scholarly journals The Sexual Politics of Anti-Trafficking Discourse

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Prabha Kotiswaran
Keyword(s):  
Sex Work ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
Sexual Politics ◽  
Global South ◽  
International Organisations ◽  
Swedish Model ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
Forced Labour ◽  
Palermo Protocol ◽  
Sexual Services

Abstract20 years since the negotiation of the Palermo Protocol on Trafficking in 2000, the anti-trafficking field has gone from an early, almost exclusive preoccupation with sex work to addressing extreme exploitation in a range of labour sectors. While this might suggest a reduced focus on the nature of the work performed and a greater focus on the conditions under which it is performed, in reality, anti-trafficking discourse remains in the grip of polarised positions on sex work even as the carceral effects of anti-trafficking law become evident and the Swedish model of criminalising the purchase of sexual services spreads. In this article, I demonstrate how despite the recent discursive shifts to ‘modern slavery’ and ‘forced labour’, the anti-trafficking transnational legal order itself reinforces, rather than diffuses cultures of sex work exceptionalism. The growing international sex workers’ movement has offered resistance, yet a closer look at the movement and the widespread support that it has garnered for decriminalisation from international organisations, while valuable, helps reveal the greatest cost yet of anti-trafficking discourse, namely, the inability of the sex workers’ movement to produce a sophisticated theory of regulation to reduce levels of exploitation within sex work, one which is commensurate with the informality and heterogeneity of sex markets the world over. Finally, to the extent that neoabolitionist projects derive legitimacy from interventions abroad, especially in the global South, I chronicle the edifice on which it rests in one such context, namely India, to demonstrate how countries in the global South are not merely conduits for the global North’s preoccupation with moral gentrification through neo-abolitionism, but rather, that the circuits of global governmentality while influential, are highly contingent, thus producing opportunities for creative forms of mobilisation by sex workers.

scholarly journals The Double-Edged Sword of Health and Safety: COVID-19 and the Policing and Exclusion of Migrant Asian Massage Workers in North America

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (5) ◽  
pp. 157
Author(s):  
Elene Lam ◽  
Elena Shih ◽  
Katherine Chin ◽  
Kate Zen
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
Social Welfare ◽  
Human Trafficking ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
Interpersonal Violence ◽  
Sex Trafficking ◽  
The State ◽  
Emergency Relief ◽  
Sexual Services

Migrant Asian massage workers in North America first experienced the impacts of COVID-19 in the final weeks of January 2020, when business dropped drastically due to widespread xenophobic fears that the virus was concentrated in Chinese diasporic communities. The sustained economic devastation, which began at least 8 weeks prior to the first social distancing and shelter in place orders issued in the U.S. and Canada, has been further complicated by a history of aggressive policing of migrant massage workers in the wake of the war against human trafficking. Migrant Asian massage businesses are increasingly policed as locales of potential illicit sex work and human trafficking, as police and anti-trafficking initiatives target migrant Asian massage workers despite the fact that most do not provide sexual services. The scapegoating of migrant Asian massage workers and criminalization of sex work have led to devastating systemic and interpersonal violence, including numerous deportations, arrests, and deaths, most notably the recent murder of eight people at three Atlanta-based spas. The policing of sex workers has historically been mobilized along fears of sexually transmitted disease and infection, and more recently, within the past two decades, around a moral panic against sex trafficking. New racial anxieties around the coronavirus as an Asian disease have been mobilized by the state to further cement the justification of policing Asian migrant workers along the axes of health, migration, and sexual labor. These justifications also solidify discriminatory social welfare regimes that exclude Asian migrant massage workers from accessing services on the basis of the informality and illegality of their work mixed with their precarious citizenship status. This paper draws from ethnographic participant observation and survey data collected by two sex worker organizations that work primarily with massage workers in Toronto and New York City to examine the double-edged sword of policing during the pandemic in the name of anti-trafficking coupled with exclusionary policies regarding emergency relief and social welfare, and its effects on migrant Asian massage workers in North America. Although not all migrant Asian massage workers, including those surveyed in this paper, provide sexual services, they are conflated, targeted, and treated as such by the state and therefore face similar barriers of criminalization, discrimination, and exclusion. This paper recognizes that most migrant Asian massage workers do not identify as sex workers and does not intend to label them as such or reproduce the scapegoating rhetoric used by law enforcement. Rather, it seeks to analyze how exclusionary attitudes and policies towards sex workers are transferred onto migrant Asian massage workers as well whether or not they provide sexual services.

scholarly journals Utilising ‘modern slave’ narratives in social policy research

2019 ◽  
Vol 40 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-49
Author(s):  
Coretta Phillips
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Policy Research ◽  
Secondary Analysis ◽  
Slave Narratives ◽  
Limited Attention ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
Narrative Interview ◽  
Forced Labour

Modern slavery has received somewhat limited attention in social policy. Partially responding to this gap, while acknowledging the contested nature of the term ‘modern slavery’, this article makes the case for the primary and secondary analysis of ‘slave narratives’ which provide experiential and agential accounts by those directly harmed by forced labour, coerced sex work and other forms of exploitation. Analysis of a narrative interview with Sean, a (citizen-)victim of forced labour proved under s.71 of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009, demonstrates the multifaceted nature of labour exploitation and its multiple, severe and long-lasting harms. That the form and structure of Sean’s narrative of forced labour resembles those used in the abolitionist cause against antebellum slavery points to a certain timeless essence to forced labour exploitation. The article concludes with implications for intervention.

scholarly journals Sex Work and the City

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 6-13
Author(s):  
Helen Roitberg
Keyword(s):  
Sex Work ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
Sexual Exploitation ◽  
State Regulation ◽  
Indigenous Women ◽  
Women's Bodies ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Sexual Services ◽  
The City ◽  
Ongoing Project

Bill C-36, or the Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act, which was introduced in Canada in 2014, made the purchase of sexual services illegal. To the end of eliminating sex work, Bill C-36 rests on the premise that sex work is inherently exploitative, and that sex workers and their communities are harmed by the exchange of sexual services. Considering that Indigenous women are overrepresented among sex workers and disproportionately victims of severe violence, this paper examines the goals of Bill C-36 in conversation with Canada’s ongoing project of colonialism. This paper demonstrates that Bill C-36 upholds the systemic devaluation of Indigeneity by which Indigenous women’s bodies are rendered deserving of violence, and by which this violence is normalized and invisibilized. Rather than protect ‘victims’ of sexual exploitation, Bill C-36 relies on the colonial stereotypes of the Indigenous prostitute to reimagine sexually autonomous Indigenous women as inherent threats to (white) Canadian society and themselves, and thereby justify state regulation in both public and private spaces.

scholarly journals (Re)Conceptualising Unfree Labour: Local Labour Control Regimes and Constraints on Workers' Freedoms

2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Judy Fudge
Keyword(s):  
Key Words ◽  
Human Trafficking ◽  
International Organisations ◽  
Multifaceted Approach ◽  
Modern Slavery ◽  
Local Labour ◽  
Growing Body ◽  
Forced Labour ◽  
Labour Power ◽  
Control Regime

Disputes over the meaning of human trafficking, forced labour and modern slavery have both provoked and coincided with a reinvigorated debate in academic and policy literatures about how to conceptualise unfree labour. This article traces the contours of the debate over free and unfree labour, identifying its key stakes as the debate has developed and paying particular attention to recent interventions. It begins by identifying a problem common to both canonical liberal and Marxian approaches to the free/unfree labour distinction, which is to fetishise the labour market. It then discusses the consensus that is emerging across disciplines and in leading international organisations that labour unfreedom in contemporary capitalism is best conceptualised as a continuum rather than a binary, highlighting recent disciplinary-specific contributions. It argues that the metaphor of a continuum of labour unfreedom obscures more than it illuminates. Drawing upon the growing body of literature that advocates a multifaceted approach to labour unfreedom, this article argues that a robust concept of local labour control regime does a much better job of capturing the complex mix of consent and coercion involved in extracting value from labour power than the idea of a continuum of labour unfreedom.  KEY WORDS: unfree labour; migration; capitalism; exploitation; labour control

Prostitution and sex work

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Teela Sanders ◽  
Barbara G. Brents
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Sexual Behaviour ◽  
Sex Trafficking ◽  
Sex Industry ◽  
Swedish Model ◽  
Global Trend ◽  
Male Client ◽  
Sexual Services ◽  
Sex Wars

This essay discusses the debates about prostitution and sex work in relation to the ‘sex wars’ paradigm, posing questions about its theoretical usefulness in addressing the regulation of commercial sexual activity between adults. The authors map the global trend in accepting the ‘Swedish model’ for managing the sex industry, noting the problems that have resulted with the turn to criminalization that many Western countries have taken in recent years. This ‘turn’ has been influenced significantly by myths about sex trafficking and the belief that all commercial sex is in some ways forced, coerced, or exploitative. The authors discuss the discourses that frame the male client as the ‘offender’ and the female as the ‘victim and offender’. The consequences are reviewed both for individuals engaging in sexual services and for contemporary feminist debates. The human rights perspective can offer useful insights for understanding and regulating sexual behaviour.

Sex work abolitionism and hegemonic feminisms: Implications for gender-diverse sex workers and migrants from Brazil

2020 ◽  
Vol 68 (4) ◽  
pp. 852-869
Author(s):  
Lua da Mota Stabile
Keyword(s):  
Sex Work ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
Global South ◽  
Radical Feminism ◽  
Trafficking In Persons ◽  
Gender Diverse ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Decolonial Feminism ◽  
Brazilian Case

This article investigates and analyses the main characteristics and issues involving Western hegemonic feminisms, especially so-called ‘radical feminism’, on the topic of sex work and trafficking in persons/migration, to understand how these discussions have influenced the main conventions, regulations and legislation on this global subject. In particular, it enables understanding of how these regulations invisibilize and, sometimes, criminalize trans* and gender-diverse people in migratory contexts. The contributions to decolonial feminism and transfeminism made by decolonial trans writers are essential to analyse and critique some of the conceptions espoused by Western hegemonic and especially trans-exclusionary feminisms that have influenced the international anti-trafficking and anti-prostitution discourse today. These discourses often affect the voluntary migration of trans* and gender-diverse sex workers, mainly from the Global South, such as in the Brazilian case.

“I Have My Own Room on 139th Street”

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
LaShawn Harris
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Black Women ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
Black Communities ◽  
Socioeconomic Conditions ◽  
Personal Lives ◽  
Sexual Labor ◽  
Sexual Services

This chapter explores black women's multilayered roles within New York's sex commerce, moving beyond widely accepted historical interpretations that position black sex laborers primarily as street solicitors. Identifying black women as madam-prostitutes, casual prostitutes, and sex-house proprietors and entrepreneurs, this chapter addresses the difficulties of documenting sex work within black communities, the broad socioeconomic conditions and personal circumstances outlining black women's entrance into the urban sexual economy, and the occupational benefits of indoor prostitution. In an attempt to avoid or limit their presence on New York streets, black sex workers—when the opportunity arose—sold and performed sexual services in furnished rooms and hotels, in their own homes, in massage parlors and nightclubs, and in other legitimate and illegitimate commercial businesses. Furthermore, indoor and residential sexual labor was significant to sex laborers' working and personal lives.

scholarly journals Justice and Civil Liberties on Sex Work in Contemporary International Human Rights Law

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 4
Author(s):  
Belinda Brooks-Gordon ◽  
Marjan Wijers ◽  
Alison Jobe
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
Sex Trafficking ◽  
Civil Liberties ◽  
Adult Women ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Policy Problem ◽  
International Consultation ◽  
Forced Labour

To fulfil obligations in international law State parties have to take the issue of human trafficking seriously. The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) provides General Recommendations (GR) to member states on the interpretation of the Women’s Convention. In 2018 the CEDAW Committee started to develop a GR on trafficking in women and girls in a process planned to conclude in 2020. The first stage towards this was through the publication of a Concept Note to serve as a basis for dialogue during the two-year international consultation period. The Concept Note is a vital link in a textual chain because it frames the policy problem and actively constructs its own ‘documentary reality’. This article provides a critical analysis of the CEDAW Concept Note on the grounds that such analysis provides an understanding of its discursive construction of trafficking, migrant labour and sex work, by an institution responsible for international jurisprudence on human rights. Analysis of the Concept Note explores the documentary constructions including narratives that merge adult women with girls, the symbolism of exploitation, the silencing of scientific research, the elision of sex worker voices, and sex work as work. The analysis leads us to conclude that the General Recommendation should define what counts as ‘exploitation’, and ‘forced labour’, and address the growing international recognition of best evidence on the wider impact of sex work laws, in order that legal framing and constructions of sex trafficking are not erroneously used to curtail rights of sex workers.

scholarly journals Hustling the Platform

2021 ◽  
Vol 120 (3) ◽  
pp. 533-551
Author(s):  
Kate Hardy ◽  
Camille Barbagallo
Keyword(s):  
United Kingdom ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
Risky Behaviors ◽  
Sex Industry ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Power And Control ◽  
Security Checks ◽  
Sexual Services ◽  
And Control

An increasing amount of sex work in the United Kingdom is now digitally mediated, as workers and clients identify each other, agree prices and services, undertake security checks, and often make payment through various platforms and websites. Existing accounts of “digital sex work” have been both overly technological deterministic and optimistic, largely invisibilizing capital and the new forms of power and control it enables. The authors argue that the dominant platform for digital sex work in the United Kingdom, AdultWork, is reshaping the market in direct sexual services, driving down standards and prices, and normalizing risky behaviors. The article posits that these changes in the sex industry are symptomatic and reflective of wider shifts in labor-capital relations and technology and therefore argues that bringing research on platform work and sex work into closer dialogue is mutually productive. Studies of digital sex work would benefit from critical insights into power and control in platform work, while scholars of platform work—and of work and employment more generally—have much to learn from paying attention to the gendered labor of sex workers. In particular, resistance and collective organizing among sex workers, some of the most marginalized workers in contemporary capitalism, can suggest wider strategies of labor resistance and transformation in platform work and beyond.

scholarly journals Female Sex Work Dynamics: Empowerment, Mobilization, Mobility

2021 ◽  
pp. 43-60
Author(s):  
Saroj Pachauri ◽  
Ash Pachauri ◽  
Komal Mittal
Keyword(s):  
High Risk ◽  
Health Services ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Sex Workers ◽  
Reproductive Health Services ◽  
Services Research ◽  
Multiple Partners ◽  
Nations Programme ◽  
United Nations Programme ◽  
Sexual Services

AbstractUNAIDS defines sex work as selling sexual services (Ditmore in Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS. UNAIDS, 2008, [1]). Sex workers involved in sexual relations with multiple partners are a key group of women who need access to comprehensive sexual health services, including HIV prevention, treatment, and care (Lafort et al. in Reproductive health services for populations at high risk of HIV: performance of a night clinic in Tete province, Mozambique. BMC Health Services Research, 2010, [2]). There are a broad range of sex workers in various locations including those who are street-based and brothel-based, those who work as escorts, and those who work from their own homes.

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