Vulnerability and exploitation – human trafficking after disasters
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Traffickers are likely to exploit disaster victims or profit from the recovery efforts. Human trafficking exploits others for profit through force, fraud, or coercion, which decimates lives, fractures families, and exploits victims' bodies and labor as renewable resources. Seeking vulnerable populations, traffickers use physical and psychological abuse, fear, and intimidation to exert control over their victims. Some may keep victims shackled, while others use less obvious methods, including debt bondage, wherein victims feel honor-bound to satisfy dubious debts.
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Case Example: Worker Exploitation During Hurricane Katrina Rebuild
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After Hurricane Katrina decimated the Gulf Coast region in 2005, President George W. Bush suspended the Davis-Bacon Act to help increase the recovery pace by removing bureaucratic paperwork. The suspension of the act eliminated the requirement for federal contractors to match the prevailing wages, which repelled local workers but attracted migrant workers accustomed to lower wages. Additionally, the Department of Homeland Security suspended the requirement that federal contractors provide proof of their workers' citizenship status or eligibility to work. Although the Davis-Bacon Act was suspended for only two months, reenacting it did not include a review of the executed contracts or retroactive requirements for those months. As a result, federal contractors continued employing those migrant workers at bargain rates.
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Case Example: Sexual Exploitation in the Wake of Hurricanes
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The day after Hurricane Harvey made landfall, representatives from the mayor's office assessed the disaster shelters' landscape and communication capabilities. The Houston anti-trafficking task force distributed materials that illustrated the displaced persons' vulnerability to being targeted and indicators for recruitment at shelters. That large-scale operation involved a "cot-to-cot" strategy of speaking personally with over 4,000 evacuees in their native languages.
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Research indicates that the most effective means of curbing trafficking results from applying a comprehensive and holistic whole-of-government approach. The definition of comprehensive evolves as experts learn more about these operations and their exploitative tactics. A comprehensive strategy should enhance not only penal sentences but also the design of victim service parallel with legal advocacy programs and law enforcement training to ensure the curriculum includes victim-centered, trauma-informed care strategies. As research develops articulating the nexus between disasters and trafficking, emergency management agencies should be brought into the comprehensive counter-trafficking definition.