Complex linkages between forced labor slavery and environmental decline in marine fisheries

abstract

Recent media attention on human rights abuses in the fishing sector, precipitated by undercover investigations from nongovernmental organizations and investigative journalists (e.g., Environmental Justice Foundation [EJF] 2014, 2015a, 2015b; Mendoza, McDowell, Mason, and Htusan 2016), has prompted calls from the scientific community for increased transdisciplinary and empirical research of fisheries’ social dimensions, such as labor (Kittinger et al. 2017). Given views that social and ecological systems are interdependent (Ostrom 2009), the need for theory development to explicate pathways for how this interdependence occurs and the potential for using policy and practices for intervention and prevention exist. Integrating ecological data and economics and human rights theory, Brashares and colleagues’ (2014) wildlife decline and social conflict framework offered a hypothesis about the negative association between fish stock declines and child slavery. Yet, more precision in terminology, pathways, and feedbacks may be warranted. With the aim of exploring empirical, conceptual, and theoretical support for Brashares et al.’s (2014) pathways, the revised theory developed in this article posits how forced labor slavery and environmental decline in marine fisheries may be linked.

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Notes on contributors

Jessica L. Decker Sparks

Jessica L. Decker Sparks is a graduate of the University of Denver’s Graduate School of Social Work’s doctoral program, a course director in the Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University’s Conservation Medicine program, and a research associate at the Rights Lab at the University of Nottingham. Her research uses mixed-methods approaches to explore, understand, and quantify linkages between overfishing, marine fish stock declines, and forced labor slavery.

Leslie K. Hasche

Leslie K. Hasche is an associate professor at the University of Denver’s Graduate School of Social Work. Her gerontological and mental health services research informs her teaching of theory-based and contemporary issue courses related to social work, aging, and intergenerational justice.