Professor of Contemporary Slavery Kevin Bales has received an award in recognition of his pioneering and inspirational work to end modern-day slavery.

The Catalyst Award is being presented at the 13th Annual Human Trafficking Awareness Day, which brings together United Abolitionists, Paving the Way Foundation, Central Florida Human Trafficking Task Force, and dozens of US organisations dedicated to ending modern-day slavery.

The conference is being hosted virtually at the University of Central Florida, Orlando. Tomas J. Lares, founder and president of United Abolitionists, said: “Kevin Bales is considered in many anti-trafficking circles to be the father of the modern-abolitionists movement here in the United States.  He is truly a role model and has been an inspiration to countless abolitionists today.”

Professor Bales, from the School of Politics and International Relations, is Research Director of the University of Nottingham’s Rights Lab Beacon of Excellence, the leading and largest group of modern slavery scholars in the world, and is a key figure in the science behind the antislavery movement, equipping policymakers with the data and toolkits needed to act.

He was appointed a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George (CMG) in the Queen’s New Year Honours in 2017 for his ‘services to the global antislavery movement’ and in 2018 received the Economic and Social Research Council’s International Impact Prize in recognition of his unprecedented insights into the prevalence of modern-day slavery around the world.

Professor Zoe Trodd, Director of the Rights Lab, said: “More than any other individual, Kevin has created a global antislavery movement that had put the end of slavery within our grasp, and we’re delighted that our colleagues in the United States are recognising his inspirational contribution.”

Read more about Professor Bales’ remarkable work with the Rights Lab.