Anti-Trafficking Review
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Worker Protections at Sea: Climate change and life aboard distant water fishing vessels
No full textThis short essay discusses the impact of rising temperatures on workers’ health in ocean-based labour sectors, such as industrial fishing, which have attracted little scholarly and activist attention. It provides some reflections on the relationship between a heating planet and work by exploring how climate change can lead to injury and death among distant water fishing workers. I focus on two climate change outcomes that impact fishers: the increasing salinity of water and the dramatic reduction in fish species
Climate Brides: (Un)Tying the knots between climate change and child marriage
Full text linkAlthough both climate change and child marriage have received sustained policy and research attention, their intersection remains critically underexplored. This article examines how climate stress—arising from rapid-onset disasters and slow-onset processes such as drought and salinisation, and intensified by displacement and weak governance—reshapes marriage practices in South Asia, where climate vulnerability and gendered precarity converge with particular intensity. Drawing on ethnographic research in drought-affected western India and case studies from the Indo-Bangladesh border, southern India, and Afghanistan documented through the Climate Brides project, the paper traces how child marriage functions as an infrastructure of adaptation—a mechanism for redistributing labour, debt, and care under conditions of crisis. Across cases—from Gate-Cane weddings in Maharashtra to trafficking-linked unions in the Sundarbans, post-tsunami marriages in Tamil Nadu, and Toyana exchanges in Afghan displacement camps—early and forced marriage emerge not as cultural residues but as adaptive, if extractive, responses to livelihood erosion and the retreat of state support. Using feminist political ecology and social reproduction theory, the article calls for interdisciplinary, justice-oriented approaches that recognise child marriage as part of the gendered infrastructures of climate adaptation
Interview: Currents of Despair: The political ecology of migration and trafficking in the Mekong region
No full textOne of the special issue guest editors, Denise Brennan, conducted this interview with David Feingold to learn more about his experience of witnessing the impact of climate change and ecological changes on people’s lives and livelihoods in Southeast Asia
Experiences of Families Separated across Borders Following Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking
No full textWithin the United Kingdom’s system for identifying survivors of modern slavery and human trafficking, survivors coming from overseas account for nearly 75%. This data indicates that many survivors are separated from family in the process of trafficking, yet little is known about the impact this separation has on them and their families. This article addresses this gap by analysing case data and twelve interviews with anti-slavery practitioners. The findings demonstrate that separation from family can hamper survivors’ recovery, due to the distress caused by the separation and an ongoing need for survivors to provide for family overseas. The process of family reunification is unnecessarily lengthy and complex, and survivors receive limited support for this aspect of recovery. The impact of separation on families is significant, and a ‘family-oriented’ approach to survivor support should be developed alongside measures to address the structural issues that create extended periods of separation and precarity for migrants
The Family as a Protective Factor: Economic considerations of Bangladeshi labour trafficking survivors
No full textEconomic dependence often exists within trafficked immigrant families, both before the human trafficking situation and after family reunification in the United States. While economic dependence can deepen individuals’ vulnerabilities to human trafficking, this article explores how the family unit can serve as a protective factor, especially for those who have recently experienced family reunification. Writing from the perspective of social service providers, we utilise a composite case study of several clients to exemplify how families can support and protect each other within their new environment in New York City and after reunifying with extended family members. This case study demonstrates that social service providers must adopt a family and community-centric approach to survivor support to ensure they strengthen the ability of the family unit to serve as a protective factor against further exploitation for trafficking victims in the US
Social-Climbing Projects of Families in the Context of Human Trafficking from Nigeria to France
No full textMost African women involved in prostitution in major European cities today come from Edo State in Nigeria, where human trafficking has become an economic model. Despite moral judgment and the stigmatisation of sex workers in Nigeria, sending a woman to Europe represents an opportunity that many families decide to take as they rely on the potential financial benefits that would allow collective social climbing. This article analyses migration for prostitution purposes as a family project, helping to shed light on the role of parents in the mechanisms that make possible and even reinforce the sexual exploitation of women in Europe
Enduring Abuse for the Sake of Remittance: The sacrifices of trafficking victims
No full textThis article discusses the interrelationship between exploitative practices and financial empowerment of trafficked women. It provides a nuanced understanding of women’s motivations for migration and considers the impact of migration on victims and their families. Drawing from three months of observations and 18 qualitative interviews with female victims of trafficking in Malaysia, the article discusses women’s perception of financial empowerment and the sacrifice, pain, and suffering they endured in exchange for an exploitative income. The findings revolve around three main themes: (i) the role of domestic violence in contributing to exploitation; (ii) the need for victims to support family as a reason to migrate for work, and (iii) enduring abuse and exploitation to support family and avoid the shame of returning empty-handed. The findings highlight how women are willing to endure various forms of abuse, including exploitation, mistreatment, and harsh working conditions, to provide financial support for their families and how domestic violence often serves to facilitate or render women vulnerable to exploitatio
Climate-induced Exploitation: Workers’ rights and protections on a heated planet
Full text linkThis article envisions new approaches to worker protections on a heated planet. As worksites become increasingly hazardous, legal frameworks that regulate workplace standards as well as provide protections for forced labourers do not account—as of yet—for the heightened risks they face due to climate change. The article calls for the re-evaluation of the socio-legal dimensions of forced labour as climate-altered working conditions worsen. It focuses on three under-examined populations who labour in sectors exceptionally burdened by the climate catastrophe in the United States: undocumented migrants, H-2A and H-2B visa recipients, and incarcerated and formerly incarcerated individuals. These workers labour through excruciatingly hot temperatures, dismal air quality, and toxic pesticides often with no protective gear or water or shade breaks. They also do ‘disaster work’ by preparing for and cleaning up after fires, hurricanes, and floods. The authors consider if the worst of worsening working conditions constitute forced labour and conclude by outlining protections and remedies that workers have been demanding
Solar Value Chain and Workers: Supporting a just transition in Australia by strengthening human rights due diligence
Full text linkA just transition requires climate measures to be implemented in a way that engages and protects affected and vulnerable people and communities. However, due to the prevalence of modern slavery in global renewable energy supply chains, including evidence of people in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region being subjected to state-sanctioned forced labour at various stages of the solar supply chain, the transition to net zero is currently unjust. This paper examines whether Human Rights Due Diligence (HRDD) can be strengthened in Australia to better protect workers in solar value chains, and thus, more effectively support a just transition. By considering a case study of one of Australia’s most prominent energy companies, AGL Energy Limited, this paper highlights the gaps in stakeholder engagement and in the identification of a broad range of human rights and environmental risks and impacts along the value chain. This case study also highlights the limitations of HRDD to protect rightsholders located in places with state-sanctioned forced labour programmes. The paper contends that for Australia to credibly position itself as a global leader in addressing modern slavery while advancing its transition to net zero, this aspiration must be underpinned by substantive legislative reform and enhanced regulatory measures to effectively support a just transition
Editorial: Climate Emergency and Work on a Heated Planet
Full text linkThis Editorial introduces a Special Issue of the Anti-Trafficking Review that analyses the links between climate change, migration, and exploitative labour. It documents some of the deteriorating climate-induced labour conditions and outlines the main arguments made in the Special Issue contributions. It concludes with several recommendations for future research and possible actions to protect workers on a heating planet