5 Year Studentship-(Un)free consumption

(Un)free consumption: exploring the role of markets in modern slavery. (2024)

What you get

The PhD studentship is offered for a maximum of five years, beginning in September 2024, renewable on a yearly basis, subject to satisfactory performance on the doctoral degree. The successful candidate will receive:

• Full fee waiver
• Stipend equivalent to the UKRI doctoral stipend, currently £18,622 per annum.
• The possibility of teaching and/or marking activities in the School (maximum of six hours per week during term time).
• Opportunity to apply for any part-time Research Assistant roles available.
• Teaching work will be paid in addition to the stipend.

Type of award

5-Year studentship - (Un)free consumption: exploring the role of markets in modern slavery.

PhD project

The International Labour Organization (ILO) estimates that 50 million people around the world were living in modern slavery in 2021 (a number that is increasing). This involves a wide range of coercive practices extending beyond ‘sweatshop’ or ‘bad labour conditions’ such as document confiscation, wage theft, movement restriction, deception, threats, and violence. At its core, human vulnerability is exploited through physical and psychological coercion to generate revenue streams that often tie back to markets and consumption (both illegitimate and legitimate). It is believed that many of our products and services consumed today – especially those spanning global supply-chains- are in some way (and often unintentionally/unknowingly) tainted by some form of exploitation. Moreover, consumption is often used as a lever to drive and maintain patterns of modern slavery. For example, a lack of access to basic goods – food, shelter, loans etc – render citizens vulnerable to being recruited into a life of modern slavery (‘Handling’ agents will deliberately target food kitchens and deprived city areas, for example). Consumption is also a structuring feature of long-term exploitation, where food, transport and housing can be added to a persons’ dept on a continual basis, to make them feel obligated to work harder and longer. Consumption may also be something that those in forced labour (e.g. domestic servitude) are required to do on behalf of others. More positively, acts of material and symbolic consumption may serve as liberatory objects, items that provide hope, momentary freedom or even eventual emancipation from confinement. Of all these interesting and impactful questions about the relationship between (un)freedom and consumption, the current stream of research in this space is significantly underdeveloped (certainly in comparison to other disciplines such as Supply Chain Management). Where there has been glimmers of interest by marketing scholars, ‘developments’ seem to be in the context of conventional ways of thinking about ‘ethical’ consumption, ‘fair trade’ and the labelling of products as ‘slave free’. This vein of research around ‘free consumers’ buying slave-free products remains important, however, these often focus in on niche areas of the market and ignore the more macro questions around how low-cost demands drive value out of the lower end of supply-chains and thus, tragically, drive costs towards zero – a key condition of modern slavery to flourish (Crane, 2013).

Addressing modern slavery requires that we better understand the role that Markets and Consumption play, given labour exploitation often involves aspects of consumption, or lack thereof (e.g. demand for food, housing and money often locks vulnerable victims into non-waged, coercive labour). Within marketing, this research project would aim to add to existing questions about how ‘free’ consumers (like you and I) might choose ‘slavery-free’ products, the question of how ‘unfree’ consumers experience products or services as a structuring feature of their exploitation or, more positively, as a potential vehicle of their liberation. Potential areas of focus could be;

-          How do (free) consumers choose slave-free products and services?

-          What is the role of markets and marketing in this?

-          How do certain market models contribute to conditions for modern slavery?

-          How and why is consumption used as an enabler of modern slavery?

-          How does consumption feature in certain types of modern slavery (from domestic servitude to forced or bonded labour)?

-          What are the forms of (unfree) consumption conducted by those in modern slavery and how does this structure their experience?

-          What role does consumption and markets play in the symbolic and material liberation of those trapped in modern slavery?

Eligibility

Open to UK/EU and overseas applicants. Applicants should have:

• 2:1 honours degree,
• Master’s degree in a related subject (or studying for this) with a good level pass, or non-UK equivalent.
• Proof of proficiency in English i.e., an IELTS certificate taken within the last two years. (At least 6.5 overall with at least 6.0 in each of the four sections.)

Number of scholarships available

One.

Deadline

How to apply

You need to apply for a PhD in Management at the University of Sussex, including a research proposal addressing one of the research topic above. Guidance on applications is available here:  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/study/phd/apply

Contact us

• For questions relating to the application process, contact business-researchstudents@sussex.ac.uk.
• For informal enquiries in relation to ideas for research topics, contact Robert Caruana R.J.Caruana@sussex.ac.uk.

Timetable

• Deadline for applications – January 15 2024
• Shortlisting – January 18 & 19 2024
• Interviews (online panels) week of January 29 2024
• Offers made week of February 5 2024.