Manufacturing Freedom

Sex worker rescue and rehabilitation programs have become a core focus of the global movement to combat human trafficking. Manufacturing Freedom offers an ethnographic exploration of two American anti-trafficking organizations that offer vocational training in jewelry production to women migrants in China and Thailand as a path out of sex work. Activists brand this jewelry a "slave-free good" and then sell it to consumers in the United States, generating racialized circuits of commerce and morality centered around promises of freedom from enslavement and redemptive wages for former sex workers--whom these organizations universally label as victims of trafficking. Workers, by contrast, often contest the trafficking label and object to the moral and disciplinary processes that ensnare them in a pernicious global web of anti-trafficking rescue. In this novel study, Elena Shih argues that these anti-trafficking rescue and rehabilitation projects profit off persistent labor abuse of women workers and imagined but savvily marketed narratives of redemption, thereby propagating a transnational moral economy of low-wage women's work that obfuscates relations of race, gender, national power, and inequality.

Sex worker rescue and rehabilitation programs have become a core focus of the global movement to combat human trafficking. Manufacturing Freedom offers an ethnographic exploration of two American anti-trafficking organizations that offer vocational training in jewelry production to women migrants in China and Thailand as a path out of sex work. Activists brand this jewelry a "slave-free good" and then sell it to consumers in the United States, generating racialized circuits of commerce and morality centered around promises of freedom from enslavement and redemptive wages for former sex workers--whom these organizations universally label as victims of trafficking. Workers, by contrast, often contest the trafficking label and object to the moral and disciplinary processes that ensnare them in a pernicious global web of anti-trafficking rescue. In this novel study, Elena Shih argues that these anti-trafficking rescue and rehabilitation projects profit off persistent labor abuse of women workers and imagined but savvily marketed narratives of redemption, thereby propagating a transnational moral economy of low-wage women's work that obfuscates relations of race, gender, national power, and inequality.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • SELECTED BY THE ECONOMIST AS ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR “A rambunctious book that is itself alive with the animal spirits of the marketplace.”—The Wall Street Journal Freedom’s Forge reveals how two extraordinary American businessmen—General Motors automobile magnate William “Big Bill” Knudsen and shipbuilder Henry J. Kaiser—helped corral, cajole, and inspire business leaders across the country to mobilize the “arsenal of democracy” that propelled the Allies to victory in World War II. Drafting top talent from companies like Chrysler, Republic Steel, Boeing, Lockheed, GE, and Frigidaire, Knudsen and Kaiser turned auto plants into aircraft factories and civilian assembly lines into fountains of munitions. In four short years they transformed America’s army from a hollow shell into a truly global force, laying the foundations for the country’s rise as an economic as well as military superpower. Freedom’s Forge vividly re-creates American industry’s finest hour, when the nation’s business elites put aside their pursuit of profits and set about saving the world. Praise for Freedom’s Forge “A rarely told industrial saga, rich with particulars of the growing pains and eventual triumphs of American industry . . . Arthur Herman has set out to right an injustice: the loss, down history’s memory hole, of the epic achievements of American business in helping the United States and its allies win World War II.”—The New York Times Book Review “Magnificent . . . It’s not often that a historian comes up with a fresh approach to an absolutely critical element of the Allied victory in World War II, but Pulitzer finalist Herman . . . has done just that.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “A compulsively readable tribute to ‘the miracle of mass production.’ ”—Publishers Weekly “The production statistics cited by Mr. Herman . . . astound.”—The Economist “[A] fantastic book.”—Forbes “Freedom’s Forge is the story of how the ingenuity and energy of the American private sector was turned loose to equip the finest military force on the face of the earth. In an era of gathering threats and shrinking defense budgets, it is a timely lesson told by one of the great historians of our time.”—Donald Rumsfeld

The demand for free speech on campus is a distraction, we need to follow the money

Get ready for this summer’s anticipated movie SUICIDE SQUAD with the comics that inspired the film, including fan-favorite characters Harley Quinn, Deadshot and Captain Boomerang! THE WORLD’S WORST HEROES HAVE GONE ROGUE! Task Force X team members Harley Quinn, Deadshot, Captain Boomerang, Black Manta and Parasite are killers being given a chance to do good for the U.S. government...not that they have a choice. One step out of line and their handler, Amanda Waller, can set off their surgically implanted bombs. But if they play along, this “Suicide Squad” might just be their shot at redemption. When Waller discovers that Task Force X is being manipulated by a shadowy corporate conspiracy, she decides to take her team off the grid. Now, without their bombs to keep them in check, the only thing keeping the world’s worst heroes from becoming full-blown villains again is their desire to see justice served. Will that be enough to keep Waller’s former prisoners from killing their jailer? NEW SUICIDE SQUAD VOL. 3: FREEDOM collects NEW SUICIDE SQUAD #13-16 and SUICIDE SQUAD MOST WANTED: DEADSHOT AND KATANA, by writer Sean Ryan (FLASHPOINT: GRODD OF WAR) and artist Philipe Briones (UNCANNY X-FORCE), and also featuring Brian Buccellato (DETECTIVE COMICS), Mike W. Barr (BATMAN: SON OF THE DEMON), Viktor Bogdanovic (BATMAN: ARKHAM KNIGHT) and Diogenes Neves (BATMAN/SUPERMAN).

A public health approach to human trafficking requires a nuanced understanding of its root causes. This textbook applies a historical lens to human trafficking from expert resources for the multidisciplinary public health learner and worker. The book challenges the anti-trafficking paradigm to meaningfully understand historical legacies of present-day root-causes of human trafficking. This textbook focuses on history’s utility in public health. It describes history to contextualize and explain present times, and provides public health lessons in trafficking prevention and intervention. Public health recognizes the importance of multiple systems to solve big problems, so the chapters illustrate how current anti-trafficking efforts in markets and public systems connect with historical policies and data in the United States. Topics explored include: Capitalism, Colonialism, and Imperialism: Roots for Present-Day Trafficking Invisibility, Forced Labor, and Domestic Work Addressing Modern Slavery in Global Supply Chains: The Role of Businesses Immigration, Precarity, and Human Trafficking: Histories and Legacies of Asian American Racial Exclusion in the United States Systemic and Structural Roots of Child Sex Trafficking: The Role of Gender, Race, and Sexual Orientation in Disproportionate Victimization The Complexities of Complex Trauma: An Historical and Contemporary Review of Healing in the Aftermath of Commercialized Violence Historical Context Matters: Health Research, Health Care, and Bodies of Color in the United States Understanding linkages between contemporary manifestations of human trafficking with their respective historical roots offers meaningful insights into the roles of public policies, institutions, cultural beliefs, and socioeconomic norms in commercialized violence. The textbook identifies sustainable solutions to prevent human trafficking and improve the health of the Nation. The Historical Roots of Human Trafficking is essential reading for students of public health, health sciences, criminology, and social sciences; public health professionals; academics; anti-trafficking advocates, policy-makers, taskforces, funders, and organizations; legislators; and governmental agencies and administrators.