How we have become part of the problem of modern slavery

Tony Read says to end the misery of human trafficking, we must first recognise our own complicity

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Published: 6:15pm, 29 Jul 2015Updated: 5:25pm, 3 Aug 2015

Today we need to ask who are the slave masters and who are the slaves

There is a growing awareness and a movement is building round the world to end the trafficking of people for profit. The United Nations has established July 30 as World Day Against Trafficking in Persons, and is encouraging all nations to join its blue-heart campaign to fight against trafficking's insidious inroads into every nation.

Trafficking is estimated to be a US$150 billion business causing untold human misery. Counter-trafficking organisations, major businesses, governments and religious groups are making significant commitments to work together to eradicate slavery. Parallels are often drawn between the work of William Wilberforce and a group of more than 20 abolitionists who worked together to help abolish the African slave trade in the 18th century, and efforts today to end modern-day slavery, as it is now termed. This name was chosen to shock the world into action.

Yet, despite all the attention and effort, there seems to have been little impact so far.

Today, we point the finger elsewhere and try to bring down the slave traders, the bad guys and the traffickers, thinking that the need for abolition is out there somewhere

It is estimated that out of an estimated 35 million slaves worldwide, a mere 50,000 victims have been released. If we face up to the issue squarely, it seems clear that the traffickers are far better at their game than the counter-traffickers. They have far greater incentive to succeed than those trying to bring them to account; the sheer diversity of guises and opportunity gives them a nimble advantage over the slow, painstaking work of building solid cases against them.

The problem is that the legal and technical nuances of what constitutes trafficking, and prosecuting it, are a million miles removed from the misery and pain the victims suffer. If we could somehow compute the cost of the suffering and spend an equal amount on prevention, we might make some progress.

But where is the best place to focus our resources?

The chain of involvement in trafficking is long and often stretches over many jurisdictions and involves many accomplices, such that human slavery today has many faces. The three main ones are big business, organised crime and human exploitation.