Publication Date

Fall 2022

Journal

Virginia Journal of International Law

Abstract

Slavery and the slave trade stubbornly persist in our time, but they receive insufficient attention in international human rights law. Even when courts adjudicate slavery violations, they often fail to characterize slave trade conduct that nearly always precedes slavery. Courts also characterize acts that meet the definition of slavery or the slave trade only as other human rights harms, such as forced labor or human trafficking. This failure to accurately characterize violations also as slavery and the slave trade perpetuates impunity and denies victims full expressive justice. This Article argues for reviving international human rights law’s prohibitions of slavery and the slave trade. It also argues that a state responsibility complement to individual criminal accountability will assist to enforce or reform prohibitions of slavery and the slave trade in domestic laws, transform structures that perpetuate those harms, and dismantle systems that support them.

Volume

63

Issue

1

First Page

51

Last Page

[ii]

Publisher

The Virginia Journal of International Law Association

Keywords

Comparative and Foreign Law, Government (General), Human Rights Law, Religion and the Law, Slavery, Race and Ethnicity Issues, Property--Personal and Real, International Law

Disciplines

Comparative and Foreign Law | Human Rights Law | International Law | Law

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