VULNERABILITIES RELEVANT FOR COMMERCIAL SEXUAL EXPLOITATION OF CHILDREN/DOMESTIC MINOR SEX TRAFFICKING: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW OF RISK FACTORS (2019)
The commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) and domestic minor sex trafficking (DMST) occur across the United States, violating the rights and health of far too many children and youth. Adequate prevention efforts should seek to understand the factors that make minors vulnerable to sexual exploitation in order to properly design programs to prevent victimization. This review presents the identified risk factors collected via a systematic literature review. Following full-text review, 15 studies were selected for inclusion by meeting the following criteria: original quantitative or qualitative research studies published in English from January 2010 to September 2017 with titles or abstracts that indicated a focus on the risk factors, vulnerabilities, or statistics of CSEC/DMST and a domestic focus on CSEC/DMST (for U.S.-based journals) with findings that did not combine associations between minors and adults in the study. Relevant risk factors and vulnerabilities found in this review include child abuse and maltreatment, caregiver strain, running away or being thrown away, substance use, peer influence, witnessing family violence or criminality, poverty or material need, difficulty in school, conflict with parents, poor mental health or view of self, involvement in child protective services, involvement in juvenile detention or delinquency, early substance use, and prior rape or adolescent sexual victimization.
Citation: Franchino-Olsen, H. (2019) ‘Vulnerabilities Relevant for Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children/Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking: A Systematic Review of Risk Factors’, Trauma, Violence & Abuse, pp. 1-13.
Editorial: Gains and Challenges in the Global Movement for Sex Workers’ Rights (2019)
Over the past two decades, there has been a growing body of excellent academic and community-based literature on sex workers’ lives, work, and organising efforts, and on the harmful effects of anti-trafficking discourses, laws, and policies on diverse sex worker communities. Importantly, a significant portion of this work has been produced by sex workers and sex worker organisations.[1] When we decided to devote this Special Issue of Anti-Trafficking Review to the theme of sex work, we acknowledged this reality. However, we also thought that, given that the discourses, laws, and policies that directly impact sex workers globally are continually changing, the production of new evidence-based research and critical perspectives is constantly needed.
Citation: Lepp, Annalee and Borislav Gerasimov (2019) ‘Editorial: Gains and Challenges in the Global Movement for Sex Workers’ Rights’, Anti-Trafficking Review.
Sex Worker Resistance in the Neoliberal Creative City: An auto/ethnography (2019)
Sex workers are subjects of intrigue in urban and creative economies. Tours of active, deteriorating, or defunct red-light districts draw thousands of tourists every year in multiple municipalities around the world. When cities celebrate significant anniversaries in their histories, local sex worker narratives are often included in arts-based public offerings. When sex workers take up urban space in their day-to-day lives, however, they are criminalised. Urban developers often view sex workers as existing serviceably only as legend. A history of sex work will add allure to an up-and-coming neighbourhood, lending purpose to its reformation into a more appropriately productive space, but the material presence of sex workers in these neighbourhoods is seen as a threat to community wellbeing and property values. This paper considers how sex workers, continuously displaced from environments they have carved out as workspaces, may use the arts to draw attention to these ongoing contradictions. It investigates how sex workers may make visible the idiosyncratic state of providing vitality to a city’s history while simultaneously being excluded from its living present. Most critically, it suggests ways in which sex workers may encourage those involved as producers and consumers of neoliberal urban revitalisation projects to connect these often fatal paradoxes to the laws that criminalise their labour.
LATIN AMERICAN AND CARIBBEAN SEX WORKERS: GAINS AND CHALLENGES IN THE MOVEMENT (2019)
This article challenges the notion that the organised sex worker movement originated in the Global North. Beginning in Havana, Cuba at the end of the nineteenth century, sex workers in the Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) region have been organising for recognition and labour rights. This article focuses on some of the movement’s advances, such as the election of a sex worker to public office in the Dominican Republic, the system where Nicaraguan sex workers act as court-appointed judicial facilitators, the networks of sex worker organisations throughout the region, and cutting-edge media strategies used to claim social and labour rights. Sex workers are using novel strategies designed to disrupt the hegemonic social order; contest the inequalities, discrimination, and injustices experienced by women in the sex trade; provoke critical reflection; and raise the visibility of sex work advocacy. New challenges to the movement include the abolitionist movement, the conflation of all forms of sex work with human trafficking, and practices that seek to ‘rescue’ consenting adults from the sex trade.
The Philippine Sex Workers Collective: Struggling to be heard, not saved (2019)
Sex Work, Migration, and Human Trafficking in South Africa: From polarised arguments to potential partnerships (2019)
In South Africa, the conflation of sex work with human trafficking means that migrant/mobile sex workers are often framed as victims of trafficking while arguments for the decriminalisation of sex work are discounted due to claims about the risks of increased trafficking. This is despite the lack of clear evidence that trafficking, including in the sex industry, is a widespread problem. Sex worker organisations have called for an evidence-based approach whereby migration, sex work, and trafficking are distinguished and the debate moves beyond the polarised divisions over sex work. This paper takes up this argument by drawing on research with sex workers and a sex worker organisation in South Africa, as well as reflections shared at two Sex Workers’ Anti-trafficking Research Symposiums. In so doing, the authors propose the further development of a Sex Work, Exploitation, and Migration/Mobility Model that takes into consideration the complexities of the quotidian experiences of migration and selling sex. This, we suggest, could enable a more effective and productive partnership between sex worker organisations and other stakeholder groups, including anti-trafficking and labour rights organisations, trade unions, and others to protect the rights and well-being of all those involved in sex work.
BUTTERFLY: RESISTING THE HARMS OF ANTI-TRAFFICKING POLICIES AND FOSTERING PEER-BASED ORGANISING IN CANADA (2019)
Drawing on knowledge gleaned from over four years of community organising and from the ongoing compilation of the experiences of Asian and migrant sex workers in Canada, this article presents a case study of the work of Butterfly, a migrant sex worker-led and sex worker-focused organisation. It explores how Butterfly, through various mediums, has sought to challenge the discourses, laws, and policies that negatively impact Asian and migrant sex workers. It also highlights how the organisation, through its peer-based model and activities and its radical centring of the voices and experiences of Asian and migrant sex workers, is able to more effectively address their everyday realities and struggles. In this way, Butterfly offers a grassroots alternative to the often detrimental prohibitionist and anti-trafficking interventions undertaken by governments, law enforcement, and social service organisations.
Unacceptable Forms of Work in the Thai Sex and Entertainment Industry (2019)
This article examines the working conditions in sex and entertainment work in Thailand using the Unacceptable Forms of Work (UFW) Framework. Criminalisation of sex work and insufficient oversight of labour conditions increase the vulnerability of sex workers to police harassment; prevent sex workers from accessing legal and social protections; and contribute to the decent work deficit in the sector. Protecting the human rights of sex workers and ensuring decent work in the Thai sex and entertainment industry necessarily involves the decriminalisation of sex work; amending labour and social protection laws, policies, and systems to be inclusive of sex workers; and ensuring implementation. Throughout the process of policy change, the involvement of sex workers, their employers, and civil society organisations is crucial.
Of Raids and Returns: Sex work movement, police oppression, and the politics of the ordinary in Sonagachi, India (2019)
Drawing on ethnographic work with Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee (DMSC), a grassroots sex worker organisation in Sonagachi, the iconic red-light district in Kolkata, India, this paper explores the politics of the detritus generated by raids as a form of state violence. While the current literature mainly focuses on its institutional ramifications, this article explores the significance of the raid in its immediate relation to the brothel as a home and a space to collectivise for labour rights. Drawing on atyachar (oppression), the Bengali word sex workers use to depict the violence of raids, I argue that they experience the raid not as a spectacle, but as an ordinary form of violence in contrast to their extraordinary experience of return to rebuild their lives. Return signals both a reclamation of the detritus as well as subversion of the state’s attempt to undermine DMSC’s labour movement.
The ‘Prioritizing Safety for Sex Workers Policy’: A sex worker rights and anti-trafficking initiative (2019)
This article presents a case study of how sex worker and anti-trafficking organisations and activists in San Francisco, California, worked together to develop and pass the ‘Prioritizing Safety for Sex Workers Policy’. This policy, as enacted by the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office and the San Francisco Police Department, creates a legal environment where people can come forward and report to law enforcement when they are a victim of or witness to an array of violent crimes while engaged in sex work, and not be arrested or prosecuted for their involvement in that criminalised behaviour or for any misdemeanour drug offences. The article details how the groups came together and the challenges they faced while developing the policy. The work was fuelled by the recognition that no one wants people in the sex industry to experience violence. That is true whether selling sex is their choice, influenced by their life circumstances, or something they are being forced or coerced to do. The Prioritizing Safety for Sex Workers Policy is a unique example of the way in which sex workers, people who have experienced trafficking, service providers, activists, women’s rights policymakers, the police department, and the District Attorney’s office came together around a common goal.
‘The Problem of Prostitution’: Repressive policies in the name of migration control, public order, and women’s rights in France (2019)
This article focuses on the political debates that led to the adoption of the sex purchase ban (commonly referred to as the Swedish or Nordic model) in France in April 2016. It examines the convergence of French mainstream feminists and traditional neo-abolitionist actors in the fight against prostitution, and its impact on sex workers’ rights and wellbeing. We argue that there is continuity between the effects produced by the ban on soliciting enacted in 2003 and those created by the law penalising clients passed in 2016. In discussing the current repression of sex work in France, we highlight how the construction of the ‘problem of prostitution’ should be seen in light of broader political anxieties over sexism in poor neighbourhoods and immigration control, which justify the national priorities of security and public order.
‘Sex Trafficking’ as Epistemic Violence (2019)
While the American Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act of 2017 (FOSTA) has been heavily criticised by researchers and activists for the harm it inflicts on sex workers, many of these critics nevertheless agree with the Act’s goal of fighting sex trafficking online. This paper, however, argues that in American legal discourse, ‘sex trafficking’ refers not to human trafficking for sexual exploitation, but rather to all forms of sex work. As such, the law’s punitive treatment of sex workers needs to be understood as the law’s purpose, rather than an unfortunate side effect. This paper also demonstrates how the discourse of ‘sex trafficking’ is itself a form of epistemic violence that silences sex workers and leaves them vulnerable to abuse, with FOSTA serving to broaden the scope of this violence. The paper concludes by highlighting ways journalists and academic researchers can avoid becoming complicit in this violence.
The New Virtual Crackdown on Sex Workers’ Rights: Perspectives from the United States (2019)
On 11 April 2018, the Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA) was signed into law in the United States. FOSTA introduced new provisions to amend the Communications Act of 1934 so that websites can be prosecuted if they engage ‘in the promotion or facilitation of prostitution’ or ‘facilitate traffickers in advertising the sale of unlawful sex acts with sex trafficking victims.’ While supporters of the law claim that its aim is to target human traffickers, its text makes no effort to differentiate between trafficking and consensual sex work and it functionally includes websites where workers advertise services or share information, including safety tips.[3] Following the law’s passage—and even before its full implementation—sex workers felt its impact as websites began to eliminate platforms previously used to advertise services. Backpage, an adult advertising website, was pre-emptively seized by the FBI. Other platforms began to censor or remove content related to sex work, including Google, Craigslist, and many online advertising networks. Sex workers in the United States have denounced the passage of FOSTA for reducing workers’ ability to screen clients and ensure safety practices. This paper provides an overview of the findings of a recent survey with sex workers in the United States, details the advent of similar initiatives in other countries, and explores how the legislation conflates trafficking with consensual sex work.
Time to Turn Up the Volume (2019)
I remember my first self-organised donor panel well. It was at the Global Social Change Philanthropy Conference in Washington, DC in 2013. I had just started work as the first coordinator of the Red Umbrella Fund—the newly established fund for and by sex workers. I organised a session that would clarify the distinction between sex work and human trafficking and emphasise the need to fund sex worker organising. We had a strong panel: an awesome sex worker activist, a knowledgeable academic, a passionate service provider, and a committed funder. I was, however, in for a rude awakening: even though the line-up was great, the audience was scarce. I thought to myself, if we can’t even get funders to show up and learn about sex workers’ rights, how will we ever meet the needs of sex worker organisations fighting for their basic human rights?
Anti-trafficking Efforts and Colonial Violence in Canada (2019)
In Responding to Human Trafficking: Dispossession, Colonial Violence, and Resistance among Indigenous and Racialized Women, Julie Kaye offers a critical examination of how Canadian state and non-state actors understand human trafficking and implement anti-trafficking measures. Kaye examines Canada’s anti-trafficking policies and the efforts of non-government organisations (NGOs) through one-on-one interviews and focus group discussions. She demonstrates the way in which this politically charged issue has worked to conceal Canada’s violent colonial history and naturalise the inequalities and structural and material conditions in which trafficking and various forms of violence occur. Kaye argues that trafficking discourses position the colonial state as the saviour and therefore work to reinforce its power.
Human trafficking for sex, labour and domestic servitude: how do key trafficking types compare and what are their predictors? (2019)
Combatting trafficking in human beings is a well-established social policy and crime prevention priority for the twenty-first Century. Human trafficking, as defined in international law, can occur for diverse exploitative purposes. Yet, different forms of trafficking are routinely conflated in research, policy and interventions. Most of the attention to date has been on sex trafficking of women and girls, leaving male victims and other trafficking types comparatively overlooked. In this study, we disentangle differences between key trafficking types using rare individual-level data from the United Kingdom’s central system for identifying trafficking victims. For a sample of 2630 confirmed victims, we compare those trafficked for sex, domestic servitude and other labour across variables relating to victim demographics, the trafficking process and official responses. Having established significant and substantial differences at bivariate level, we use multinomial logistic regression to identify predictors of trafficking type. Overall, our results underline the complexity and diversity of human trafficking and warn against conflating different types. Within a holistic counter-trafficking framework, a more disaggregated and nuanced approach to analysis and intervention is vital in ensuring more finely-targeted responses. This original study has clear lessons for research, policy and practice.
Citation: Cockbain, E. and K. Bowers (2019) ‘Human trafficking for sex, labour and domestic servitude: how do key trafficking types compare and what are their predictors?’, Crime, Law and Social Change, 72(1), pp. 9-34.
COMMERCIAL SEXUAL EXPLOITATION AND SEX TRAFFICKING OF CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS: A NARRATIVE REVIEW (2017)
A growing body of research addresses the issue of “commercial sexual exploitation of children” (CSEC) and “child sex trafficking.” These overlapping terms describe crimes of a sexual nature committed against children and adolescents that involve exploitation for financial or other gain. Existing literature demonstrates that commercially sexually exploited youth typically experience significant and ongoing trauma. The literature teaches that these youths have a unique set of health risks, including violence-related injuries, sexually transmitted infections, unwanted pregnancy, and a variety of mental health problems. Though federal law defines these youth as victims of human trafficking, in many states, commercially sexually exploited children and adolescents are incarcerated for crimes related to their exploitation. Fear of incarceration can prevent victims from seeking available services. While health care providers may play a critical role in connecting commercially sexually exploited youth with community resources, most providers lack the knowledge of human trafficking necessary to fulfill this role effectively. Published research about this vulnerable pediatric population, although rapidly growing, is still extremely limited. Further research into the prevention, identification, intervention, and multidisciplinary management of CSEC and sex trafficking of children and adolescents is needed.
Citation: Barnert, E., Z. Iqbal, J. Bruce, A. Anoshiravani, G. Kolhatkar and J. Greenbaum (2017) ‘Commercial Sexual Exploitation and Sex Trafficking of Children and Adolescents: A Narrative Review’, Academic Pediatrics.
CONFRONTING COMMERCIAL SEXUAL EXPLOITATION AND SEX TRAFFICKING OF MINORS IN THE UNITED STATES (2013)
Commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking of minors in the United States are commonly overlooked, misunderstood, and unaddressed forms of child abuse. Their consequences are far-reaching. Despite the gravity of commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking of minors in the United States, moreover, few professionals and systems responsible for protecting and serving children and adolescents are adequately prepared to prevent, identify, and respond to these problems. Although a modest amount of research and noteworthy practices and programs have emerged, far more needs to be known before it will be possible to adequately understand and respond to commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking of minors in the United States. This report is designed to provide a more complete picture of the problems by connecting the dots between more established fields of research and practice and the emerging body of work on commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking of minors in the United States. This report also aims to provide the scientific underpinnings for future practice, policy, and research efforts and help raise awareness and encourage action on problems of national importance with serious health and safety implications. The report identifies opportunities—through the expansion and enhancement of current efforts and the introduction of new strategies—to advance understanding of and improve the nation’s response to commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking of minors.
Citation: Clayton, E.W., R.D. Krugman and P. Simon (Eds.) (2013) Confronting Commercial Sexual Exploitation and Sex Trafficking of Minors in the United States. United States: Committee on the Commercial Sexual Exploitation and Sex Trafficking of Minors in the United States.
AND BOYS TOO: AN ECPAT-USA DISCUSSION PAPER ABOUT THE LACK OF RECOGNITION OF THE COMMERCIAL SEXUAL EXPLOITATION OF BOYS IN THE UNITED STATES (2013)
While awareness of commercial sexual exploitation of boys (CSEB) has paled next to that of commercial sexual exploitation of girls (CSEG), two important studies in the past 12 years, (Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children in the U.S., Canada and Mexico and The Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children in New York City), have estimated that high percentages of commercially sexually exploited children in the U.S. are boys. This study examines available information about CSEB, their participation in CSEC, and services available to them. It is based on desk reviews, supplemented by interviews with 40 key service providers and youth agencies. The research explored several questions relating to the existence and circumstances of CSEB including about their backgrounds and experiences, their exploiters, their needs and what services are available to meet those needs. Although many of the answers were inconclusive, several clear findings and messages stood out. Most significantly, responses from service providers clearly indicate that the scope of CSEB is vastly under reported, that commercial sexual exploitation poses very significant risks to their health and their lives; that gay and transgenders are over-represented as a proportion of the sexually exploited boys; and that there is a shortage of services for these boys. The fact that boys and young men may be less likely to be pimped or trafficked highlights the fact that even if there is no third party involved in the commercial transaction, “buyers/exploiters” of sexually exploited children should be prosecuted under anti-trafficking statutes. ECPAT-USA recommends to raise awareness about the scope of CSEB and to expand research about which boys are vulnerable to sexual exploitation and how to meet their needs.
Citation: Friedman, S.A. (2013) And Boys Too: An ECPAT-USA discussion paper about the lack of recognition of the commercial sexual exploitation of boys in the United States. United States: ECPAT.
HUMAN TRAFFICKING OF YOUNG WOMEN AND GIRLS FOR SEXUAL EXPLOITATION IN SOUTH AFRICA (2012)
This paper illustrates the plight of victims of human trafficking for involuntary prostitution. A theoretical framework to elucidate the vulnerability of young women and girls to human trafficking is provided, particularly within the socio-economic and socio-cultural context within which human trafficking in South Africa occurs. South African responses to human trafficking are identified, taking into account the fact that the relevant legislation has not yet been passed into law, because certain social and legal politics are preventing the rapid processing of this law. A strategy or policy that could effectively reduce the human trafficking of young women and girls for sexual exploitation in South Africa is proposed.
Citation: Lutya, T.M. (2012) Human Trafficking of Young Women and Girls for Sexual Exploitation in South Africa. INTECH.
AN EXPLORATORY MODEL OF GIRL’S VULNERABILITY TO COMMERCIAL SEXUAL EXPLOITATION IN PROSTITUTION’, CHILD MALTREATMENT (2011)
Due to inaccessibility of child victims of commercial sexual exploitation, the majority of emergent research on the problem lacks theoretical framing or sufficient data for quantitative analysis. Drawing from Agnew’s general strain theory, this study utilized structural equation modeling to explore: whether caregiver strain is linked to child maltreatment, if experiencing maltreatment is associated with risk-inflating behaviors or sexual denigration of self/others, and if these behavioral and psychosocial dysfunctions are related to vulnerability to commercial sexual exploitation. The proposed model was tested with data from174 predominately African American women, 12% of whom indicated involvement in prostitution while a minor. Findings revealed child maltreatment worsened with increased caregiver strain. Experiencing child maltreatment was linked to running away, initiating substance use at earlier ages, and higher levels of sexual denigration of self/others. Sexual denigration of self/others was significantly related to the likelihood of prostitution as a minor. The network of variables in the model accounted for 34% of the variance in prostitution as a minor.
Citation: Reid, J.A. (2011) ‘An Exploratory Model of Girl’s Vulnerability to Commercial Sexual Exploitation in Prostitution’, Child Maltreatment, 16(2), pp. 146-157.
TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS TO EUROPE FOR SEXUAL EXPLOITATION (2010)
This chapter is extracted from the UNODC report: The Globalization of Crime — A Transnational Organized Crime Threat Assessment. This chapter focuses on trafficking in persons to Europe for sexual exploitation and presents data on the profile of trafficking victims, how they were trafficked and profiles of traffickers.
Citation: UNODC (2010) Trafficking in Persons to Europe for sexual exploitation. Vienna, Austria: United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.
EVIDENCE ON WOMEN TRAFFICKED FOR SEXUAL EXPLOITATION. A RIGHTS BASED ANALYSIS (2007)
This paper investigates which factors influence the pattern of enforcement (violation) of basic rights among women trafficked for sexual exploitation. A conceptual framework is adopted where the degree of agency and the possibility to influence the terms of sex-based transactions are seen as conditional on the enforcement of some basic rights. Using IOM data on women assisted in exiting from trafficking for sexual exploitation, we investigate the enforcement (violation) of five uncompromisable rights, namely the right to physical integrity, to move freely, to have access to medical care, to use condoms, and to exercise choice over sexual services. By combining classification trees analysis and ordered probit estimation we find that working location and country of work are the main determinants of rights enforcement, while individual and family characteristics play a marginal role. Specifically, we find that (i) in lower market segments working on the street is comparatively less ‘at risk’ of rights violation; (ii) there is no consistently ‘good’ or ‘bad’ country of work, but public awareness on trafficking within the country is important; (iii) the strength of organized crime in the country of work matters only in conjunction with other local factors, and (iv) being trafficked within one’s country, as opposed to being trafficked internationally, is associated with higher risk of rights violation.
Citation: Bettio, F. and T.K. Nandi (2007) ‘Evidence on women trafficked for sexual exploitation. A rights based analysis’, European Journal of Law and Economics, 29(543).
GENDER, TRAFFICKING, AND SLAVERY (2002)
This publication highlights different understandings of the issues, the incentives to migrate, the realities that trafficked persons confront, and the inherent complexities in dealing with the outcomes. It emphasises the need for a multitude of multi-agency responses that incorporate human rights considerations and tackle poverty and unequal gender relations. The books in Oxfam’s Focus on Gender series were originally published as single issues of the journal Gender and Development.
Williams, S. and R. Masika (Eds.) (2002) Gender, Trafficking, and Slavery. United Kingdom: Oxfam GB.