The Role of Social Intermediaries for Addressing Modern Slavery in Supply Chains

In this paper, we conceptualize modern slavery as a boundary problem leading to restrictions for some workers to access fundamental core labor rights, making them the least powerful actors within the supply chain. Based on an in-depth case study of the ‘modern slavery crisis’ in Thailand, we first uncover cognitive and power boundaries that exist between some workers and supply chain firms, which increase the risk of enslavement for workers across three phases in their employment journey. Next, we identify several boundary-spanning activities that social intermediaries such as NGOs engage in to bridge these boundaries. Our findings show that informational boundary spanning activities by social intermediaries can successfully bridge cognitive boundaries that workers often face with respect to their labor rights in supply chains across all phases. By contrast, relational boundary spanning activities by social intermediaries are less successful when it comes to the bridging of power boundaries that exist between workers and supply chain firms. Our boundary spanning perspective on modern slavery sheds light on novel approaches to tackling this complex issue beyond traditional compliance approaches.