Intergalactic Summit

Greetings,

As you all may have noticed, discussions about slavery are endless and too numerous to even count them. Some may be well constructed and civil while others inevitably sink into hatred and unproductive animal behaviors. But for almost all of these discussions and debates, there is one constant that I have noted again and again, and this unchanging fact is the confusion, the lack of precision and thus the resulting mutual misunderstandings revolving around the term "slavery". Some speak of slavery in general, without taking into account all its specificites and legal (or non legal) cases, be it by simple ignorance, convenience, or just an inability of being more accurate. But most of all, due to a lack of common conventions.

With that in mind, I would like us to discuss, if you will, and elaborate a little basic lexicon to emulate a better understanding when people come to refer to slavery and debate about it. So, if you agree to work on this, I will humbly try to keep this topic updated if the results turns out to be constructive and productive. In a second time, it would probably be even more formal if everyone of us agreeing with this could sign it, support it, etc.

Firstly, some attempts at a definition :

1. A slave is by definition a person who is the property of another person or a group of persons, and whose labor and/or also whose life often is subject to the owner's volition.

2. A slave is a person who is allowed to be treated as property by an entity by their society for an indefinite amount of time and is also subject to a contract, including (or not) trading to another person or group.

But this defintion remains broad and embraces all of the different cases that one can find in New Eden. For example, a slave under an Amarrian Holder is not bound to the same laws and duties to a slave under an Angel Cartel member, and this can even greatly vary depending on their very status, be it moral or litteral. Eventually, I would like to try to define and make a distinction of all the usual different cases which regularily come up. With better descriptive tools at our disposal, people should be able to better and more accurately discuss and debate about slavery without sometimes confusing everything.

Of course, there will always be people unaware of such a thing, but the main objective is to promote a common basis going in the way explained above. Naturally, this is open to discussion and remarks.

Before going further, I would like to remain people that this topic is not about what is right or wrong, but merely to define a little better what are FACTS, so please remain FACTUAL. Attempts to derail this topic to debates based on personnal opinions and judgements of value will not be tolerated. This topic is also not a topic on slaves conditions, meaning the possible well treatment or mistreatment of said slaves.


Hence this is the differentiation I would propose :

I do not like the term "voluntary slave." It's too often used by rich kids trying to be edgy. A slave who can choose to end their slavery at any time is not a slave. A slave who can not choose that is not a voluntary slave anymore. I guess what you meant with that term I would call "bonded slavery": You enter the a term of slavery (more or less) voluntarily, but the duration of the slavery is bound to a condition. For example, repayment of a certain debt.

As a geeneral reply to your post, I think your classification is not bad, but I doubt that the "why" of slavery is the only or even the most important aspect.

A more important distinction to me would be the "how" of slavery, the conditions under which the slaves live.

For example, some slaves are "simply" forced to work. Their owners do not care what they do outside of the work time, what events they celebrate, or who they mate with, as long as they work. I would call this "forced work slavery." Once you add some restrictions to that work - maximum work time, wage, etc. - you quickly leave the realm of "slavery" and enter that of "wage labor." Even the choice of employer, usually considered important here, is not necessary, as some Caldari corporations have proven.

Some slaves on the other hand are greatly restricted in what they can do outside of the actual work, what cultural practices they can follow, what partners they mate with, etc. This I would call "chattel slavery."

There is another apparently very important distinction. It's interesting to see that the Cartel, while involved in slave trade, does not evoke nearly as much opposition from many freedom fighters as the Amarr do. I think this is due to two factors. The first is that many Cartel members are Minmatar, and thus much less "outsiders" than the Amarr. Being enslaved by someone closer in kin is considered much less problematic than being enslaved by someone further away from your kin.

Secondly, the Cartel tends to enslave individuals, while the Amarr tend to abduct whole clans. Clans are extremely important to us Minmatar, and just like we consider someone who cuts off hands much less of a criminal (but still a criminal) than an outright murderer, taking individuals off a clan is considered (while still bad) much less of a problem than taking whole clans.

Thirdly, I suspect the Amarrian preference to what I called "chattel slavery" above is another factor for the difference in reaction.

A slave isn't simply a person owned by another person. Slaves can also be owned by families or other groups.

I did not know you had different "types" of slaves. Is that how they are listen in the market?

not to sure what a family of ducks or a group of cats are but I assure you no one can truly own a person. You can't lock someone's soul as it were

Dear Farel you can use any differentiations who want, i'd lke to resume your effort by only one word : contract.

Any discussions or debates will be around a property contract bewteen a slave and his owner (person or institution). It will be a political debate only. Abolitionism as political philosophy will fall under this field of knowledge and how to give slaves the right to buy/cancel their own contract.

If people want to discuss around morale or ethic, you already know that your definition and differentiations will not help.
The whole existence of slavery and slaves are based on the existence of this contract that make a man property of another one (or group). Please note that this contract may have a material or immaterial form.

Allow slaves in the empire to cancel the contract legaly and now we are talking.
Desctroy the idea that such contracts are justified and you will destroy slavery.
Put a price to theses contracts and the economical science will certainly have something to say about it.

Thank you Mr Caine, you nailed it to the point. This is exactly what I mean.



You remark is valid and has to be taken in account. Thank you. I am modifying right now what has to be modifed in consequence.




Resuming everything to contracts does not help to make the matter easier. A contract can still cover moral values or concerns of legitimacy for the acts that said contract enables. Depending of the terms of the contract and the justification of said contract (which can be totally different in a lot of cases), debates about these contracts thus have to take in account the reasons behind them.

Though if you feel this is really important, a precision can definitly be added in the definition, stating that most of slaves are bound by various contracts to their masters.



This is out of topic and not welcome in this discussion. My apologies in advance for my rudeness.

A good definition of slavery or slave has many aspect to it. I thank you for starting your attempt at defining it. This is my contribution:

Property
Property refers to the legal status of a person. Being property implies having an owner and implies the ability to change ownership. Being an owner in term implies a large amount of control over the property. I do not think having the legal status of property is a necessary condition for the common sense concept of slavery? For example: people captured by Angel Cartel members and then forced to work for them at gunpoint are not slaves in a strictly legal sense. It is sufficient to be treated as property to be a slave.

Humanity
You speak of 'a person' which is an essential element of the definition. Dogs are never slaves, nor are primates. We treat many sentient creatures as property but they are never slaves. I am not sure how people define the borders of humanity in this case. Is a rogue drone held for experiments in a science lab a slave? Can Jovians become slaves, or are they so far genetically removed from us that they can't?

Control
Being a slave implies another having a large amount of control over one's own life. This control does not have to be absolute. The Scriptures regulate a lot of matters what one should and shouldn't do with one's slaves for example. It is also not necessary for the control to be exercised. A book you own that lies forgotten in some library and you never think about for 10 years is still subject to your control when you find it again. It is sufficient for the possibility of control to be present.

Sphere of influence
One important aspect remains. The amount of control your owner can exercise over you has to be accepted by your direct surroundings. A Matari who escaped his Amarrian master and flees to the Republic is no longer considered a slave, even though in a legal sense he still is, and the possibility exists that he might come under the control of his owner again in the future. The mere fact that he is outside of the direct sphere of influence of a society that supports his owner controlling him makes him a slave no longer. This ties into the property aspect mentioned above. If your environment condones someone treating you as property, you are effectively a slave.

Indefinite length
There time you are treated as someone's property is not well defined. Either there is no clear and predefined end to your status, or you have no control over the length of your status. If you sign on with the military, you understand that when battle occurs you might be completely controlled by your superiors, and even to the point of them letting you die (for whatever purpose) under the threat of death (desertion). However, you still have some amount of control over when you resign or what term you signed for. Even military service under conscription has a defined service term. If it hasn't, conscription is equal to slavery.

Some corner cases to think about:

Children
I often use children as an example, because children share many things with slaves. Children, especially young children, are often completely dependent upon their parents (or caretakers), both in a factual sense and in a legal sense. They have no ability to choice things other than the choices allowed to them by their parents, their labors and/or life are subject to their parent's volition. No one calls children slaves because most cultures believe a high amount of control is justified and even desired when it concerns young humans. Factually, children are for the most part treated as property, EXCEPT for the fact that they cannot be traded freely and their term has a well-defined end.

Prisoners
Prisoners are often treated as property. Their lives are completely controlled by others, and they are factually owned by the state or the prison they reside in. Society allows others to control these prisoners and treat them as property. Some prisoners can even have indefinite (life) sentences. The only thing that separates them from being a slave is that they cannot be traded. Prisoners with a life sentence that can be traded are effectively slaves.

Which brings me to my:

Definition
A slave is a person who is allowed to be treated as property by another person or group by their society for an indefinite amount of time and can be traded freely to another person or group.

To make the definition clearer and more concise you could perhaps exchange person or group by entity. Which also makes slave control by (for example) some hive mind intelligence possible.

I don't think that it is a necessary condition for a slave that he 'can be traded freely to another person or group'. In fact as anything else that is treated as property, I think that a slave can be subject to all kind of controls of trade - including a ban on being traded. If e.g. someone receives a slave as a gift of HRM with the obligation not to trade it, this wouldn't make the status of the slave as slave obsolete.

I'd also like to give a definition for what I'd call 'slave by convention' and 'slave by nature'. I have to admit though that this might venture already into the normative realm you'd like to avoid, Paladin.

• slave by convention - a slave that is held in accord to the norms, rules, laws etc. of the society he is held in
• slave by nature - a slave that is not competent to run his own life