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Cristal Vang SOCL 3310 Fall 2013 November 17, 2013 Disposable People By Kevin Bales Have you ever wonder where your shoes were made from? Did you know Nike and Gap supported child labor in the 1990s? Nike and Gap took part on sweatshops which made clothes and shoes because cheap labor was more beneficial for corporations in poorer countries. This is globalization at its finest. For centuries now, the high demand for popular products has been a relevant topic in society. If there is a trend at the moment buyers are out to purchase it. Companies thrive on capitalism. Many corporations base their ethics on globalization. Businesses are forced to compete with one another in order to make millions. This may mean finding work or employees in industrial countries. Charles E. Hurst the author of Social Inequality; Forms, Causes and Consequences examines globalization at an economical view. Looking at it in an economic stand point, globalization is defined as the acceleration of international trade and flow of financial capital (Hurst 374). This consists of investments, flow of workers, and free trade between countries. Globalization is an open market dealing with high levels of competition. Countries are pressured into using whatever resources they have in order to benefit themselves, while providing a product or service for the consumer whether its ethical or not. Globalization is thought to benefit the riches and the core countries while the less powerful ones are taken advantage of by the powerful nations. Corporations are entrepreneurs who seek options that only benefit their company and bank accounts. Big corporations would

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hire low paying employees in industrial countries. They do this by building an international business where they can buy labor at its lowest cost, which involves subcontractors who use slave labor. Investing in building their company out of the country benefits them because they do not have to deal with unions, insurance policies for employees, high paying wages, etc. Corporations establish markets in foreign countries to the benefit of their needs which leaves millions of people jobless here in the US. For example, Kevin Bales author of Disposable People writes how families are kept as slaves and exploited for their services in order to fulfill the needs of globalization and the high demand of products mainly in countries with higher statuses. In Pakistan children are important assets to enslaved families working in the kilns making bricks day in and day out (Bales 150). I will be arguing the effects of globalization and how it supports slavery. Before discussing about what Bales wrote on slavery, I will talk about Karl Marx and Max Webers theory on globalization. Globalization has produce wealth and riches for the elite and dominant. Hurst describes it best by stating, Globalization is to create great interdependence between parts of the world and to compress the world into a smaller place. It is a strict economic phenomenon, involving the increase in direct investment, flow of workers, and free trade in direct investment (Hurst 39). Marx and Webber believe this because numerous companies are now making their products in industrial countries for cheaper labor and lower taxes. Capitalism is now expanding to other parts of the world. When companies hire out of the countries employees or slaves as we know it are more vulnerable to exploitation, un-renewable contracts, harsh living and working conditions, but who benefits from this? Corporations capitalize on this and benefit by millions of dollars.

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Weber and Marx contend how globalization is an opportunity for powerful nations to take advantage of lower nations in order to use them for their labor. Marx states globalization has no national boundaries, which have left many people in the United States unemployed. Globalization not only promotes but encourages internationalism which allows all countries to compete against each other in a competitive market. Globalization produces inequality throughout the world. Countries that are poor struggle in this type of market because of the resources they lack. Third world countries are left to survive and make money any way possible. Some even resort to sex trade, the prostitution industry, brick making, and child slavery among many other things. When falling in the traps of these types of business people are often put into slavery and forced to work. Some people think slavery was abolished years ago but it still exists. The reason slavery still exist is because cheap labor is the best labor in a business aspect. Why pay $20 an hour when you can hire someone in Thailand or Europe who is willing to work for $1 an hour? Bales does an excellent job explaining the different ways families, children, individuals are trapped into slavery. He states, there are three different types of slavery which are used to trap a person into becoming a slave their whole life. There is chattel slavery, debt slavery, and contract slavery but the most important thing to remember is, slavery is enforced with violence and they are held against their wills for purpose of exploitation, (Bales 20). In India there are about 65 to 100 million children from ages fourteen and younger who work eight hours or more a day. As I said before, children are a big asset and viewed as a profitable income for a poor family living in a third world country. Children who are slaves do

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not attend school, they work in horrible working conditions, and most of these young kids are sick. Their families cant afford health care so children are left to deal with the medical condition. India is one of the leading countries struggling with the highest rate of child labor. Bales describe a family who is in debt bondage and what their daily life is like. This family will normally work for a landlord who has them working all day no matter what condition the climate brings. A family who is trapped in debt bondage does not work for money, instead they receive a little over one kilogram of wheat, rice, and beans. Imagine having this much of food for a family of 5. This is basically a slow starvation. Their work consists of agricultural labor (Bales 197). Some debts are passed from parent to child. There are 45,000 children who work in factories which is the biggest concentration for child labor in the world (Bales 200). There is a bus from 3 a.m. to 5 a.m who pick up children from the ages three to fifteen who are paying some of their parents debt bondage off. They will work for the next twelve hours. They are hardly provided food, water, and breaks. The working conditions are not suitable for children. Some children produce fireworks and matches in the city of Sivakasi, Tamil Nadu (Bales 200). Gun powder is used to make fireworks which at times this mixture eats at the childs fingers leaving them with open blisters. Usually when this happens, hot coal or a cigarette is applied to the blister to cauterize the wound so they can work instead of waiting for the blister to heal because. The childs fingers will develop a scare tissue and the chemicals used in these shops consist of potassium chlorate, phosphorus, and zinc oxides which fill their lungs giving them breathing problems and blood poisoning (Bales 200).

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You may say you dont support child labor or slavery but what you purchase says more than what you think. Consumer rather pay a lower price for a certain product but that buyer might not know where its made from or who made it. The tea you drink may have been picked by bonded workers in Assam. Jewelry, precious stones, bricks, timber, stone, sugar, fireworks, cloths, rugs almost any handmade good in India might be produced by a bonded laborer, (Bales 198). The hands of an enslaved child could have made your 4th of July fireworks. We are all connected to slavery in some way. What we purchase and where we shop can support slavery. So, from this given evidence that Bales showed us, we know for a fact that slavery plays an important role in globalization. If a certain product wasnt in high demand then there would be less slavery around the world. Adding to the evidence that globalization supports slavery, I will examine Pakistans slavery. Families are tied into slavery working in the kilns making bricks. Any poor or peasant family can sell themselves into debt bondage to brick kiln owners (Bales 155). Punjabi brick kilns are the size of a football field (Bales 153). The weather temperature is well over 130 degrees and if slaves fall in the burning kilns there is no hope for return. They will automatically be incinerated (Bales 151). If their hands or feet get burned there is hope depending how quickly they are pulled out of kiln. Children and adults work in these types of conditions on a daily basis. Families need children to work to make ends meet. Just like in India, children in Pakistan are a significant asset to paying off their families or parents debt bondage. Barely any children were attending school, Bales notes that only a handful of children went to school. The children who went to

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school were boys, girls were hardly included (Bales 151). Exploitation of these workers leads to tension at the kilns. Wives and daughters are vulnerable to harassment and can be sexually assaulted in kilns by the owner or guards (Bales 159). In the worst kilns women are abducted and raped which is why some kilns are gender segregated (Bales 160). Bales states, from his finding and interviewing different families and owners about 30% of kilns cheat their workers and only 10% abuse their workers. Business will most of the time always use cheap raw materials with the cheapest labor available. This drives corporations across all nations. This type of globalization and economic makes slave workers cheap and expendable commodities. Slave labor provides some of the most popular raw materials available to consumers. Another country I will examine is Brazil. Brazil is made up of a variety of charcoal camps also known as batteria. Charcoal camps are located in the heart of a forest. These camps only last about three to four years because after a while the surrounding environment is ruined from the charcoal (Bales 129). The camps are isolated from society and the city. Slaves are often taken from their home voluntarily thinking they will obtain a wellpaying job but find themselves tricked into the charcoaling making business. Since, their homes are in long distance and they are working in the forest workers who try to escape are usually found and killed on the spot for running away. Charcoal camps are filled with heat and smoke. The charcoal ovens are round brick and mud domes (Bales 130). Bales describes the working conditions to be horrible, covered with black soot and gray ash, shiny with sweat, the workers move like ghost in and out of the smoke around the ovens, (Bales 13 0). Workers there are

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constantly coughing, hacking and spitting trying to clear their lungs which are full of smoke, ash, heat, and dust (Bales 130). Most of the workers who climb inside the burning ovens to empty charcoal have the worst of jobs. They are almost naked but this exposes their skin to burns (Bales 131). Most of the charcoal workers Bales have met suffer from burn scares on their hands, arms, legs some even still swollen or blistering. These slaves are viewed as an object. Slaves produce goods and services that flow into the global market and Brazils charcoal camps are a prime example of how globalization supports slavery. In Thailand, brothels and commercial sex is normal and accepted. This is one horrible aspect why brothels are one of the leading businesses in Thailand and why they make such a big profit from people. These girls can be from six to fifteen years of age. In his book, Bales did a great job explaining how much a brothel profits from on a monthly basis. Monthly expenses come to about $10,280.00 in U.S. money. Expenses can be from rent, utilities, food/drinks, pimps salary, cashier, cook, bribes, and payments to taxis, and alcohol. Keep in mind there are about 30 girls who live and work inside a brothel. The income/ profit brothels receive are $81,280.00 in a month. This means brothels pocket about $71,000.00 (Bales 55). Thailands economic boom included a sharp increase in sex tourism tacitly backed by the government, International tourist arrivals jumped from 2 million in 1981 to 4 million in 1988 to over 11 million in 2003, which provides evidence why brothels are a global business (Bales 75). Thailands government supports brothels because they provide a mean of income .

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Government officials turn the other check because they pocket some of the earnings made from a brothel. Sex tourism has created a business built on sex slavery. Thai culture, as we have seen has always treated women and sex as commodities to be bought, sold, and traded, and used (bales 76). Sex exploitation has transformed into new business opportunities. This is supported by the government. Since, Thailand makes millions of money from sex tourists, the government has swept the rumors of AIDS crisis under the carpet. Women and girls who are exploited and degraded in the Thai brothels have no way out. Normally, these girls are from poor families who sell their daughter to agents hoping they would have a better life. If a girl were to run back to her family she maybe be look down upon or rejected by her own family. When working in brothels these girls are raped, tortured, abused, brainwashed, and some are diagnosed with HIV or AIDS. If these girls try to run away from the brothels the police will hunt them down and then returned to their pimp where they are beaten sometimes even raped. After all the horrible things that can happen to a runaway prostitute they are ordered to work and often given hundreds of men just to torture them so they wont run away again. These young girls are trapped and have no resources to return back to their village. Believe it or not but brothels are a popular attraction to tourists. Some schedule their vacation around the notion of sleeping with a young prostitute because of this high demand young girls are lured into the prostitution business on a daily basis. Bales have provided mainly helpful details on how globalization is a market for capitalist corporation making millions from consumers. Buyers want a product or service at a low cost.

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The result of this is slavery. Cheap labor is more affordable for companies. Although my argument is globalization effects slavery, some may argue slavery is solely built on status inequality. Status is the ranking of individuals and groups on the basis of social and evaluated characteristics, with class, which is largely an economic ranking (Hurst 376). Looking at it in a global point of view, Weber argues the separation between class and status marks differences in cultural activities (Hurst 88). Different regions of the world live in different conditions. Areas around the world lack certain resources which does not allow individuals to succeed compared to someone else who is accompanied by programs, contracts, unions, aid to assist them in need. Even though there is status inequality and some people are more fortunate than others people who are born into a low income or a poor family living a third world country cannot escape the hardships of their lives. Some believe the chances are very slim for someone to come out of that type of lifestyle. Others resort to selling themselves into slavery or debt bondage which is passed down to generations or a mother selling her daughter to an agent thinking she will live a better life. Those who live in a lower economical country are easily corrupted by globalization from powerful core countries. Even though some may argue slavery still exist because of status inequality the real reason is because of globalization. If corporations in more powerful countries no longer seek for cheap labor and take advantage of less powerful countries there would be a decline in slavery. Its the corporations who know they can hire cheap labor in third world countries which is another way of setting poor families and individuals up for failure. Families and individuals who are in slavery depend

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on these low paying jobs to get by. If corporations no longer build their businesses in industrial countries slavery would slowly but surely decline. Slavery is linked to our lives through many ways. The high demands from consumers, business building their companies outside of the country, and those who invest in such pension or mutual funds can play a role in globalization which affects slavery. Those who profit from slavery might include anyone- even you or me (Balse 238). If you have a pension or mutual fund, they can be buying stocks in businesses that own companies who subcontracts slave labor (Bales 238). Many goods are made from the hands of a slave. For example, carpets made by the hands of slave children have been sold to popular department stores. People who are buying these good dont even realize they are supporting slavery through globalization. Slaves produce many goods that flow in to the global market making up most of what we buy. To demonstrate how globalization affects slavery, Haitian men, women, and children have been enslaved in the Dominican Republic harvesting sugar and exporting it to United States and other countries. This is a clear example of how globalization works around the world. As I said before, our lives are linked to slavery whether we know it or not. In the nature of the global economy these enterprises are linked to other areas in the economy. To emphasize on how the global economy is linked to other areas I will refer back to Pakistan and Brazil. Pakistan slaves make bricks day in and day out, same with Brazilian slaves who make charcoal and work in the worst environment. The charcoal from Brazil supplies steel mills and factories (Bales 242). The global flow of steel is transported to factories in Mexico who make car parts which are then carried to United States to be assembled into new cars. A car

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that you might of purchased. The slaves in Pakistan who produce bricks are bought by local builders or sometimes the government (Bales 242). Globalization does in fact play a major role into why slavery is still alive. Marx and Webber said globalization produces wealth and riches for the elite and dominant which in this case its the corporations and companies. Furthermore, Marx and Webber also said Globalization is to create great interdependence between parts of the world and to compress the world into a smaller place. It is a strict economic phenomenon, involving the increase in direct investment, flow of workers, and free trade in direct investment (Hurst 39). The flow of workers are those individuals and families who are enslaved because of globalization. Ultimately, Bales gave us an enormous amount of evidence to prove that slavery is an element in globalization. Marx and Webber helped us define the theory to better understand how slavery and globalization connect together. In conclusion, we have enough proof from Bales that globalization does support slavery.

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Work Cited Bales, Kevin. Disposable People. Berkeley : University of California Press, 2000. Print. Hurst, Charles E. Social Inequitaly. 8. New Jersey : Pearson Education Inc, 2013. Print.

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