{"id":123560,"date":"2018-12-10T12:00:02","date_gmt":"2018-12-10T12:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=123560"},"modified":"2018-12-05T12:48:40","modified_gmt":"2018-12-05T12:48:40","slug":"we-all-buy-slave-made-products-heres-how-we-avoid-feeling-guilty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2018\/12\/we-all-buy-slave-made-products-heres-how-we-avoid-feeling-guilty\/","title":{"rendered":"We All Buy Slave-Made Products: Here\u2019s How We Avoid Feeling Guilty"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Modern slaves are not kept in literal chains, but this does not justify being oblivious to it. Consumers should care about how a product is made. Shutterstock<\/p><\/div>\n

3 Dec 2018 – <\/em>We consume the products of slavery every day. All of us. Today\u2019s globalised supply chains make it is almost impossible to avoid goods or services free of the fingerprints of slavery. Electronic gadgets, clothing, fish, cocoa and cane sugar are the products mostly likely to be tainted.<\/p>\n

Read more: At last, Australia has a Modern Slavery Act. Here’s what you’ll need to know<\/a> <\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In contrast to state-sanctioned slave ownership in the the past, modern slavery does not involve a person being a legal possession.<\/p>\n

Instead it involves any situation of exploitation that a person cannot refuse or leave, because of threats, violence, coercion, deception or abuse of power. The Global Slavery Index<\/a> estimates this applies to 15.4 million people (mostly women) in forced marriages, and a further 24.9 million people in forced labour.<\/p>\n

Yet just because modern slaves are not kept in literal chains, does this justify being oblivious to it?<\/p>\n

What of the responsibility of consumers to care about how a product was made, rather than choosing the cheapest product, no questions asked?<\/p>\n

Our research<\/a>, based on in-depth interviews with 40 consumers, shows the strategies people use to shrug off feeling guilty about their purchasing decisions.<\/p>\n

Age restrictions<\/strong><\/p>\n

One of our interviewees explained how she empathised with children who were exploited, but not necessarily adults. A \u201cgrown man\u201d, she told us, had \u201cother options\u201d. Even if an adult was working for less than the minimum wage, she said, \u201cthey are earning a bit of money, they\u2019re happy with that [\u2026] so I don\u2019t classify it as modern slavery\u201d.<\/p>\n

This was a common approach in \u201cslave\/not-slave\u201d categorising. We use \u201crules of thumb\u201d \u2013 including assessments of the person\u2019s ability to exercise choice and to speak up for themselves \u2013 to decide if they are legitimate causes for our concern or obligation.<\/p>\n

Blame their culture<\/strong><\/p>\n

Another tactic to diminish feelings concern is to perceive others as having moral sensibilities different to our own. It is a form of cultural relativism: what would not be okay here (for me), is okay over there (for them).<\/p>\n

One participant expressed it like this: \u201cif a sweatshop factory is working within the rules and regulations of its host country,\u201d he said, \u201cthen by virtue of the ethics of that country it is not morally wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n

Somehow they deserve it<\/strong><\/p>\n

One interviewee blamed modern slaves for not working hard enough to avoid being exploited.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have the opportunity to go to school and to get a proper job,\u201d she said. \u201cIf they don\u2019t take it, it\u2019s their choice. If they don\u2019t do anything about it, it is because they just don\u2019t want to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Seeing modern slavery as something victims bring on themselves lends itself to reducing the issue to a brutal calculus: \u201cit\u2019s a cost-benefit analysis,\u201d another participant said. \u201cThere are these problems, but I get so much benefit from it.\u201d<\/p>\n

We\u2019re all slaves, really<\/strong><\/p>\n

We can also trivialise the experience of slavery by suggesting, for example, that we ourselves are \u201censlaved\u201d (for example to our job, or to technology), or that the working conditions of some slaves aren\u2019t that bad.<\/p>\n

What is to be done<\/strong><\/p>\n

Our research is a step towards raising awareness of modern slavery to the point where we can no longer take a deny-all-knowledge approach. We need to expose the justifications going on in our heads for what they are \u2013 neutralisations to shut down moral feeling.<\/p>\n

Read more: What businesses can do to stamp out slavery in their supply chains<\/a> <\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There are many stakeholders with a role in eradicating the modern slavery – governments, businesses and transnational organisations. But consumers hold a powerful position in the equation.<\/p>\n

_________________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n

Michal Carrington <\/a>– Lecturer in Marketing, University of Melbourne <\/em><\/p>\n

Andreas Chatzidakis <\/a>– Royal Holloway <\/em><\/p>\n

Deirdre Shaw <\/a>– Professor, University of Glasgow <\/em><\/p>\n

Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under Creative Commons license.<\/em><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 theconversation.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

3 Dec 2018 – Hidden slavery is a growing global problem but we continue to turn a blind eye and embrace a seemingly insatiable demand for fast, cheap goods and services.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":123562,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-123560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-capitalism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=123560"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123560\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/123562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=123560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=123560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=123560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}