Modern Day Slavery in the United Arab Emirates

Abstract

In the past few years, there has been growing public awareness of the existence of slavery. This may be attributed in part to the media coverage of the civil war raging in the Sudan which, among other things, has revealed a bustling market in human trafficking. However, little or no attention has been directed to several other regions in the world, including, for example, the Arabian Gulf States, where rapid modernization tends to hide a gruesome reality of modern day slavery. This paper examines three forms of slavery in the United Arab Emirates, used here as a case study—the exploitation of children (sometimes as young as five years old) as camel jockeys; the sexual enslavement of women; and the migrant workers who enslave themselves. By relating the data on present-day slavery to both the history of this ancient institution and to our current definitions of slavery, the author concludes that what is needed is a deeper awareness of the scope, nature, and forms of modern day slavery and a global effort to abolish it.

Notes

NOTES

1. Igor Kopytoff and Suzanne Miers, “African ‘Slavery’ as an Institution of Marginality,” in Slavery in Africa: Historical and Anthropological Perspectives, ed. Suzanne Miers and Igor Kopytoff (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1977), 3.

2. William D. Phillips, Jr, Slavery from Roman Times to the Early Transatlantic Trade (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1985), 5.

3. J. R. P. Montgomery, “Some Common Questions Answered,” available at: http://www.ohchr.org/english/law/slavetrade.htm

4. United Nations Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery, “The Slave Trade, and Institutions and Practices Similar to Slavery” (1956), section 1, article 1.

5. Orlando Patterson, Slavery and Social Death: A Comparative Study (Boston, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982).

6. Bernard Lewis, Race and Slavery in the Middle East (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994).

7. Lucy Williamson, “Child Camel Jockeys Find Hope,” BBC News, Dubai, 19 July 2005, available at: http://newswww.bbc.net.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/4236123.stm.

8. Peter Conradi, “Kidnapped Children Starve as Camel Jockey Slaves,” Abu Dhabi, The Sunday Times, 27 March 2005, available at: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1543325,00.html.

9. Saul Hudson, “US Blasts Allies for Human Trafficking,” Reuters News Service, 4 June 2005, available at: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20050604/TRAFFICK04/TPInternational/Africa.

10. Meenakshi Ganguly, “Kamala's Tears,” Time South Pacific no. 30 (27 July 1998), Asia section.

11. Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_slavery, (accessed 19 July 2005).

12. Available at: http://www.whywork.org/about/faq/wageslave.html, (accessed 9 July 2005).

13. Neil Ford, “Jobs for the Boys,” Middle East, 1 October 2003, p. 54.

14. Hussan M. Fattah, “Migrants’ Dreams Dry up in Dubai Desert,” The New York Times, 26 March 2006.

15. Morteza Aminmansour, “Slavery of Children and Women in Persian Gulf Countries,” Persian Journal, 20 June 2004.

16. See http://www.whywork.org/about/faq/wageslave.html.

17. UAE Labor Law, available at: http://www.mol.gov.ae/Pages-EN/documents-en/rule-labour.html.

18. Personal interview with an employee, Dubai University College, 26 November 2005.

19. Khaleej Times, 24 August 2005.