Friday, February 14, 2014

Breakdown of Global Slavery Index Methodology


                As I will be using the methodology of the Walk Free Foundation’s Global Slavery Index (GSI) as a guide to developing a human trafficking risk index at the provincial level for Kazakhstan, I will go through and explain the GSI methodology, and point out possible corollaries that I could use within my own methodology. Moreover, I will need to continually updating and revising it to reflect data availability and applicability. Part of the goal of this post is to obtain feedback on the usefulness/accuracy of suggested indicators, and to seek assistance in locating sources of relevant data that I have overlooked, so please comment with any suggestions.
                The GSI establishes a level of risk by country based on 33 quantitative indicators divided across five general dimensions: slavery policy, human rights, development, state stability, and women’s rights and discrimination. I will go through each and expand on their indicators, with an eye to how I could  apply the same or similar within my own methodology. Key to my ability to incorporate an indicator is the likelihood that it varies across the Kazakh provinces, national policies that generally affect each province equally is unlikely to provide any useful insight into the difference in risk between provinces. Additionally, I must be able to obtain data on that indicator at the provincial level, either through publicly available sources or through direct request from the Kazakh or local provincial governments.
                Slavery Policy is composed of the seven indicator variables: prevention, prosecution, protection, law enforcement training, migration regulation, monitoring of labor practices, and parallel legal system. Prosecution, protection and prevention are based on a scale developed in Cho, Dreher, & Neumeyer’s “The Determinants of Anti-trafficking Policies - Evidence from a New Index” (2012).[1] Prosecution measures “whether the country has legislative and other measures to establish criminal offences for trafficking in persons, in line with the definition provided by the (UN) Anti-trafficking Protocol; whether such legislative and other measures are appropriately and effectively enforced.” Protection measures “whether the country protects the human rights of victims of trafficking; identifies them; and provides for the physical, psychological and social recovery of victims of trafficking by legislative and other measures.” Prevention measures whether the country establishes and practices comprehensive policies, programs and other measures to prevent and combat trafficking in persons.” Kazakh provincial data replicating these measures is not readily available. However, through both qualitative research into the Kazakh legal system regarding human trafficking (of particular significance will be whether trafficking is prosecuted at the federal or provincial level, if at all), a simplified version may be adaptable to my methodology.
                The next three within Slavery Policy are law enforcement training, migration regulation to limit trafficking, and the monitoring of labor practices, which are based on the US Dept. of State’s “Trafficking in Persons Report 2013”.[2] Law enforcement training in human trafficking and the monitoring of labor practices may differ significantly between provinces, and could be obtainable by request through the provincial governments. While migration regulations specifically is more federal policy and unlikely to differ by province, information on the number of migrants by province could prove useful and also could be possible to obtain through request.
                The final variable within Slavery Policy is the existence of a parallel legal system that endangers the rights of minorities, based on the “World Factbook” published by the Central Intelligence Agency.[3] As with migration policy, the legal system is unlikely to differ significantly between provinces, but further research may reveal otherwise.
                Human Rights is composed of seven more indicators: access to legal and property rights, civil liberties, political rights, freedom of assembly, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and worker’s rights. Access to legal and property rights is based on the “International Property Rights Index” published by the Property Rights Alliance.[4] The civil liberties and political rights variables are from the Freedom House rankings.[5] The three freedom and the worker’s rights variables vary based on the protection of each as measured by the “Human Rights Data Project” by CIRI.[6] All of these measures are generally federal in nature and while the enforcement of federal law may differ significantly across the provinces, it will be difficult to capture through publicly accessible data and unlikely to be monitored by the provinces. It could be possible through qualitative sources such as LexisNexis to get an idea on where violations of political and worker rights have occurred based on media reports.
                Development consists of nine indicators: access to financial services, cell phone users, credit information, international debt, internet activity, GDP per capita in terms of purchasing power parity (GDP-PPP), the Human Development Index (HDI), literacy, and social safety net. The first six are all based on World Bank measures.[7] The HDI comes from the dataset compiled by the UN Development Programme.[8] Literacy is a scale based on data from the CIA’s “World Factbook”. Finally, social safety net scores are measured by the International Labor Organization.[9] All of these variables differ between provinces in Kazakhstan, yet not all will likely be accessible. The Kazakh government provides both internet activity and literacy by province. GDP-PPP is not available, however basic income data is, which should be an adequate replacement. Access to financial services and cell phone users may be accessible via a request to the federal or provincial governments. Credit information and HDI would likely be difficult to accurately measure by province, and international debt and social safety net are federal measures that are unlikely to differ significantly by province.
                State Stability is composed of seven variables: corruption, governance, independence of judiciary, peace index, weapons access, political instability, and violent crime. Corruption varies from highly corrupt to clean based on Transparency International’s “Corruption Perceptions Index”.[10] Governance ranges from weak to strong based on the World Bank’s “Governance Indicators.”[11] Independence of judiciary scores are again from the “Human Rights Data Project” by CIRI. Provided by the Vision of Humanity’s “Global Peace Index”, both the peace index ranges from most to least peaceful, and weapons access from low to high access).[12] Political instability varies from no to high vulnerability as measured by The Economist Intelligence Unit’s “Political Instability Index”.[13] The last, violent crime, measures the homicide rate per 100,000 population as compiled by the UN Office on Drugs and Crimes (UNODC).[14] All of these indicators could provide important differentiation between provinces, yet only crime is readily available at the provincial level. Of the remaining six, independence of judiciary, the peace index, weapons access and political instability would probably be very difficult to obtain and may not differ significantly across provinces. Corruption and governance will also be difficult to obtain, but could be very valuable as they likely differ considerably across provinces and both have a strong influence on the prevalence of human trafficking. I will continue to look for additional sources of data for both. Additionally, the UNODC’s “Drugs Monitoring” platform provides information on drug trafficking seizures by province that could be a valuable indicator of state capability and reach.[15]
                The final dimension, Women’s Rights and Discrimination, contains the Gini coefficient, women’s economic rights, and women’s political rights. The Gini coefficient measures income inequality as reported by the World Bank.[16] Women’s economic and political rights are scored from no rights to nearly all, again from the “Human Rights Data Project” by CIRI. Of these three the Gini coefficient is readily available by province. Both measures of women’s rights would be valuable, but none of the data I have been able to find at the provincial level differentiates between men and women, but perhaps through a direct request to the Kazakh statistics agency.


[1] http://www.economics-human-trafficking.org/data-and-reports.html
[2] http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2013/
[3] https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/
[4] http://www.internationalpropertyrightsindex.org/
[5] http://www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/freedom-world-2013#.Uv0ZvtxdXIc
[6] http://www.humanrightsdata.org/
[8] http://hdr.undp.org/en/statistics/hdi
[9] http://www.ilo.org/global/research/global-reports/world-social-security-report/lang--en/index.htm
[10] http://www.transparency.org/cpi2012/results#myAnchor1
[11] http://data.worldbank.org/data-catalog/worldwide-gove
[12] http://www.visionofhumanity.org/#/page/about-gpi
[13] http://viewswire.eiu.com/site_info.asp?info_name=social_unrest_table&page=noads
[14] http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/homicide.html
[15] http://drugsmonitoring.unodc-roca.org/
[16] http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SI.POV.GINI
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