Abstract

Today's use of terms such as "trade" and "slavery" is so broad and widespread that some people talk of an unprecedented renewal of these phenomena. In fact, excluding metaphorical or media exaggerations, cases of real enslavement are mostly found in Asian situations due to endebtment (bondage labour), and within international criminal networks, which exploit or induce prostitution in a situation of administrative irregularity. In most other cases instead, the language of slavery conflates and conceals various other phenomena, such as illegal forms of recruitment through gangmasters ("caporalato"), illegal confiscation or forfeiture of wages, exploitive deception and manipulation at the expense of workers.