The book describes and reveals how indigenous peoples suffer from slavery often in the shape of debt bondage and prostitution. The cases discussed cover indigenous peoples in India, Nepal, Taiwan/China, the Philippines and Indonesia in Asia. In South America cases from Peru, Bolivia and Paraguay are revealed.

The enslaved peoples are often tropical rainforest dwellers or mountain hill tribes. In the opening chapter the actual slavery of the 1990s is brought in a historical perspective, as the editors relate the slavery of indigenous peoples today to the general history of slavery and the history of Anti-Slavery International.

The numerous case histories shed light on the mechanisms and consequences of contemporary slavery in the modern world.