03/03/2020

Annual ICLQ Lecture: Philippa Webb on state responsibility for modern slavery

Last night Professor Philippa Webb delivered the 20th Annual ICLQ Lecture at the British Institute of International and Comparative Law.

Philippa and her colleague Dr Rosana Garciandia (King’s College London) were invited to give the prestigious lecture on the strength of their 2019 publication State Responsibility for Modern Slavery: Uncovering and Bridging the Gap.

In the lecture, Philippa and Rosana argued that the legal framework of state responsibility can be used to help eradicate modern slavery.

They identified five scenarios in which states may have responsibility for modern slavery. These scenarios are not hypothetical, as demonstrated by recent developments including:

• Last Friday’s decision of the Supreme Court of Canada in the Nevsun litigation which concerned the alleged complicity of a Canadian mining company with forced labour in Eritrea.
• Credible reports of modern slavery in the cotton industry in Uzbekistan and the Xingjiang Uyghur Autunomous Region in China.
• The alleged involvement of diplomats in human trafficking and domestic servitude in the UK which is the first Employment Appeal Tribunal case to be granted a leapfrog certificate to the Supreme Court.

The event was chaired by ICLQ Editor in Chief Professor Sir Malcolm Evans OBE KCMG.