Introduction Open Access
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Published:September 2024
The introduction presents the book’s central concept, the “banality of good,” drawing on Hannah Arendt’s use of banality to refer to a rote thoughtlessness in political life and situating the concept in relation to other work on structural violence and bureaucratic governance. It then outlines the book’s ethnographic approach to the everyday practice of global governance. It offers historical context for Japan’s involvement in the UN-sponsored global counter–human trafficking campaign and the structural vulnerability of Filipina migrants working in Japan’s sex industry, who are the primary group assisted through Japan’s efforts. The introduction outlines the emergence and limitations of a globalized institutional approach to human rights more broadly and human trafficking specifically.