Our Society and Slavery

In the First World, we think of slavery as dead. Over. Gone. We think of it as an historic aberration, a blemish on the past, but certainly not something that still exists in modern times. Yet over 27 million people are still enslaved today, and that number isn’t decreasing. Slavery is not dead at all, we just don’t notice it, and our failure to acknowledge its existence,it allows it to continue unchecked. To truly abolish slavery we must take down a system that is already in place, and has been in existence for thousands of years. Slavery is deeply ingrained into many sections of society, and to eradicate it we must change society.

The most challenging part of stopping slavery is giving up our reliance on it. Unseen slavery powers many parts of the world economy, and so we all rely upon it, knowingly or unknowingly. The list of major companies that use slave labor is long, and shockingly includes many iconic brands such as Nike, Apple and Disney. The fact that we in the First World allow anyone, especially such high profile, successful companies, to get away with exploiting people is truly atrocious and shameful, and most of us are shocked to learn about it. So how does it come about? What is modern slavery?

Slavery relies on systems of bondage, discrimination and exploitation that have been in place for thousands of years and have continued to grow and evolve throughout history. Modern slavery is also fueled by globalisation. The movement of people, money, and information throughout the world, and the spread of production, supply, and distribution chains has allowed modern slavery to grow, and enabled it to stay out of the grasp of authorities. Of course Nike, Apple and Disney don’t directly enslave people, but their suppliers do, which makes them, the companies and us, their customers, ultimately responsible for the exploitation of slave labor.

Modern slavery exists in many forms, the most common of which is debt bondage. Debt bondage occurs when people are encouraged to borrow money, often on the promise of a better job, or a better life elsewhere. The debt they are subsequently forced to pay back is massively inflated by interest and other charges, so these people end up working for years with no reward, in short as slaves. Sexual slavery, where people, usually women and children, are forced to work in the sex industry is also flourishing in modern times. As is domestic servitude, where the normal and legal practice of live in help is used to cover the exploitation and control of another person, and contract slavery, where people are deceived into slavery by a false employment contract. So you can see that while the traditional chattel slavery, where a person is legally owned by another, may be virtually extinct, slavery itself is alive and well.

How is it that this abhorrent and illegal practice is so widespread today? Put simply, it is because we aren’t doing enough to stop it. Kevin Bales, president of Free The Slaves, says that the fact slavery is still thriving comes down principally to ignorance about the institution and lack of resources directed at eradicating it. This is particularly true in first world countries where we are often not aware that slavery is not exclusively a thirld world problem. Many people in first world countries believe that slavery is nothing to do with them and that they are powerless to prevent it. Nothing could be further from the truth. We all benefit from the slave trade, only the slaves themselves do not.

Slavery may be illegal in every country in the world, but that does not mean it doesn’t exist. Between 14,000 and 17,500 people are trafficked into the United States each year. Most are forced into the sex trade, domestic servitude, or agricultural labor. At any one time, between 52,000 and 87,000 are in bondage. We don’t notice these people because we don’t realise what they are, we simply don’t perceive them as slaves. David Batstone, the author of ‘Not For Sale’ describes how he had, unknowingly, been dining at a restaurant staffed by slaves. “That’s the paradox: slavery is in reality not invisible, Except in rare circumstances, slaves toil in the public eye. The truth is that we do not expect to find it in “respectable” settings.” he writes.

We may prefer to think of slavery as a thing of the past, but in doing so we turn a blind eye to the crime of slave trading and we fail to acknowledge the suffering of the slave. David Batstone also writes that

“Many people bristle to hear the word slavery used to describe the modern practice of exploitation. Deeply ingrained in the collective psyche of Western culture is the notion that slavery ended in the nineteenth century. It is not unusual to read a newspaper account of “slavelike conditions” in a copper mine in, say, Bolivia. The laborers were kidnapped, coerced to work without pay and prohibited from leaving the mine. So why would the writer ferfer to the laborer’s conditions as “slavelike”? Because the writer buys into the cultural myth that “real slavery” was vanquished long ago.”
If we continue to deny the suffering of these millions of people, nothing will change.

Slavery will only be eradicated if we all take responsibility for its existence. All sections of society must acknowledge their reliance on slavery and take active steps to cease this unhealthy dependency. It is no good pleading ignorance and shifting the blame onto others. We must all stand up to be counted and reject slavery in its entirety. We must boycott products and services produced by slave labour, even if this means paying higher prices. We must lobby our governments to enforce anti slavery legislation, to end human trafficking and to help other nations tackle the endemic poverty, corruption and violence which allows slavery to flourish. We must provide better opportunities for those at risk of exploitation and we must work to overturn cultural norms which encourage and condone the exploitation of others. Slavery is a scourge on humanity and it is the responsibility of all humankind to work towards its abolition.

The Link Between Power and Corruption

A student in UWCSEA calls for quiet, he is the leader of his G.C. Once everyone has quieted down, he begins the session by asking everyone whether or not they have any ideas for fundraising. First he writes his own idea on the board, then adds everyone else's. There are some really good ideas, but in the end, he goes with his own. Is it the best? No, but who can challenge him?

This is just one example of power affecting someone into making the wrong decision. This is because power, the one thing everyone wants in their life, is corruptive. Power is corruptive because, once you have power, you go up a step in life. You have gained authority over someone and with this authority you can go on and make them do what you want, when you want.

Iain Mclaughlin, head of Coca-Cola in Southeast Asia, when asked about this issue, revealed other examples of people being corrupted by power, “They force people in the organization to do things that aren’t necessarily in the best interests of the company. Or they use their position power to make unreasonable demands on people which impacts their lives.” The two examples above exposes the concept that, with power comes an ability to affect our the people around us, our environment, in a negative way and implies a sense of people changing because of power, which the Guardian researched further in a experiment.

They gave participants scenario’s with two choices, the social choice or the anti-social choice. In the beginning, before the scenarios started, they asked the participants what choice they would go with and 97% of the participants said they would choose the social choice. However, once the experiment started and they got actual power, the clock started ticking. The pressure of making a decision kept on rising and rising, and in the end everyone made the anti-social choice.

This experiment shows that power makes people change, but why does this happen? When asked this question, Iain Mclaughlin replied. “Power makes things easier, the more power you have the easier it is to get things happening and get things done.” The idea that power makes things easier is significant because it gets to the heart of why power is so wanted and so corruptive. With power you suddenly have this ability to do more, do things that might have been out of reach before, and this new ability can make life much simplier. Whether or not this new found ability is positive or negative depends on situation and the person.

But, what can we do about this. What can be done to stop this corruption. Iain Mclaughlin answered this question in his interview. “To stop corruption there has to be safeguards, checks and balances, to stop people corrupting.”

There have to be checks and balances. One example of these might be asking your friends, the people you knew before your new role, your new power, whether they have noticed anything different about you. Another check might be asking your boss or one of your peers to watch you while you work and see if they find negative use of power. An example of a balance could be spreading your power out evenly to the people around you. Try and give everyone around you a say, endeavour to make your environment as democratic as possible.

There is a link between power and corruption and this link will change the people around you, create corruption were there wasn’t any before. However, don’t let this link affect you. Try and check in regularly with the people around you, and balance out your power as evenly as possible. Make sure your sense of integrity always stays intact and rely on those around you to keep it that way. To stay whole even though you have power will become harder and harder as time goes on. Temptation will start to slide in, the benefits of what you could get if you only just did one thing wrong will show. But, in the end that will mean you’ve let power change you. That would mean you’re a worse person than who you were originally, all because of a concept, an idea, something that isn’t even real.


Sources:
http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2014/dec/17/does-power-lead-to-corruption-research-testosterone

Iain Mclaughlin

Round Square

It wasn’t often UWCSEA East welcomed an abundance of visitors, let alone a large group of infants, but with the Round Square conference, today was different.

Students from Persatuan Pemudi Islam Singapura visited 8 DSz at the UWCSEA East campus. Warming the hearts of the 8th grade students, they enlightened the classroom and engaged in various activities prepared by the students. One of the more favoured activities was a Playdoh station, which allowed the infants to play with the homemade Play-Doh. The reaction the infants garnered during their entrance was a synchronised “Awh...”. A sound that was rarely heard during regular school days. Although most of the activities had received a positive response from the infants, Jenga was received poorly, “One of the kids kicked me!” expressed station organizer, Aditya Bhanap. Overall, the children were said to have had an excellent time on campus and were impressed by the class’s hospitality and the extensive size of the international school, and the conference illuminated a new path for connections.

By Philip Haryanto