this is a great addendum to the other comments about the regularity of this: it’s not entirely racism or from the ‘host’ country, the ship owners also don’t want their labor force escaping from phenomenally oppressive and dangerous conditions that exist on board. you let sailors off in port you traditionally lose some, and in neoliberal cost-cutting environments it’s even more essential to retain labor now as there’s less surplus replacements available.
Company owners aren’t really afraid of that. By law all sailors are allowed to cancel their contract at any time, after which they have to be left in the nearest port. Stowaways aren’t covered by this because they’re not hired as sailors. They’re not hired at all. The labour they can do is usually menial due to a mix of factors - They won’t have the technical know-how to do a lot of advanced stuff, they might have difficulty communicating, there’s trust issues and a ship is already crewed to fulfill the tasks it needs to do - Though always as sparsely as possible. This means if there’s suddenly an extra set of hands they’ll mainly be cooking and cleaning, which is essential, but there’s already people doing that, so the cooking and cleaning will just be better, which is nice, but capitalists don’t care about that.
Even if the free labour a stowaway provides was skilled it’s not really common enough for this to be something the company owners rely on or even care about (in terms of labor costs). Even if it were common the company owners would still hate stowaways because they are an expense for every ship they’re on, even if they’re made to work for free. There’s an incredible amount of paperwork attached to having a stowaway, and a lot of places won’t even let you dock if you have one. Suddenly your cargoship can’t gain access to a habour, it can’t unload, it can’t reload, your profits are fucked, all because you wanted to keep an indentured servant on board. You can’t kick them off the ship either, because now they’re registered as being on your ship, so if they suddenly disappear people are going to ask questions. Now if the stowaway had disappeared before anyone had reported a stowaway?.. Well then that’s just the cost of doing business. But once they’re registered you’re on the hook.
Countries won’t let your ship dock because they’re afraid the filthy undocumented person on board (who is almost assuredly from some horrible third world country yuck!) might leave the ship and go into the sea.
Capitalists hate stowaways because they cost them money. Sailors dislike the hassle that’s attached to having a stowaway. The hassle is bureaucracy. The bureaucracy is because people are afraid of undocumented immigrants. This is because of racism.
All the “making the stowaway work” is more something that kind of springs from the crew. You’ve got this guy on board, he’s been on board for a few months. He might as well chip in a bit, right? He can do the laundry or whatever.
That’s what I know about the stowaway culture, but I’m mainly drawing on anecdotes from Scandinavian ships, though all ships have pretty international crews, so I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s not just standard procedure almost everywhere. Cruise ships excluded.
i wasn’t insinuating that all unfree labor on ships is stowaways that have been caught, rather that contingents of the laborforce are not allowed to exercise rights they should have through legal trickery. places go along with it even if their local laws should facilitate a more robust set of rights.
Oh okay then I misunderstood you, my bad! Yeah you’re completely correct, the conditions on board are horrible and exploitative, especially for workers from the global south
this is a great addendum to the other comments about the regularity of this: it’s not entirely racism or from the ‘host’ country, the ship owners also don’t want their labor force escaping from phenomenally oppressive and dangerous conditions that exist on board. you let sailors off in port you traditionally lose some, and in neoliberal cost-cutting environments it’s even more essential to retain labor now as there’s less surplus replacements available.
Company owners aren’t really afraid of that. By law all sailors are allowed to cancel their contract at any time, after which they have to be left in the nearest port. Stowaways aren’t covered by this because they’re not hired as sailors. They’re not hired at all. The labour they can do is usually menial due to a mix of factors - They won’t have the technical know-how to do a lot of advanced stuff, they might have difficulty communicating, there’s trust issues and a ship is already crewed to fulfill the tasks it needs to do - Though always as sparsely as possible. This means if there’s suddenly an extra set of hands they’ll mainly be cooking and cleaning, which is essential, but there’s already people doing that, so the cooking and cleaning will just be better, which is nice, but capitalists don’t care about that.
Even if the free labour a stowaway provides was skilled it’s not really common enough for this to be something the company owners rely on or even care about (in terms of labor costs). Even if it were common the company owners would still hate stowaways because they are an expense for every ship they’re on, even if they’re made to work for free. There’s an incredible amount of paperwork attached to having a stowaway, and a lot of places won’t even let you dock if you have one. Suddenly your cargoship can’t gain access to a habour, it can’t unload, it can’t reload, your profits are fucked, all because you wanted to keep an indentured servant on board. You can’t kick them off the ship either, because now they’re registered as being on your ship, so if they suddenly disappear people are going to ask questions. Now if the stowaway had disappeared before anyone had reported a stowaway?.. Well then that’s just the cost of doing business. But once they’re registered you’re on the hook.
Countries won’t let your ship dock because they’re afraid the filthy undocumented person on board (who is almost assuredly from some horrible third world country yuck!) might leave the ship and go into the sea.
Capitalists hate stowaways because they cost them money. Sailors dislike the hassle that’s attached to having a stowaway. The hassle is bureaucracy. The bureaucracy is because people are afraid of undocumented immigrants. This is because of racism.
All the “making the stowaway work” is more something that kind of springs from the crew. You’ve got this guy on board, he’s been on board for a few months. He might as well chip in a bit, right? He can do the laundry or whatever.
That’s what I know about the stowaway culture, but I’m mainly drawing on anecdotes from Scandinavian ships, though all ships have pretty international crews, so I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s not just standard procedure almost everywhere. Cruise ships excluded.
i wasn’t insinuating that all unfree labor on ships is stowaways that have been caught, rather that contingents of the laborforce are not allowed to exercise rights they should have through legal trickery. places go along with it even if their local laws should facilitate a more robust set of rights.
Oh okay then I misunderstood you, my bad! Yeah you’re completely correct, the conditions on board are horrible and exploitative, especially for workers from the global south
Passports stay in the captain’s safe.