The myth of ‘Irish slaves’ and of an ‘equality of suffering’ between enslaved Africans and white Europeans has gone mainstream, appearing everywhere to legitimate racism and to undermine black rights struggles.
More and more groups are demanding state reparations for the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Could this be a reality before the ‘international decade for people of African descent’ ends?
The existence of more than 200 autobiographical writings by former slaves gives us a crucial window in the world of legal slavery, however reading them is tricky.
Capitalism has always depended on domestic servitude, which still persists today. So why have the women clothing, caring, and cooking for new generations of workers been omitted from its history?
Governments and activists in Europe and America invoke the immediacy of “modern-day slavery” to sidestep challenging questions regarding the case for reparations. Instead of repairing harm, they promise rescue.
We must acknowledge slavery’s role in creating the modern world if we are to address its legacy. The UNESCO Slave Route Project exists to help breach the wall of silence.
Commemorating slavery is popular in Europe and the Americas these days, but the living legacies of slavery remain significant problems in former slave societies like the United States and Brazil.
Activism against so-called 'modern slavery' often appears to descend from the abolitionism of previous centuries. The history of past movements provides insight into the forms and weaknesses of current movements. Français.
La lutte contre l’esclavage dit « moderne » apparaît souvent comme un héritage de l’abolitionnisme des siècles antérieurs. Interroger l’histoire de ces courants antiesclavagistes passés permet une perception différente des formes d’engagements actuels, de leurs forces et de leurs faiblesses. Engli
Ethical consumption is seen as a way of combating the evils found in global supply chains, yet its ambivalent track record highlights a number of practical complications and political challenges.
The history of slavery and the slave trade shape contemporary patterns of vulnerability and exclusion in Southern Senegal, but continuity between past and present is not a straightforward process.
The US government is using anti-human trafficking laws to intensify the surveillance and criminalisation of migrating women and harden the national security state—as it has since 1875.
