Trabalho análogo ao de escravo e racismo estrutural: um retrato dos resgates de trabalhadores baianos

Abstract

The aim of this study was to analyse cases of labour analogous to slavery in Bahia, from the perspective of the overexploitation of labour and the structural racism entrenched in social and labour relations in Brazil, through a reflection based on a bibliographical review of the subject, as well as verifying who and where these structural issues are most effective in enslaving in Bahia, by mapping social characteristics such as race, education, age and gender, as well as identifying the priority cities in Bahia, according to data from 2023, from where the rescued migrated. The aim is to contribute to the study of the issue, as well as to the development of public policies to combat it in Bahia. Through a descriptive analysis of the rescue data available on the SmartLab platform covering the period between 2002 and 2022, we were able to analyse the main economic activities in which these workers were rescued, as well as the social profile of the worker through the variables of age, gender, education and self-declared race. For the 2023 data, provided by the teams from the Labour Prosecutor's Office and the Bahia Department of Justice and Human Rights, we were able to map, in most of them, the cities of origin and the activities in which they were rescued. The highest concentration is in territories that comprise the semi-arid region of Bahia, which shows us the scenario of vulnerability faced by the population of this region. 81 workers were registered in the Sisal Territory, 29 in the Southwest of Bahia, 11 in the Piemonte da Diamantina and 11 in the Piemonte Norte do Itapicuru. The Metropolitan region registered 86 workers, Portal do Sertão 12, Baixo Sul 7 and Extremo Sul 6. In some cases we were unable to map the worker's place of birth or residence. The case of the wineries was the largest, with the groomer having recruited 196 workers in 35 different cities, highlighting the breadth of the grooming network.