Geographies of marginalization : encountering modern slavery in tourism

At first glance, relating modern slavery to tourism might seem excessive and an exaggeration to what are seemingly unrelated concerns. While modern slavery practices in the global textiles, mining, agricultural, domestic services and sex industries have been on the receiving end of much critical research and mainstream commentary, the global tourism supply chain has not faced the same extent of investigation and critique. Even the UNWTO, the globe's tourism industry cheerleader, has so far avoided making such explicit linkages and has mostly celebrated the sector’s potential to contribute to development, and in isolation to how this manifests in the global tourism supply chain. However, TUI the world’s largest consolidated travel company has taken the lead on formally acknowledging the reality that modern slavery exists in the tourism supply chain with their Modern Slavery Statement.