who, in engaging the services of prostitutes, unknowingly support the commercial sexual exploitation of girls. It includes the businessperson who decides to move their manufacturing business to a third world county where they are promised cheap labour and are ignorantly supporting child labour. The list goes on and on. Finally, the third audience is the public conscience. By appealing to the public conscience and raising awareness about the horrors endured by trafficked victims we can hope to gain further support from the general population. We have the opportunity to inspire people into action against this scourge on humanity, be it political, economic or social.
Protection
The need for protection of victims is paramount. At the forefront is the fundamental need for society to care for victims of serious human rights abuses. It is imperative that victims of trafficking be protected from further trauma. While it is clear that governments should be responsible for providing protection and services to these victims, this is not always the case. Victims must have efficient access to justice, shelter, medical care, legal aid, counselling, child care, immigration and economic assistance and assistance in integrating back into their original community or into a new community so that they can rebuild their lives.
Prosecution
Secondary to the need for victim protection is the need for the state to punish the wrongdoers. Making protection of victims a priority is an important strategy because it is only when victims are completely protected and assured of their safety that they will even begin to consider telling their story or aiding authorities to capture their tormentors. Once victims are given assurances of protection, many will step forward voluntarily and testify, achieving justice not only for the state but also for them.
Policy
Government policy regarding human trafficking and issues surrounding human trafficking is an important element in the effort to end human trafficking. Government policy affects how easily victims have access to protection and how willing a government will be in prosecuting the perpetrators of these crimes.
Ending human trafficking will not be an overnight accomplishment. It will be a long drawn out process – we may never completely eradicate it. While it remains profitable for people to use these ‘cheap’ human lives they will continue to dispose of them readily. With Australia taking its role in the process as a destination country for human trafficking, it is critical that we become involved in the fight to end modern day slavery and human trafficking. Wether it be learning more about the issues, supporting World Visions new Don’t Trade Lives Campaign (http://www.donttradelives.com.au/) or jumping on a plane to Zanzibar in seven months – every person’s efforts count.
2007 was the inaugural year for this program and it will be continuing this year, with applications closing on September 15th. I would strongly recommend this program for anybody with an interest in humanitarian or international law. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions about the program at all.
Rebecca Griffiths(becksta_101@hotmail.com)
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