own, tend to lead multinational lives, moving themselves and their money from nation to nation as they wish, shedding assets and workers in one country and investing in another whenever this seems advantageous. Meanwhile the majority of taxpayers in advanced capitalist nations have been seduced by free-market ideology into accepting policies of privatising public resources and cutting back public expenditure, especially on social welfare. These policies have only further pushed the underclass toward social exclusion.Are things about to get better, at least in some countries, following the election of labour and social democratic governments in Britain, France and Germany? Will the emergence of ‘compassionate conservatism’ in Britain, Australia and elsewhere also make a difference? With both the social democratic ‘third way’ and ‘compassionate’ conservatism, it seems that the same policies of marketisation, free trade, privatisation and welfare cutbacks will be pursued. What both offer is the prospect of some kind of social inclusion to counter the effects of these policies. But, in practice, will they offer anything more than smoke and mirrors? We have a proposal that might make a modest but real contribution to a solution for the new millennium to problems of unemployment, insecurity and social exclusion.The Proposal.Our proposal is that we reintroduce chattel slavery — but this time on an optional basis — for all those facing the prospect of social exclusion. We should change the law to allow individuals the choice of contracting into a term of slavery — even lifelong slavery — as chattels of wealthy owners capable of providing them with secure sustenance in return for unpaid labour at the behest of their masters. It is not envisaged that voluntary slavery would replace the familiar employment of wage labour by capitalists; it would, rather, be an addition to it, an option fo...
