Slavery in contemporary Africa

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Africa has a long history of slavery. Slavery proably existed there even before there was writing. Even today, it is one of the regions affected by contemporary slavery.^[1] The slave trade intensified with the trans-Saharan and Indian Ocean slave trade^[2][3] and again with the trans-Atlantic slave trade;^[4] Because there was a high demand for slaves, this created a number of kingdoms in the Sahel-zone. These kingdoms were at war with each other all the time, as this was the only way to get prisoners of war, which could be turned into slaves to be exported.^[5] During the age of colonialism in Africa, in the 18th and 19th centuries,as well as the early 20th century, these patterns continued.^[6] The colonial authorities tried to stop slavery, starting from about 1900, but they were not very successful. After decolonization, slavery continued in many parts of Africa even though it is technically illegal.^[7]

Slavery in the Sahel region and the Horn of Africa exists along racial and cultural boundaries: There are Arabized Berbers in the north, and darker Africans in the south.^[8]

In the Sahel states of Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Chad and Sudan there is a concept called hereditary servitude: One family serves another family. This is passed on from the parents to the children. The pattern is centuries old, and slavery can make use of it.^[9] Other forms of slavery exist in parts of Ghana, Benin, Togo and Nigeria.^[10] Other forms of slavery in Africa involve human trafficking, the recruiting or enslavement of child soldiers and child labourers. Human trafficking occurs in Togo, and children are trafficked from Togo, Benin and Nigeria to Gabon and Cameroon. ^[11][12]

According to the Anti-Slavery-Society, modern day slavery in Africa means that whole groups of people are exploited, even when this is not called "slavery". ^[13][14][15]

Although this exploitation is often not called slavery, the conditions are the same. People are sold like objects, forced to work for little or no pay and are at the mercy of their "employers".

— Antislavery Society, What is Modern Slavery?

Forced labor in Sub-Saharan Africa^[16] is estimated at 660,000.^[17] This includes people involved in the illegal diamond mines of Sierra Leone and Liberia, which is also a direct result of the civil wars in these regions.^[18] In 2017, the International Labour Office estimated that 7 in every 1,000 people in Africa are victims of slavery.^[19]

1. ↑ Kusi, David K. (2000). Africa, One Continent and Many Religions: Towards Interreligious Dialogue in Africa (Thesis). Theological Research Exchange Network (TREN). doi:10.2986/tren.033-0550.
2. ↑ "Brazil and the slave trade, 1827–1839", The Abolition of the Brazilian Slave Trade, Cambridge University Press, pp. 62–87, 1970-03-01, doi:10.1017/cbo9780511759734.005, ISBN 978-0-521-07583-1
3. ↑ Zink, Robert James. (1969). "Uhuru wa Watumwa" as a documentary of the Arab slave trade in East Africa. OCLC 792751768.
4. ↑ Green, Toby (2011), "Rethinking the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade from a Cultural Perspective", The Rise of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade in Western Africa, 1300–1589, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 1–28, doi:10.1017/cbo9781139016407.003, ISBN 978-1-139-01640-7
5. ↑ "The Origins of Slaves Leaving West Central Africa", The Atlantic Slave Trade from West Central Africa, 1780–1867, Cambridge University Press, pp. 73–99, 2017-06-26, doi:10.1017/9781316771501.005, ISBN 978-1-316-77150-1
6. ↑ Allen, Richard B. (2017-03-29), "Asian Indentured Labor in the 19th and Early 20th Century Colonial Plantation World", Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Asian History, Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/acrefore/9780190277727.013.33, ISBN 978-0-19-027772-7
7. ↑ "Which Way Africa-Towards Africa-Exit from Colonial Empire?", Africa in the Colonial Ages of Empire, Langaa RPCIG, pp. 443–495, 2017-12-17, doi:10.2307/j.ctvh9vtjn.13, ISBN 978-9956-764-22-8
8. ↑ "The mobilization of local ideas about racial difference has been important in generating, and intensifying, civil wars that have occurred since the end of colonial rule in all of the countries that straddle the southern edge of the Sahara Desert. ... contemporary conflicts often hearken back to an older history in which blackness could be equated with slavery and non-blackness with predatory and uncivilized banditry." (cover text), Hall, Bruce S., A History of Race in Muslim West Africa, 1600–1960. Cambridge University Press, 2011.
9. ↑ "Chad-Mali-Mauritania-Niger-Senegal-Upper Volta: Convention Establishing a Permanent Inter-State Drought Control Committee for the Sahel". International Legal Materials. 13 (3): 537–539. 1974. doi:10.1017/s002078290004568x. S2CID 249000440.
10. ↑ de Ste Croix, G. E. M. (1988), "Slavery and Other Forms of Unfree Labour", Abingdon, UK: Taylor & Francis, pp. 19–32, doi:10.4324/9780203401514_chapter_one, ISBN 978-0-203-33181-1 {{citation}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
11. ↑ "news-from-human-rights-watch-vol-l5-no8a-borderline-slavery-child-trafficking-in-togo-april-2003-84-pp". Human Rights Documents Online. doi:10.1163/2210-7975_hrd-2156-0326.
12. ↑ "Traditional Slavery in Niger", Anti-Slavery International, Society's Secretary-General broadcast on the ABC on 9 March 2005 at 9.30 pm.
13. ↑ Washington, Booker T. (4 January 2020). Up from slavery. Magdalene Press. ISBN 978-1-77335-133-9. OCLC 1141252700.
14. ↑ Brace, Laura (2018-03-01), "Glimpses of Slavery", The Politics of Slavery, Edinburgh University Press, doi:10.3366/edinburgh/9781474401142.003.0010, ISBN 978-1-4744-0114-2
15. ↑ Allain, Jean (2015-01-01), "When Forced Marriage is Slavery", The Law and Slavery, Brill–Nijhoff, pp. 466–474, doi:10.1163/9789004279896_022, ISBN 978-90-04-27989-6
16. ↑ Bratton, Michael (2009-01-29), "22. Sub-Saharan Africa", Democratization, Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/hepl/9780199233021.003.0022 (inactive 2024-11-13), ISBN 978-0-19-923302-1{{citation}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of November 2024 (link)
17. ↑ "Workers' Alliance against Forced Labour and Trafficking - ITUC" (PDF). Retrieved 2015-10-14.
18. ↑ "Forced Labour". London: Anti-Slavery International. Archived from the original on 2016-12-04. Retrieved 2015-10-14.
19. ↑ Ukomadu, Angela; Chile, Nneka (7 August 2019). "West African slavery lives on, 400 years after transatlantic trade began". Reuters. Retrieved 8 August 2019.