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Inside the Business of Modern Sex Slavery
Speaker(s):
Siddharth Kara, Author
Published:
September 29, 2009
![[photo - Siddharth Kara]](http://csi.gsb.stanford.edu/sites/csi.gsb.stanford.edu/files/imagecache/img100x125/podcast_img/kara.jpg "[photo - Siddharth Kara]")
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Sex trafficking is the most highly profitable -- and exploitative -- component of contemporary slavery. In this audio lecture, author and former investment banker Siddharth Kara exposes the mechanisms behind this little-understood industry. Amidst disturbing anecdotes taken from his study of hundreds of slaves and their "owners" in eight countries, Kara offers a business and economic analysis of the sex slave industry and critiques attempts to date to abolish sex trafficking. He proposes measures that could eradicate this form of livelihood by undermining its profitability. Kara spoke as part of a workshop sponsored jointly by the Forum on Contemporary Europe and the Center for Social Innovation's Public Management Program at Stanford University.
Siddharth Kara is a former investment banker and business executive with an MBA from Columbia University. In 1995, Kara first encountered sexual slavery in a Bosnian refugee camp. He has since dedicated his life to traveling and learning the mechanisms behind the business of sex trafficking. Kara has taken a rare look at analyzing the local drivers and global macroeconomic trends that give rise to this burgeoning industry, in addition to quantifying the size, growth, and profitability of sex trafficking and other forms of modern slavery. He set aside his corporate career to pursue anti-slavery research, advocacy, and writing, and, more recently, a law degree. He currently serves on the board of directors of Free the Slaves, an organization dedicated to abolishing slavery worldwide. In 2005, he testified on contemporary slavery to the U.S. Congressional Human Rights Committee. He is the author of Sex Trafficking: Inside the Business of Modern Slavery.
Resources
More from this series:
Social Innovation Discussions
Credits:
Mike Seifried
Marguerite Rigoglioso
Ash Jafari
