Zekeria AHMED SALEM

"Slavery Between Past and Present: comparative perspective from the case study of the Haratines people in The Islamic Republic of Mauritania"

Contrary to the received wisdom, historically, the formal abolition of slavery has never put an end to the exploitation of the victims nor led to a genuine emancipation through free labor. In many settings over the world, the continuing importance of traditional social hierarchies made it even harder for many to overcome the servile status. Nowadays, scholars and international organizations alike agree on the fact that, in spite of the so-called triumph of human rights and the rule of law, at least in few instances, slavery has just been reconfigured into new forms of servitude including that of bondage, descent-based discrimination or mere “modern-day slavery”. Drawing on the case study of the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, a small country straddling sub-Saharan and North Africa, this project aims to an exploration of the various ways in which the legacy of slavery has been and still is altogether experienced, debated and challenged peacefully by the haratines, an Arab-speaking group made-up of people from slave descent. I analyze their social movement, their identity-politics and their political and religious struggles over the past thirty years. The projet aims to an exploration of the often unquestioned concept of “modern-day slavery” as well as the entanglements of various key general issues such as unfree labor, freedom, human rights, citizenship, subjectivity, and personhood.