The Concept of Exploitation

In its broadest sense, transactional/micro-level exploitation involves an agent, A, taking unfair

advantage of another agent, B. Taking unfair advantage, in turn, can be understood in two ways.
First, it can refer to some dimension of the outcome of the exploitative act or transaction. In
this case, we say that the transaction is substantively unfair. Second, to say that A takes unfair
advantage of B may imply that there is some sort of defect in the process by which the unfair
outcome has come about, for example, that A has coerced B or defrauded B or has manipulated
B. In this case, we say that the transaction is procedurally unfair.