Public discourse on scam labour systems is often framed in binary terms: perpetrators versus victims, traffickers versus the trafficked, coercion versus innocence. This publication examines the limits of that framing. Drawing on first-hand testimony authored by Lu Xiang Ri, a survivor of forced labour in Cambodia, it describes scam labour systems as socially and economically embedded environments rather than morally uniform spaces.

Based on lived experience inside scam centres, the account makes clear that individuals within these systems are not homogeneous. Not all workers are forcibly detained, and not all participants are “good people” acting solely under duress. Some individuals enter knowingly, some remain by choice, some participate opportunistically, and others become complicit over time. Coercion is present, but it operates alongside consent, adaptation, ambition, fear, and moral compromise.

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The publication situates recruitment into scam labour within broader socio-economic pressures. Many individuals leave their hometowns due to debt, unemployment, family obligation, or lack of viable opportunity. In such contexts, migration through informal or smuggling routes is often perceived as low-risk or consequence-free. Cambodia’s scam economy does not rely solely on force; it is sustained by these structural push factors, weak deterrence, and the absence of meaningful accountability along recruitment and transit pathways.

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By presenting an insider perspective that refuses moral simplification, this work adds texture to prevailing narratives of forced labour. It shows how exclusive reliance on trafficking frameworks obscures the mixed motivations and incentive structures that sustain scam labour systems in practice.

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This publication does not seek to absolve wrongdoing or deny abuse. Its purpose is to describe the system as it is experienced from within, and to make visible the conditions under which exploitation, participation, and survival coexist.