Human Trafficking: The Most Significant Crisis in World Politics

The most important and pressing issue in world politics is undoubtedly the horrors of human trafficking. The Polaris Project (http://nhtrc.polarisproject.org/materials/Human-Trafficking-Statistics.pdf) estimates twenty-seven million people are enslaved in our world today and 800,000 people are trafficked across international borders annually. These numbers have reached this magnitude due to a lack of adequate governmental policies addressing trafficking, both domestic and transnational, and due to an overwhelming amount of corrupt governments and individuals worldwide. Though some nations have pledged anti-trafficking positions, not enough is being done to halt trafficking. There is a large number of countries whose trafficking rings encompass political figures, and the police, creating areas of the world where trafficking is reinforced opposed to a focus on the apprehension of the traffickers.

The necessity of attention toward human trafficking stems from two major areas; moral obligation and the economic industry it feeds. Former Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, stated that “human trafficking is a great moral calling of our time.” A world where men, women and children are exploited at the merciless hands of others is a world that desperately needs to focus its priorities on what its moral obligations are.

Human trafficking generates a yearly profit of 32 billion dollars (Polaris Project). In other words, trafficking humans is a major, booming industry that continues to thrive because of its economic successes. There are, of course, those who directly supply this chain of money. They are the brothel owners, transporters, recruiters, pimps, business owners who traffick their workers, johns (sex customers), etc. As consumers, however, we encounter the traces of trafficking in unexpected and usually unknown ways. Articles of clothing, canned goods, or any other item that can be purchased may have passed through the hands of an enslaved person along the way. Many corporations focus only on the price they pay for the goods that stock their shelves. Many times, the sources from which a corporation purchases their goods is one that uses child labor or trafficked persons to produce their goods. This cycle feeds the trafficking industry and only prolongs the horrendous and volatile acts inflicted upon trafficking victims.

The urgency of the issue is that developed and developing societies alike must grasp the reality that this a world where human beings are enslaved unto others and thus neutrality, or lack of action on any level only signifies one’s condoning of such a rampant evil. As Dante Aligheiri’s famous quotation ensures, “the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in times of great moral crisis maintain their neutrality.”