Suchergebnisse

Abstract
At present, most countries have officially ratified the ILO Convention concerning forced or compulsory labor; however, serfdom is still present in the 21st century. This article addresses how oppressors recruit their victims and how certain mechanisms affect the extent of modern slavery. We use a matching model to analyze this recruitment process, incorporating involuntariness, which is the distinctive factor of employment relationships in modern slavery. In contrast to the standard matching model, not the workers exert effort to find jobs but the employers exert effort to find and hire slaves. Workers are heterogeneous regarding their vulnerability to enslavement, which is ex-ante unknown to the potential employers. The employer's decision whether and to what extent to engage in forced labor depends on governmental labor protection and on the probability of detection. The model includes the possibility of bribery such that an employer can avoid sanctions if illicit behavior is detected. Solving the model yields that a high probability of detection and strict labor protection decrease slavery. We show that a high share of slaveholders increases the probability of enslavement and thus, the number of slaves. Surprisingly, strict labor protection increases the slaveholder's effort, but also decreases their profit. (JEL codes: J23, J47, and J71)

Contemporarily, modern slavery represents one of the most serious human rights violations. Although most countries officially abolished slavery and ratified the 1926 Slavery Convention of the League of Nations, slavery and slave-like practices still exist in various forms throughout the world. This paper addresses why coercive relationships persist today and investigates how political decision-making, institutional environment and coercive labor practices are interlinked. Moreover, we investigate the interplay between domestic anti-slavery laws and the extent of modern slavery. This paper identifies social and economic determinants of modern slavery using a novel dataset. The panel data contain information on 144 countries and territories from 2002 - 2016 for various types of exploitation of adults and children. We study determinants of modern slavery using cluster analysis and fit a fixed effects model to explain which factors drive exploitation. We find that different types of exploitation are driven by different factors. In addition, we show that slave-sending and slave-receiving countries differ significantly. We study transnational human trafficking and identify which social and economic factors determine this specialization. Moreover, we fit a model using Poisson regression to study why some countries detect victims, originating form more countries, than others do. ; Revised version November 2021

At present, most countries have officially ratified the ILO Convention concerning forced or compulsory labor; however, serfdom is still present in the twenty-first century. This paper addresses the questions of how situations of modern slavery arise and how oppressors select their victims. The analytical framework is a labor-market model in which masters and slaves are matched via a matching function. In contrast to the standard matching model, not the workers exert effort to find jobs but the employers exert effort to find and hire slaves. Workers are heterogeneous regarding their "slavability", which is ex-ante unknown to the potential employers. Employers exert effort to recruit slaves. The employer's decision whether and to what extent to engage in forced labor depends on governmental labor protection and on the probability of detection. Moreover, the model includes the possibility of bribery such that an employer can avoid sanctions if illicit behavior is detected. The model is solved and the impact of policy variables and other exogenous parameters on the firms' activities are investigated.

This dissertation investigates modern slavery: Essay 1 presents a theoretical matching model of forced labor. It addresses how oppressors recruit their victims and how certain mechanisms affect the extent of exploitation. Essay 2 presents a theoretical model where slaveholders can buy protection from punishment by bribing corrupt inspectors. Bribery is modelled via Nash bargaining. Multiple equilibria and hysteresis are possible. Essay 3 studies empirically how political decision-making, institutional environment and exploitation are interlinked by creating a novel dataset.

We develop a model where firms profit from coercing workers into employment under conditions violating national law and international conventions and where bureaucrats benefit from accepting bribes from detected perpetrators. Firms and bureaucrats are heterogeneous. Employers differ in their unscrupulousness regarding the use of slave labour whereas bureaucrats have differing intrinsic motivations to behave honestly. Moreover, there is a socially determined warm-glow effect: honest bureaucrats feel better if their colleagues are honest too. The determination of bribes is modelled via Nash bargaining between the firm and the corrupt civil servant. It is shown that multiple equilibria and hysteresis are possible. Depending on history, an economy may be trapped in a locally stable high-corruption, high-slavery equilibrium and major changes in government policies may be necessary to move the economy out of this equilibrium. Moreover, we show that trade bans that are effective in reducing slavery in the export industry tend to raise slavery in the remainder of the economy. It is possible that this leakage effect dominates the reduction of slavery in the export sector.

We develop a model where firms profit from coercing workers into employment under conditions violating national law and international conventions and where bureaucrats benefit from accepting bribes from detected perpetrators. Firms and bureaucrats are hetero-geneous. Employers differ in their unscrupulousness regarding the use of slave labour whereas bureaucrats have differing intrinsic motivations to behave honestly. Moreover, there is a socially determined warm-glow effect: honest bureaucrats feel better if their colleagues are honest too. The determination of bribes is modelled via Nash bargaining between the firm and the corrupt civil servant. It is shown that multiple equilibria and hysteresis are possible. Depending on history, an economy may be trapped in a locally stable high-corruption, high-slavery equilibrium and major changes in government policies may be necessary to move the economy out of this equilibrium. Moreover, we show that trade bans that are effective in reducing slavery in the export industry tend to raise slavery in the remainder of the economy. It is possible that this leakage effect dominates the reduction of slavery in the export sector.

This dissertation investigates modern slavery: Essay 1 presents a theoretical matching model of forced labor. It addresses how oppressors recruit their victims and how certain mechanisms affect the extent of exploitation. Essay 2 presents a theoretical model where slaveholders can buy protection from punishment by bribing corrupt inspectors. Bribery is modelled via Nash bargaining. Multiple equilibria and hysteresis are possible. Essay 3 studies empirically how political decision-making, institutional environment and exploitation are interlinked by creating a novel dataset.

This dissertation investigates modern slavery: Essay 1 presents a theoretical matching model of forced labor. It addresses how oppressors recruit their victims and how certain mechanisms affect the extent of exploitation. Essay 2 presents a theoretical model where slaveholders can buy protection from punishment by bribing corrupt inspectors. Bribery is modelled via Nash bargaining. Multiple equilibria and hysteresis are possible. Essay 3 studies empirically how political decision-making, institutional environment and exploitation are interlinked by creating a novel dataset.