involuntary servitude
Compelled work, unfree
Involuntary servitude is forced labor—work that someone is compelled to perform against their will, typically through physical coercion, legal compulsion, or threat of punishment.
The term appears prominently in the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S.
Constitution, which abolished slavery and involuntary servitude except as punishment for a crime.
Modern usage extends to human trafficking and debt bondage situations where victims cannot freely leave.
The workers were held in conditions amounting to involuntary servitude.
- forced labourCoerced work, often unpaid
- unfree laborCompelled toil without consent
- peonageDebt-based forced labor
- draftPreliminary version of text
- debt bondageCoerced labor repaying loans
against one's will · debt slavery · slavery · chattel slavery · bought and sold · impressment · press gang · convict labor · bonded labor · human trafficking · chain gang · duress · child labor · muster · sex trafficking · forced marriage · labor camp · work camp
- slaverychattel slavery, enslaved, slave, enslavement, slave traders
- captivity crimeskidnapping, abduction, false imprisonment, hostage-taking, human trafficking
involuntary servitudevoluntary service
Unpaid assistance freely offered
volunteering · volunteer work · charitable service · community service
involuntary servitudefreedom
Absence of constraint
liberty · emancipation · self-determination · autonomy · independence
involuntary, servitude, voluntary, voluntarily, volunteer, volunteering, volunteered, volition, volitional