The Impacts of COVID-19 on Modern Slavery in Transition: A Case Study of Sudan
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Nottingham
Department Name: Sch of Politics & International Relation
Abstract
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Sudan was in the midst of a democratic transition, involving the reconstruction of state institutions, development of new legislation and governing frameworks, and a commitment to ensuring the protection and advancement of human rights. Amongst these activities, the Government demonstrated the political will to address modern slavery and improve the country's rating in the US State Department's Trafficking in Persons Report. As the country with the 14th highest prevalence of modern slavery globally, effective response efforts in Sudan would have a meaningful impact on global antislavery. Yet, despite renewed commitment, these activities faced the obstacles of economic strain, limited resources and capacity, and the ongoing need to ensure peace and stability in the country. COVID-19 exacerbated these obstacles, as well as presenting substantial new challenges to ensuring effective antislavery in the transition. Yet, the specific impacts and implications of the pandemic on modern slavery and antislavery responses in Sudan remains unknown.
This research will fill a critical knowledge and information gap on the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on modern slavery in Sudan, and formulate recommendations and guidelines for appropriate mitigation and response efforts. Through multi-layered, mixed methods analysis, our research will seek to answer five key questions:
(1) How is COVID-19 impacting the dynamics and manifestations of modern slavery in Sudan?
(2) How is COVID-19 influencing structural, community, and personal factors that underpin vulnerability to modern slavery in Sudan?
(3) How is COVID-19 affecting the development and implementation of antislavery policy and practice in Sudan?
(4) How have policy-makers and practitioners adapted their antislavery efforts in response to the ongoing challenges presented by the pandemic, and to what extent have these measures been successful?
(5) What measures should be adopted by policy-makers and practitioners to ensure effective antislavery governance in Sudan during and after the pandemic?
To understand the impacts of the pandemic on modern slavery dynamics, vulnerabilities, and responses, this project combines three layers of research and analysis: (1) a comprehensive review of existing and emerging evidence; (2) in-depth interviews with key informants in policy and practice in Sudan and internationally; and (3) a supplementary survey of key stakeholders. These research activities will form the foundation for the development of evidence-based guidance for effective policy and practice to address modern slavery in Sudan during and after the pandemic, built in collaboration with UK-based Sudanese survivors. Focus group discussion with these survivors will ensure the voice of affected communities shapes policy and practice guidance, and responds to the specific needs and interests of survivors. This approach positions survivors not as the subjects of research, but as co-creators of research outputs.
The project takes advantage of the existing expertise and networks of project partners to deliver meaningful findings and outputs in a short timeframe. Engagement with key stakeholders as both participants and users of the research ensures buy-in from the outset, and helps to facilitate uptake. Project partners will work proactively throughout the project, and on completion, to ensure findings are embedded in ongoing policy and practice processes, to support long-lasting change. This research is further embedded in a longer-term process of political transition in Sudan, in which antislavery and human rights have been considered a priority. This provides the opportunity for meaningful, evidence-based recommendations to significantly influence Sudanese antislavery governance into the future. This will support greater stability and human rights protections in Sudan, recognised to be central to building greater stability in the region more broadly.
This research will fill a critical knowledge and information gap on the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on modern slavery in Sudan, and formulate recommendations and guidelines for appropriate mitigation and response efforts. Through multi-layered, mixed methods analysis, our research will seek to answer five key questions:
(1) How is COVID-19 impacting the dynamics and manifestations of modern slavery in Sudan?
(2) How is COVID-19 influencing structural, community, and personal factors that underpin vulnerability to modern slavery in Sudan?
(3) How is COVID-19 affecting the development and implementation of antislavery policy and practice in Sudan?
(4) How have policy-makers and practitioners adapted their antislavery efforts in response to the ongoing challenges presented by the pandemic, and to what extent have these measures been successful?
(5) What measures should be adopted by policy-makers and practitioners to ensure effective antislavery governance in Sudan during and after the pandemic?
To understand the impacts of the pandemic on modern slavery dynamics, vulnerabilities, and responses, this project combines three layers of research and analysis: (1) a comprehensive review of existing and emerging evidence; (2) in-depth interviews with key informants in policy and practice in Sudan and internationally; and (3) a supplementary survey of key stakeholders. These research activities will form the foundation for the development of evidence-based guidance for effective policy and practice to address modern slavery in Sudan during and after the pandemic, built in collaboration with UK-based Sudanese survivors. Focus group discussion with these survivors will ensure the voice of affected communities shapes policy and practice guidance, and responds to the specific needs and interests of survivors. This approach positions survivors not as the subjects of research, but as co-creators of research outputs.
The project takes advantage of the existing expertise and networks of project partners to deliver meaningful findings and outputs in a short timeframe. Engagement with key stakeholders as both participants and users of the research ensures buy-in from the outset, and helps to facilitate uptake. Project partners will work proactively throughout the project, and on completion, to ensure findings are embedded in ongoing policy and practice processes, to support long-lasting change. This research is further embedded in a longer-term process of political transition in Sudan, in which antislavery and human rights have been considered a priority. This provides the opportunity for meaningful, evidence-based recommendations to significantly influence Sudanese antislavery governance into the future. This will support greater stability and human rights protections in Sudan, recognised to be central to building greater stability in the region more broadly.
Publications
Lumley-Sapanski A
(2021)
The impacts of Covid-19 on modern slavery in Sudan: Emerging findings briefing
Lumley-Sapanski A
Constructive Invisibility: Processes, Narratives, and Geographies of Invisibilisation and their Utility for Exploitation
in Transactions of the Institute of British GEographers (under review)
Lumley-Sapanski A
(2021)
The Khartoum Process and Human Trafficking
in Forced Migration Review
Lumley-Sapanski A
(2022)
The COVID-19 Impacts on Migration and Migrants from a Gender Perspective
Lumley-Sapanski A
(2021)
The impacts of Covid-19 on human trafficking in Sudan: Research Summary
Lumley-Sapanski A
(2023)
Exacerbating Pre-Existing Vulnerabilities: an Analysis of the Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Human Trafficking in Sudan
in Human Rights Review
Peiro Mir M
(2021)
The Politics of Anti-Trafficking
Description | The study found that the pandemic had increased individual risks and vulnerabilities to human trafficking in Sudan. Rather than fundamentally reshaping vulnerabilities in Sudan, the pandemic exacerbated existing individual, community, structural, and environmental risk factors which drive human trafficking and modern slavery within, through, and from the country. While many of the criminal networks, perpetrators, and methods employed in trafficking have remained the same, the dynamics of vulnerability and routes taken have shifted as a result of the pandemic. It has also disrupted the capacity of criminal justice, governance, and humanitarian organisations to provide services to survivors or to prosecute perpetrators. These disruptions further exacerbate the effects of the pandemic and Covid-19 mitigation strategies on already vulnerable groups. The lack of resources at the governmental level to tackle these issues represents a substantial challenge. However, the beacon of hope identified by interviewees was that collaborative strategies to combat human trafficking and modern slavery were put in place by governmental actors prior to the pandemic. Chief actors in government were identified by interviewees as capable advocates and governors, willing to act on the strategic goals. The hope was that this momentum would continue post-pandemic. However, it must overcome the barriers of limited resources and lack of institutional memory within governance structures. External resourcing and support were therefore identified as crucial to effective anti-trafficking governance and action in Sudan. Project engagement activities worked with key policymakers, officials, international and non-governmental actors in Sudan to explore the findings and consider translating these into policy and practice in the country. The impact plan was disrupted by the military coup in Sudan, but the project team continue to explore opportunities for working with key stakeholders outside the government to operationalise the findings, and retain connections in government to continue improving anti-trafficking efforts in the event that the situation effectively stabilises. |
Exploitation Route | The impacts of the pandemic in Sudan are severe and far-reaching, with implications internally, regionally, and internationally. The international dimensions of the issues considered in this report call for action not only by actors operating within Sudan, but also intergovernmental actors, international civil society organisations, and foreign governments. Both immediate and longer-term action are needed to mitigate the adverse consequences of the pandemic, protect victims and vulnerable populations, and ensure that efforts to combat human trafficking are embedded effectively in Sudan's new governance structures. The project reports include a range of recommendations for key national and international actors, to take forward the findings of the research. Priority recommendations are identified here: https://modernslaverypec.org/assets/downloads/Sudan-research-summary.pdf and a full set of recommendations for taking the research forward are available in the project report here: https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/research/beacons-of-excellence/rights-lab/resources/reports-and-briefings/2021/may/the-impact-of-covid-19-on-human-trafficking-in-sudan.pdf The project has also provided a springboard for the developmetn of further research and engagement projects in the region, and interrogating the issues emerging from the project. |
Sectors | Communities and Social Services/Policy Education Healthcare Government Democracy and Justice Security and Diplomacy |
URL | https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/research/beacons-of-excellence/rights-lab/resources/reports-and-briefings/2021/may/the-impact-of-covid-19-on-human-trafficking-in-sudan.pdf |
Description | The project and project event demonstrated high levels of engagement from key stakeholders working in Sudan and the Broader MENA region. Stakeholders from the Sudanese government emphasised the value of the research findings as they worked towards improving the country's anti-trafficking law and policy. In 2021, Sudan was rated as Tier 2 in the US State department's annual Trafficking in Person's Report for the first time in the report's 20-year history. The work of the project partner GPG connected to the project was cited as significant in the positive development of the country's anti-trafficking framework that contributed to this. This represented a landmark moment in anti-trafficking in Sudan. The work has also informed the provision of services and support to Sudanese survivors in the UK diaspora, provided by project partner Waging Peace, and the ongoing policy advocacy activities of project partners GPG and RUSI. The military coup in Sudan in October 2021 has disrupted the medium and long-term impact pathways of the project, particularly in relation to the government stakeholders that were central to the impact plan. The project partners continue to engage carefully with those actors where possible, in the interests of pursuing the full impact potential of the project when the situation stabilises. In the meantime, further engagement with other stakeholders is being developed to facilitate impact while the situation remains unstable, and the project team are working with international partners to ensure impact is realised in this tumultuous context. As of March 2023, the situation in Sudan remains unstable, and international stakeholders have increasingly had to reduce their level of involvement in the context for security reasons. The team is therefore now exploring ways to apply findings and lessons learned in other transitional contexts. |
First Year Of Impact | 2021 |
Sector | Communities and Social Services/Policy,Education,Government, Democracy and Justice |
Impact Types | Policy & public services |
Description | Points of inflection: Analysis of the impact of Covid-19 on the vulnerabilities Eritrean refugees face to human trafficking in Sudan |
Amount | $10,000 (USD) |
Organisation | International Labour Organization (ILO) |
Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
Country | Switzerland |
Start | 07/2021 |
End | 07/2022 |
Description | Study on EU external policy tools to address forced labour and modern slavery |
Amount | € 30,000 (EUR) |
Organisation | European Parliament |
Sector | Public |
Country | Belgium |
Start | 07/2021 |
End | 03/2022 |
Description | The COVID-19 Impacts on Migration and Migrants from a Gender Perspective |
Amount | $1,100 (USD) |
Organisation | International Organization for Migration |
Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
Country | Switzerland |
Start | 06/2021 |
End | 03/2022 |
Description | Global Partners Governance (GPG) |
Organisation | Global Partners Governance |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | This collaboration was the foundation for the project. The University of Nottingham research team provided leadership and management, research skills and expertise, and domain knowledge on the issue of human trafficking to the collaboration. |
Collaborator Contribution | GPG brought context-specific expertise and contacts to the collaboration, and were uniquely well-placed to facilitate engagement with key stakeholders in policy and practice relevant to the project. GPG helped deliver the research activities, and facilitate dissemination, uptake and engagement. |
Impact | The project itself (and therefore all associated outputs) was a product of this new collaboration. The collaboration in this project has also given rise to further collaborative work, including submission of two new proposals for joint research projects in the six months following the conclusion of this grant. This is a multi-disciplinary and multi-sector collaboration, covering law, politics and international relations, and related field from both the academic and practitioner perspectives. Our joint research has also informed GPG's ongoing work with the Sudanese government to strengthen anti-trafficking infrastructure. |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) |
Organisation | Royal United Services Institute |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
PI Contribution | This collaboration was the foundation for the project. The University of Nottingham research team provided leadership and management, research skills and expertise, and domain knowledge on the issue of human trafficking to the collaboration. |
Collaborator Contribution | RUSI brought context-specific expertise and contacts to the collaboration, and were uniquely well-placed to facilitate engagement with key stakeholders in policy and practice relevant to the project. RUSI helped deliver the research activities, and facilitate dissemination, uptake and engagement. |
Impact | The project itself (and therefore all associated outputs) was a product of this new collaboration. The institutions have also been exploring further opportunities for collaboration in joint research projects. |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Waging Peace |
Organisation | Waging Peace |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
PI Contribution | This collaboration was the foundation for the project. The University of Nottingham research team provided leadership and management, research skills and expertise, and domain knowledge on the issue of human trafficking to the collaboration. |
Collaborator Contribution | Waging Peace brought context-specific expertise working directly with Sudanese survivors to the collaboration, and were uniquely well-placed to facilitate engagement with Sudanese survivors in the diaspora, as well as engagement with other key stakeholders. Waging Peace helped to coordinate activities involving survivors, providing wraparound support infrastructure to ensure these activities were delivered ethically. Waging Peace also supported dissemination, updake, and engagement around project findings and outputs. |
Impact | The project itself (and therefore all associated outputs) was a product of this new collaboration. The project collaboration has also given rise to new collaborative work, extending on the project. The collaboration was multi-sector, between academia and civil society/frontline service and advocacy. |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Invited Speaker, Online Forum |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Third sector organisations |
Results and Impact | Invited Speaker at the Human Trafficking Foundation's monthly online forum, with the theme 'Human Trafficking Through an International Lens'. The Human Trafficking Foundation's National Advisory Forum brings together over 100 NGOs, service providers and other experts from across the UK anti-trafficking sector, and provides a unique opportunity to engage with Parliamentarians and policy-makers. The Forum also offers an opportunity to network, collaborate and share best practice. The Foundation operates a fortnightly newsletter for Forum members with information about projects, events, campaigns, reports and details of our forums. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://www.humantraffickingfoundation.org/online-forums |
Description | The impact of COVID-19 on human trafficking in Sudan |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
Results and Impact | Approximately 100 policymakers, practitioners, and researchers attended our launch event discussing findings from research activities, with contributons from key policy, civil society, and international actors. This sparked important discussion, and key stakeholders who participated reported te significance of the research and its relevance for their work. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
URL | https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-impact-of-covid-19-on-human-trafficking-in-sudan-registration-154... |
Description | Video Commentary: World Day Against Trafficking in Persons: Human Trafficking in Sudan |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | As part of RUSI's contributions to mark the World Day Against Trafficking in Persons, in this video, Keith Ditcham and Michael Jones explain the key findings of the report from the research project. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
URL | https://rusi.org/news-and-comment/video-commentary/world-day-against-trafficking-persons-human-traff... |
Description | Virtual Side Event of the 48th Session of the UN Human Rights Council |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | The project team co-hosted a Virtual Side Event of the 48th Session of the UN Human Rights Council with the UN Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights collaborating with the UN Voluntary Trust Fund on Contemporary Forms of Slavery. The project PI was a keynote speaker at this event, alongside: the UN Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery; the Chairperson of the Board of Trustees of the Voluntary Trust Fund on Contemporary Forms of Slavery; the Coordinator of the Centro de Defensa de la Vida Carmen Bascaran; Executive Director of Different & Equal; Research and Advocacy Manager at Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics; and the Head of the Protection, Policy and Legal Advice section of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. This sparked significant questions and discussions amongst participants and audience members. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
URL | https://www.ohchr.org/en/events/events/2021/webinar-road-recovery-improving-response-contemporary-fo... |