Modern Slavery Research Project - Biographies
Kevin Bales
Kevin Bales is a world-renowned academic, author, and activist dedicated to understanding and ending modern slavery. He is currently Professor of Contemporary Slavery at the University of Nottingham, where his work combines rigorous research with advocacy to expose how supply chains, environmental harms, and global economic systems intertwine with forced labor.
Kevin co-founded Free the Slaves, the U.S. sister organization of Anti-Slavery International, helping to build one of the central global movements against slavery. His research and writing have deeply shaped how modern slavery is understood today: his book Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy analyzed forced labor in multiple sectors and countries, and has been translated into many languages.
Beyond scholarship, Kevin has taken his findings into policy and practical change. He is lead author of the Global Slavery Index, an influential tool that helps governments, civil society, and businesses measure slavery’s scale and risk. He has advised multiple governments on anti-slavery law and policy, and consulted with international organizations to help develop tools and frameworks for detecting and remediating forced labor.
His published works include Ending Slavery: How We Free Today’s Slaves, The Slave Next Door: Modern Slavery in the United States, and Blood and Earth: Modern Slavery, Ecocide, and the Secret to Saving the World, among many others. These works explore not only the human cost of slavery, but also how it is embedded in environmental destruction, inequality, and economic power structures.
Kevin has been honored for his humanitarian work and scholarship with the Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order, the Companion of the Order of St. Michael and St. George (CMG), and other human rights awards.
Justin Dillon
Justin Dillon is a social entrepreneur, artist, author, and abolitionist whose work seeks to expose and dismantle systems of forced labor through technology, creative media, policy, and consumer engagement. As founder and CEO of FRDM (and formerly Made in a Free World), Dillon works with corporations, NGOs, governments, and communities to promote supply chain transparency, remediate human rights abuses, and shift both consumer behavior and institutional accountability.
Justin’s path to this work began as a touring musician. After witnessing the realities of human trafficking while on the road, he turned his creative energy toward building movements that engage people and institutions in dismantling exploitation. He directed the acclaimed documentary Call+Response, which brought international attention to modern-day slavery, and he created SlaveryFootprint.org, an interactive platform that has helped over 30 million people understand how their everyday purchases may connect to forced labor.
Passionate about equipping others to make change, Justin is also the author of A Selfish Plan to Change the World, which explores how ordinary individuals can turn their talents into meaningful impact. He frequently speaks on topics such as supply chain transparency, corporate responsibility, and movement building, inspiring audiences to see their own power to create systemic change.
https://www.one.org/us/stories/interview-author-justin-dillon-selfish-plan-save-world-book/
Alison Kiehl Friedman
Alison Kiehl Friedman is an expert in human rights, anti-slavery, and public policy whose career bridges government, nonprofit leadership, and legislation. She co-founded ASSET (Alliance to Stop Slavery and End Trafficking), a nonprofit working on human trafficking in global supply chains, and was instrumental in authoring the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act, landmark legislation that served as a model for similar laws internationally.
During the Obama Administration, Alison was recruited to serve as Deputy Director in the U.S. State Department’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons. In that position, she managed over $50 million in federal grants and coordinated interagency efforts to combat modern slavery. She also helped launch SlaveryFootprint.com, enabling consumers to understand how the products they buy can be connected to exploitative labor practices; crafted an executive order aimed at preventing taxpayer dollars from inadvertently incentivizing exploitation; and engaged in frontline diplomacy with international partners to advance anti-trafficking policies.
Alison’s leadership continued through her role as Executive Director of the International Corporate Accountability Roundtable (ICAR), where she oversaw coalition work pushing for corporate transparency, government accountability, and stronger regulation of supply chains. She has also served in multiple nonprofit and advocacy roles focused on closing gaps in law, policy, and practice that allow modern slavery to persist.
Julia Ormond
Julia Ormond is an Emmy award–winning actress and a dedicated human rights advocate whose work has spanned decades and continents. She is the President of the Alliance to Stop Slavery and End Trafficking (ASSET) and the Founding Chair of FilmAid International, a nonprofit launched during the Kosovo refugee crisis that uses film and storytelling to promote health, strengthen communities, and enrich the lives of the world’s most vulnerable and uprooted.
Julia’s commitment to justice deepened in the mid-1990s, when she began learning about human trafficking and modern slavery. What began with HIV/AIDS advocacy soon expanded into work addressing the exploitation of women and children across borders. She has collaborated closely with Vital Voices Global Partnership, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), and the U.S. government to advance anti-trafficking initiatives. In 2005, she was appointed UNODC Goodwill Ambassador against Trafficking and Slavery, a role that took her to Ghana, Cambodia, Thailand, and India to raise awareness and support local efforts to combat trafficking.
Through ASSET, Julia has worked with corporations, NGOs, and policymakers to push for systemic change. She helped convene a UN Security Council Arria-formula meeting on the intersection of terrorism, organized crime, and human trafficking, and she played a pivotal role in helping pass California’s Transparency in Supply Chains Act (SB 657) — landmark legislation requiring companies to disclose efforts to eradicate slavery from their supply chains. Julia has testified before the U.S. Congress multiple times on issues of trafficking, refugees, and human rights.
In addition to her activism, Julia has had a celebrated acting career, appearing in Legends of the Fall, Sabrina, First Knight, Smilla’s Sense of Snow, and The Barber of Siberia. She is the executive producer of the Emmy award–winning documentary Calling the Ghosts: A Story of Rape, War, and Women, which chronicles the survival of two women imprisoned during the Bosnian war.
Andrew Wallis
Andrew Wallis, OBE, is the founding Chief Executive Officer of Unseen UK, a leading charity dedicated to ending modern slavery through survivor support, systemic prevention, and partnership with business and government. Since co-founding Unseen in 2008, Andrew has guided its work from establishing safe houses and the UK Modern Slavery & Exploitation Helpline to influencing the legal and policy frameworks that shape how modern slavery is addressed in the UK.
Andrew chaired the working group for the Centre for Social Justice’s report It Happens Here: Equipping the United Kingdom to Fight Modern Slavery, which is widely credited as a catalyst for the UK Modern Slavery Act of 2015. He also advised on the development of that Act, including its provisions around transparency in supply chains. For his work, he was awarded the Order of the British Empire in 2015.
In his leadership at Unseen, Andrew combines advocacy, direct survivor services, and business engagement. His responsibilities have ranged from grassroots action—like helping set up safe houses—to advising global and UK businesses on forced labour risk, designing training and awareness programs, supporting government policy, and operating helplines that serve tens of thousands of people.
https://www.unseenuk.org/about-us/our-team/our-senior-leadership-team/