Event title: Uninformed and unethical consumer behaviour: What Australia's Modern Slavery Act represents as the ‘problem’ of modern slavery

Date and Time: Thursday 18 September 2025, 10:00am to 11:00am

Venue: LUMS Lecture Theatre 14 and online via Microsoft Teams

Event details:

The Pentland Centre is hosting a seminar exploring how Australia’s Modern Slavery Act (2018) addresses the issue of modern slavery in global supply chains and its implications for consumers, businesses, and policy.

Australia’s Modern Slavery Act (2018) (MSA) takes a decentralised, reflexive, and self-regulatory approach to governing modern slavery in global supply chains, positioning consumers as a key stakeholder responsible for influencing ethical corporate behaviour. Kyla Raby, PhD Candidate at the University of South Australia, will discuss her research which utilises a Foucault inspired critical policy analysis framework to question the way in which the legislation represents the ‘problem’ of modern slavery in global supply chains. Utilising Bacchi’s ‘What’s the problem represented to be?’ (WPR) approach, Kyla argues that the MSA represents modern slavery in global supply chains as a problem of uninformed and unethical consumer behaviour. This frames modern slavery as a market and information problem, positioning businesses as non-offenders and shifting responsibility onto consumers. Kyla argues that by deflecting attention from economic structures and global systems of labour and production, this framing distorts the issue and highlights the need for alternative problem representations.

Speaker bio: Kyla Raby is an antislavery specialist with experience across research, education, and frontline practice. She is completing her PhD at the University of South Australia, examining the responsibility placed on consumers by Australia’s Modern Slavery Act (2018). Kyla is co-author of Modern Slavery in Australia (2024) and has published in leading anti-trafficking journals. She teaches and supports research on human trafficking and modern slavery at several Australian universities and was awarded the UniSA Maurice de Rohan International Scholarship to conduct research in the United Kingdom in 2025. Kyla has designed and managed support services for survivors of trafficking in the UK, Greece, Bangladesh and Australia. She is a Protection, Gender and Inclusion delegate with Australian Red Cross and a Non-Executive Director of Be Slavery Free. She also founded Everyday Slavery, an education-based social media initiative funded by the Australian Government. Follow @everyday_slavery on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube.

Please note that this session will be recorded.

All Lancaster University staff and all students welcome - registration required.

More info about event here: https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/pentland/news-and-events/forthcoming-events/uninformed-and-unethical-consumer-behaviour-what-australias-modern-slavery-act-represents-as-the-problem-of-modern-slavery/