From ‘refugeeization’ of labour exploitation to debt bondage: developing the subversive content of protecting the victims of exploitation

Abstract

The article uses Italian law as glasses to point out that dichotomy forced/voluntary migrants affects the opposition regular/irregular migrants: in Italy the victims of trafficking (forced migrants par excellence) are eligible for a protection permit under Article 18 of the Immigration Law. Given that trafficked people are also exploited through debt-bondage, and given the polymorphism of migration routes, a distinction between regular and irregular migrants based on the mode of entry seems illogical. The crisis of the dichotomy between regular and irregular migrants is deepened by the provision according to which the same residence permit should be granted to victims of labour exploitation. On the basis of Mauss’s analysis of the gift, it is then argued that the “refugeeization” of exploited labour makes it clear that the gift-bondage emerges itself as a pivotal element of the system of exploitation and should therefore be considered as a justification for protection, and a reason for reviewing its content.