Watch & Learn
Webinar Recordings
Missed a session? Catch up here. Each webinar is a free, open conversation about the systems behind human trafficking.
⚠ Content advisory: These webinars address human trafficking, including topics of grooming, coercion, exploitation, and trauma. Some content may be difficult for survivors or those with related experiences. Please engage at your own pace.
Past Sessions
The Beginning: How We Got Here and Where We're Headed
Historical roots of human trafficking and the foundational labor case.
- ⊙Historical roots of human trafficking — from early labor exploitation to modern-day systems
- ⊙The foundational labor case that shaped how trafficking is understood today
- ⊙Why a year-long series is needed to address trafficking as a whole system
- ⊙Introduction to the three-act storytelling arc: Seeing, Understanding, Acting
The Ecosystem Revealed
Trafficking as an interconnected system across industries and institutions.
- ⊙Human trafficking as a system of connected parts — people, institutions, industries, and everyday choices
- ⊙Four core drivers that sustain the system: fear, pleasure, greed, and power
- ⊙How stress, poverty, and unstable conditions increase vulnerability
- ⊙Transportation systems as enablers of movement at scale
- ⊙The concept of moral dissonance — what society condemns vs. what it tolerates
Movement: People, Goods, and Opportunity
Transportation as an invisible thread — and leverage point — for prevention, protection, prosecution, and partnership.
- ⊙Transportation as system infrastructure — trafficking moves through everyday networks
- ⊙Exploitation in motion: when vehicles become settings for harm
- ⊙Opportunities for detection within transportation environments
- ⊙Featured contributors: Erika Keaveney (Freedom Insight) and Ted Greenfield (Invisible Angels)
The Lure: Psychology of Recruitment
Inside the mindset of a trafficker — grooming, coercion, and control.
- ⊙Human trafficking begins with influence, not force
- ⊙Stages of grooming: recruitment, trust-building, dependency, isolation, control
- ⊙How these dynamics operate in everyday environments — campuses, communities, transportation
- ⊙The Pattern Recognition Framework: from recruitment to control
Vulnerability
Socio-economic conditions that traffickers exploit.
- ⊙Socio-economic conditions that create vulnerability to trafficking
- ⊙How poverty, instability, and systemic inequity are exploited by traffickers
- ⊙The intersection of vulnerability and drift — unconscious patterns that increase risk
- ⊙Community-level factors that either protect or expose individuals
- ⊙What prevention looks like when we address root causes, not just symptoms
The Hidden Wounds
Mental health impacts and survivor-centered healing.
- ⊙Mental health impacts of trafficking on survivors
- ⊙Survivor-centered healing approaches and frameworks
- ⊙Understanding the invisible scars that trafficking leaves behind
- ⊙The role of trauma-informed care in recovery and resilience
Understanding Traffickers and the Cycle of Harm
Examining the other side of the equation — understanding traffickers, their motivations, and the cycles of harm that sustain exploitation.
- ⊙Understanding trafficker motivations, psychology, and patterns of behavior
- ⊙The cycle of harm — how exploitation is initiated, sustained, and normalized
- ⊙How traffickers identify, target, and maintain control over victims
- ⊙Breaking the cycle: what research tells us about effective intervention points
- ⊙Community and systemic responses that disrupt trafficking operations
Following the Money: Where Intervention Can Occur Across Systems
The economics, demand, and profit structures behind human trafficking — and the financial pressure points that can disrupt them. Featuring panelists Dora Ramirez, Derek Marsh, and Paul Chang.
- ⊙How financial dependence becomes psychological power — and how exploiters use money as a weapon of control
- ⊙The conditions that create vulnerability: poverty, immigration status, trauma bonding, and lack of resources
- ⊙How investigators identify the broader infrastructure behind trafficking — recruitment, movement, and financial channels
- ⊙Following the money: what financial evidence reveals about trafficking networks, and how AML tools and FinCEN data can expose them
- ⊙Why labor trafficking is systematically underpursued — and how legitimate businesses become part of the ecosystem
- ⊙The strongest intervention points in labor markets, regulatory systems, and employer accountability
- ⊙What must change: one belief to release and one action to take to genuinely interrupt cycles of exploitation
Next Session
September 23, 2026 — 2:00 PM PST
ACT III — Choosing to Act, Disrupt & Respond · Months 9–12
Detection and Disruption
From awareness to responsibility and regeneration. This session opens Act III of the series — moving from understanding the system to actively choosing to disrupt it.
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