Modern Slavery and Bonded Labour in South Asia: A Human Rights-Based Approach

This book explores bonded labor in South Asia, focusing on how it is a violation of human rights and how slaves can be empowered as rights holders. It connects bonded labor to colonization, dispossession, migration, and private land ownership and aims to uncover ways to achieve the full liberation of bonded laborers.

Format: Hardback
Length: 178 pages
Publication date: 28 March 2019
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

Bonded labor, a pervasive form of modern slavery, involves the binding of labor to a credit agreement, leaving debtors trapped in a cycle of long-term servitude. This book, through in-depth case studies from Nepal and India, adopts a human rights-based approach, treating slavery as a violation of fundamental human rights. It emphasizes the empowerment of slaves as rights holders and aims to explore the interconnectedness of rights, power inequality, and oppression. By examining the historical roots of bonded labor in South Asia, the book reveals how systems of bondage are interconnected with processes of colonization, dispossession, migration, nationalization of resources, and private land ownership. Despite its prevalence globally, debt bondage remains largely unknown in its practical consequences for marginalized communities. Drawing on extensive ethnographic research, this book serves as a valuable resource for students and scholars of modern slavery, international development, and South Asian studies. It sheds light on the urgent need for abolition and the pursuit of justice for those trapped in bondage.

Weight: 440g
Dimension: 162 x 240 x 21 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780367150921