This 2017 video from The Daily Conversation (an independent news video website based in Southern California) discusses modern slavery, in which people are made to work through force, fraud or coercion. According to the video, 4.8 million people live in modern slavery worldwide and no country, including the United States has been able to eliminate modern slavery completely. The Daily Conversation talks to Kevin Bales, professor and author of a book about modern slavery called Blood and Earth. He tells about an organization, comprised of freed slaves in Northern India, that works to make other slaves aware of their oppressed and hereditary conditions.

discussion

What constitutes “modern slavery”? Where is it? Do you think this kind of slavery is visible or invisible?

What country has the most modern slaves? What country has the least?

What is the purpose of the story Kevin Bales tells about the freed slaves who help other “hereditary” slaves achieve freedom? What does it illustrate?

Why do you think modern slavery still exists? What economic, social, and political systems support its existence?