Gender, Trafficking, and Slavery

Edited by Rachel Masika

Oxfam Focus on Gender The books in Oxfam's Focus on Gender series were originally published as single issues of the journal Gender and Development, which is published by Oxfam three times a year. It is the only British journal to focus specifically on gender and development issues internationally, to explore the links between gender and development initiatives, and to make the links between theoretical and practical work in this field. For information about subscription rates, please apply to Carfax Publishing, Taylor and Francis Ltd, Customer Services Department, Rankine Road, Basingstoke, Hants RG24 8PR UK; fax: + 44 (0) 1256 330 245. In North America, please apply to Taylor and Francis Inc, Customer Services Department, 325 Chestnut Street, 8th Floor, Philadelphia, PA 19106, USA; fax (+1) 800 8218312. In Australia, please apply to Carfax Publishing Company, PO Box 352, Cammeray, NSW 2062, Australia; fax: +61 (0) 2 9958 2376. E-mail: [email protected] or visit http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the Publisher.

The views expressed in this book are those of the individual contributors, and not necessarily those of the Editors or the Publisher.

Front cover: Children working as bonded labourers in a carpet-weaving shed, Pakistan Photo: Ben Buxton, Oxfam

© Oxfam GB 2002 Published by Oxfam GB, 274 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 7DZ, UK. http://www.oxfam.org.uk/publications Typeset in Palatino by Oxfam; printed by Information Press, Eynsham Oxfam is a registered charity No. 202918 Oxfam GB is a member of Oxfam International ISBN 085598 478 3

This book converted to digital file in 2010 Contents

Editorial 2 Suzanne Williams and Rachel Masika

Crossing borders and building bridges: the Baltic Region Networking Project 10 Carolina Johansson Wennerholm

Who gets to choose? Coercion, consent, and the UN Trafficking Protocol 20 Jo Doezema

Human rights or wrongs? The struggle for a rights-based response to trafficking in human beings 28 Ann D. Jordan

Trafficking in children in West and Central Africa 38 Mike Dottridge

Child marriage and prostitution: two forms of sexual exploitation? 43 Susanne Louis B. Mikhail

Slavery and gender: women's double exploitation 50 Beth Herzfeld

Half-hearted protection: what does victim protection really mean for victims of trafficking in Europe? 56 Elaine Pearson

NGO responses to trafficking in women 60 Marina Tzvetkova

A tale of two cities: shifting the paradigm of anti-trafficking programmes 69 Smarajit Jana, Nandinee Bandyopadhyay, Mrinal Kanti Dutta, and Amitrajit Saha

Reducing poverty and upholding human rights: a pragmatic approach 80 Meena Poudel and Ines Smyth

Resources 87 Compiled by Nittaya Thiraphouth Publications 87 Organisations 92 Electronic resources 94 Videos 94 Conferences 95

This book converted to digital file in 2010 Editorial Suzanne Williams and Rachel Masika

rafficking and slavery are areas of Amongst national and international human experience that are highly organisations seeking to intervene on Tcomplex and which evoke powerful behalf of - or in partnership with - and contradictory feelings amongst those trafficked people there exist deep divisions, attempting to understand them. Slavery on issues of principle, perception, and itself is something we like to consign to the strategy. These divisions relate especially to dark period of colonial history, but it is still, two issues - the fine line between uncomfortably, with us. Today it takes on a trafficking and migration, and the broader and more clandestine range of distinction between 'free' and 'forced' relationships that are less characteristic of prostitution.1 These distinctions have the slave trading of previous centuries. important consequences for the protection Ordinary people are alarmed to discover of the human rights of trafficked persons in that they may be implicated in slavery by receiving countries, and for the free move- becoming part of a commercial chain which ment of people through assisted voluntary exploits the bonded labour of children in migration. This debate is explored in the carpet industry; or by buying chocolate several articles. It is also the case that the produced from cocoa worked by enslaved voices of the women, children, and men labourers in West Africa. who are enslaved, traded, and trafficked, One aspect of modern slavery which and their accounts of their experiences, vary elicits particular revulsion is the trafficking enormously in accordance with differences of women, girls, and boys into the sex in their national context, their societies, and industry, and this is one of the issues upon their expectations of life. As this collection which many of the contributors here focus. will show, there is no single truth here, but This raises the issue of gender discrimination a wide range of different perceptions, and oppression, and the ways in which contexts, and strongly-held convictions. gendered power converges with poverty to However, there are common elements in the drive or lure women and girls into factors which expose people to trafficking situations where they are subjected to and slavery-like practices, which define the extreme forms of violence. It also raises coercion and exploitation that characterises questions about women's agency and these practices, and which form the basis of empowerment, and tests the hypocrisies of strategies to address them. These elements moral judgements and double standards in include inequality and oppression based on relation to women's and men's sexuality gender, age, race and caste, poverty and the and identity. struggle to overcome it, deception, corruption, and greed. Editorial

Over the past 50 years a number of forms of exploitation such as forced international instruments have been created marriage and forced labour, reflected in to deal directly or indirectly with the the Beijing Declaration and Platform for various elements of slavery and trafficking, Action. starting with the Universal Declaration of Finally, in the year 2000, all countries Human Rights (UDHR). The UDHR states signed the UN Convention against in its opening articles that: 'Everyone has the Transnational Organised Crime and its two right to life, liberty and security of person. No protocols. One of the protocols deals one shall be held in slavery and servitude; specifically with trafficking in persons - the slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish all their forms.' (Human Rights Web 1997, Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women Articles 3 and 4) The Convention against and Children. The Protocol provides the Torture, the Convention on the Rights of the first international definition of trafficking. Child, the Convention On The Elimination This definition broadens that of the 1949 Of All Forms Of Discrimination Against Convention, which set prostitution at the Women (CEDAW), and the Declaration on heart of trafficking, and bound states the Elimination of Violence against Women parties to 'take all necessary measures to all attempt to state and regulate the rights repeal or abolish any law, regulation or and duties of human beings, as individuals administrative provisions by virtue of and in society. The 1926 Slavery Convention which persons who are engaged in, or are was supplemented in 1956 by the suspected of engaging in, prostitution are Supplementary Convention on the Abolition subject either to special registration or to of Slavery and the Slave Trade and the possession of a special document or to Institutions and Practices Similar to Slavery, any exceptional requirements for and expanded the definition of slavery to supervision or notification'. Advocates of those acts having the same effects as this 'abolitionist' system emphasise slavery, such as debt bondage, serfdom, effective legislation against illicit traffic and and exploitation of the labour of women exploitation of the traffic of others, drafted and children. to preclude traffickers and profiteers from The 1949 Convention for the circumventing them and escaping punish- Suppression of the Trafficking in Persons ment. There is no distinction between and Exploitation of the Prostitution of forced and voluntary prostitution. Others (the Trafficking Convention), The definition of trafficking in the UN building upon international instruments protocol (UNODCCP 2000) reads: concerning 'white slave traffic', brought '"Trafficking in persons" shall mean the prostitution and trafficking into the same recruitment, transportation, transfer, legal framework, requiring states parties to harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of punish those exploiting the prostitution of the threat or use of force or other forms of others, even with their consent. The coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, contradictions inherent in this Convention of the abuse of power or of a position of continue to fuel debates about trafficking vulnerability (interpretative note 63) or of and prostitution today. The Trafficking the giving or receiving of payments or Convention also calls upon states parties to benefits to achieve the consent of a person provide care and maintenance for victims of having control over another person, for the trafficking and to bear the cost of purpose of exploitation. Exploitation shall repatriation to the nearest border. Since include, at a minimum, the exploitation of 1949, the definition of trafficking of women the prostitution of others or other forms of and girls was broadened to include other sexual exploitation (interpretative note 64), forced labour or services, slavery or practices notions of consent and coercion, and shows similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of how the compromise around consent in the organs.' protocol leaves the interpretation of what it actually means to the discretion of states Interpretative note 64 circumvents the issue parties. This entails that when the protocol of different national legal approaches to is translated into law and policy, initiatives prostitution, by stating that the protocol may be either repressive or emancipatory addresses the exploitation of the prostitution for women, depending on the state's of others only in the context of trafficking, interpretation. and avoiding a definition of prostitution itself. By making coercion and deception Ann Jordan also provides an historical central to the definition of trafficking, it overview of the development of inter- does not require governments to consider national law on trafficking, and points to all prostitution to be trafficking, and thus the negative consequence of the conflation illegal. What the Protocol fails to do, of trafficking with prostitution in the however, is to require signatories to extend Trafficking Convention of 1949, that of assistance and human rights protection to criminalising prostitutes and their clients. trafficked persons. As long as national legal systems follow this model, there are considerable dangers The discussion and debates which for women involved in prostitution. For surrounded the defining of trafficking example, they may be forced into the hands during the drawing up of the protocol of third parties offering protection from reflected the polarised positions of many of arrest and police abuse in exchange for the the governmental and non-governmental proceeds of, or control over, sex workers' organisations involved in the process. labour. Once the industry is pushed Several authors in this collection address underground, organised crime takes over, these debates. Jo Doezema discusses the and sex work continues or increases arguments put forward by two broad lobby under more violent conditions. Jordan groups at the negotiations. The Human argues that a human rights approach to Rights Caucus views focuses on the rights trafficking provides a better framework of trafficking victims. It recognises the for tackling trafficking because it upholds difference between forced and voluntary the rights of the victims. prostitution, presenting sex work as a legitimate labour option for women, one in The conditions faced by trafficked which women have agency, and for which persons include classic elements associated they should not be penalised, morally or with slavery historically, such as abduction, legally. The Coalition Against Trafficking in use of false promises, transport to a strange Women (CATW), problematises prostitution city or country, loss of freedom and in itself as an extreme form of gender personal dignity, extreme physical abuse, discrimination, and thus as a violation of and deprivation. The persistent oppression women's fundamental human rights. of women, and the vulnerability of A key difference between these two children, intersecting with other forms of broad coalitions rests on the notion of discrimination such as poverty, caste, and consent and whether women can meaning- race, means they are over-represented fully consent to sex work, or are always among trafficked and bonded persons. The coerced into prostitution by virtue of the International Organisation for Migration gendered nature of sexual relations, by (IOM) estimates that between 700,000 and force, or as the result of limited options for two million women and children are earning a living. Doezema traces the trafficked across international borders historical context of the debates on the annually (IOM 2001,1). Editorial Accurate numbers are difficult to obtain What facilitates trafficking due to the clandestine and illegal nature of and slavery? trafficking, the lack of anti-trafficking legislation in many countries, the reluctance Globalisation, dislocation, and poverty of victims to report their experiences to the Globalisation, liberalisation, and free authorities, and the lack of government market promotion have paved the way for priority given to data collection and research. the unfettered movement of capital and Whilst a large proportion of women and labour. While borders have opened for children are trafficked for the purpose of trade, capital, investors, and individuals prostitution, men, women, and children are from wealthier countries, people from trafficked for other purposes that include poorer countries have not been given the entertainment, sweatshop industries, illegal same freedom of movement. Many Western adoption of children, organ transplants, nations have introduced stringent forced marriage, mail-order brides, domestic restrictions and prohibitive immigration work, forced labour, drug trafficking, and laws to keep out asylum seekers and begging. economic migrants from poorer countries. Within this climate of immigration What drives women, men, and children restrictions, trafficking has flourished, and to leave their homes and take unknown more people are turning to traffickers to risks at the hands of traffickers? What facilitate migration. Carolina Wennerholm compels parents to send their children provides a brief overview of the extent of away from home? What mechanisms, trafficking, citing Asia and the Baltic Region factors, and forces make it possible for some to show how the majority of trafficked people to exercise ownership rights over persons are women. Patterns of movement others? To what extent does trafficking or are varied, occurring within countries and sex work involve consent, choice, or across borders and continents. coercion? Where do we draw a line People move for many reasons: they distinguishing between migration and may seek better employment opportunities; trafficking? What are the implications of the safety from persecution, violence, human new UN Protocol for trafficked persons? rights violations, discrimination, religious What does 'protection' mean for trafficked and cultural tensions; or an escape from persons? Do current responses and poverty. Economic decline, civil wars, measures incorporate the specific needs of ethnic conflicts, and environmental disasters trafficked women, especially those suffering are all 'push factors' and may bring about a gender-based violence? Does trafficking in breakdown of law and order at home that women perpetuate and reinforce the makes opportunities for trafficking and subordinate status of women? bonded forms of labour easier to exploit. This collection of articles explores and Children captured by the Lord's Resistance debates these questions, from a range of Army in Uganda, for example, have been perspectives. The writers highlight the forcibly taken to Sudan and enslaved: boys different understandings of the issues, the as soldiers, girls as servants, 'wives', and incentives to migrate, the realities that sex slaves (Leggett 2001). trafficked persons confront, and the Poverty and the aspiration for a better inherent complexities in dealing with the way of life are by far the major 'push outcomes. They emphasise the need for a factors' and are also among the principal multitude of multi-agency responses that reasons why parents send their children incorporate human rights considerations away to work. As Wennerholm points out, and tackle poverty and unequal gender remittances from children's labour can relations. sustain entire families in some Asian countries. However, Wennerholm cautions Non-participation in political activity and against assuming that anti-poverty decision-making processes limits women's strategies or economic growth on their own ability to effect change, challenge can eradicate the problem. In countries discriminatory practices, or bring about where there is an expanding middle class action to prosecute traffickers. such as Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Several authors in this collection discuss Philippines, the financial capacity and the gender discrimination that characterises motivation for men to purchase sex services trafficking and slavery-like practices in has increased. Where there is a demand for different cultural settings and country- such services, trafficking in women specific contexts. Smarajit Jana et al. use increases. case studies to demonstrate the ways in which gender discrimination, inequality, Gender-based discrimination and cultural constraints on women in While males are trafficked also, with trade Bangladesh and India entice women into in young boys dominating in some parts of trafficking for sex work, and the discrim- the world, the majority of trafficked persons ination and violence they encounter are women and girls. Trafficking is a highly thereafter. Jana et al. also debate the role of gendered transaction. Unequal gender agency, presenting the perspectives of sex relations and patriarchal values and workers for whom sex work is one of the systems are at the root of the causes and few available options for self-advancement patterns of trafficking and other forms of and survival. enslavement. In all cases, but particularly Beth Herzfeld provides examples of where it takes the form of violence and gender-specific forms of slavery, such as sexual abuse against women and girls, ritual servitude in West Africa. In these discrimination is a major factor behind cases, girls are given by their family to a trafficking. Key locations of discrimination shrine to atone for a family transgression. include the household, the family, and the Priests exercise ownership over these girls, immediate community. who are obliged to act as wives and provide Because it is widely the case that girls sexual services to their 'owners'. Herzfeld are less valued than boys, many families highlights the additional hardships that make less investment in their future. In women and girls face within certain forms societies where dowry payments are of bonded labour, and the gendered required, or where girls leave home when differences in the types of work that they get married and no longer contribute children are forced to take on. to household income and labour, girls may Meena Poudel and Ines Smyth use the be perceived to be a financial burden on case of a young Nepali woman to illustrate families. This low-status, low investment, the elements of crime and violence involved vicious cycle leaves women and girls with in trafficking, and the role that social limited economic options, increases their institutions such as the household, family, vulnerability to highly exploitative forms of community, market, and state may play in labour, and leads them to take exceptional violating the rights of women and girls. risks. 'In some countries where discrim- They provide examples of human rights ination against female children is more violations during the three stages of pronounced, daughters are made to feel trafficking - recruitment, work, and rescue. their financial obligation to the family.' Mike Dottridge demonstrates the way in (CATW 1995, 12) Limited access to which the common practice in West and education and information for girls and Central Africa of sending children to women in many societies can make them wealthier relatives in cities and other easy prey for the duplicity of traffickers. countries is being distorted by poverty. Editorial

Girls are more at risk of being trafficked for Asia Pacific, for example, sees trafficking in domestic service because they are women and children as a gender issue and considered more obedient and suited for a serious form of violence against women. this type of work. Dotteridge concludes by Economic empowerment of women is seen reflecting that if the majority of trafficked as a key factor for anti-trafficking strategies children were boys, rather than girls, more in origin and resettlement countries. In attention would be paid to the problem. conjunction with USAID, UNIFEM is Susanne Mikhael outlines the ways in implementing an anti-trafficking initiative in the Mekong sub-region (UNIFEM East which cultural constructions of gender 2 roles in the Middle East and North Africa and South-East Asia 2001 ). can lead to disadvantage and potentially Ann Jordan points out that in the adverse impacts on the survival, livelihood context of the new UN Protocol, which is opportunities, and choices of children. very weak on protection of victims, there Mikhael points to certain similarities are opportunities for advocates to influence between child marriage and prostitution, the process of adopting domestic anti- areas of exploitation usually considered as trafficking legislation in signatory countries. being very different. She describes how Currently, most have inappropriate or these practices, in different ways, violate inadequate laws and policies providing the rights of children and perpetuate the some protection to victims or none at all. exercise of ownership rights over She cautions that conflating trafficking with individuals for the purposes of exploiting undocumented migrations risks leading to their sexuality or labour. She highlights the the prosecution of victims while traffickers ways in which the cultural context escape. underpinning these practices does not For the most part, victim protection has provide girls with the protection they been prioritised only when victims assist in require as children, and to which they have prosecutions. As Elaine Pearson points out internationally-agreed rights. in this collection, in the case of trafficked women in Western Europe, the kinds of measures undertaken by law enforcement Response strategies officials in Europe can increase some Trafficking and slavery have a multi- women's vulnerability to discrimination faceted nature involving illegal migration, and violations of their rights. Providing violence, violations of human rights and victims with temporary rights to stay in the labour standards, poverty, and gender country of destination with access to discrimination. Institutional responses to services such as housing, medical and legal trafficking and slavery reflect this variety of services, counselling, language and concerns and are largely influenced by integration courses, financial assistance, political considerations, organisational and in some countries the right to work, for culture and interests, the different ways of the purpose of giving testimony, rewards viewing the problem and the solutions, and those willing to testify and penalises those country-specific factors such as the who are not. existence or non-existence of anti- Women returning home after having trafficking legal frameworks and the been trafficked may be shunned by their resources to provide for basic needs and families and communities because of protection. punitive attitudes towards women's The United Nations (UN) and other sexuality in countries of origin. In some Inter-Governmental Organisations (IGOs) countries they are detained, forced to have dedicated substantial resources to undergo compulsory medical tests, and develop more effective solutions. UNIFEM- have their identities exposed in the media. The various needs of those who survive characterise trafficking. Jana et al. present an experience of trafficking range from the initiatives of an HIV prevention and protection and legal assistance to intervention organisation working in psychological counselling, financial Bangladesh and India whose work includes assistance, and shelter. Jana et al. and outreach work with and practical support Poudel and Smyth show how trafficking for sex workers, and political initiatives to creates additional hardships for women uphold the rights of this marginalised including sexual exploitation and other group. Herzfeld cites an example of Anti- forms of gender-based violence and Slavery International's work that includes discrimination, requiring gender- raising awareness of the harm of bonded responsive interventions. labour and using child labour, and has had Because of their illegal status, many some significant results. Poudel and Smyth trafficked people fear and distrust state-run discuss Oxfam's anti-trafficking programme organisations. For this reason, and because in Asia, which is rooted in a poverty the majority of trafficked people are reduction and rights-based framework. women, human rights and women's Tackling the roots of poverty and organisations have often been their first oppression means looking not only at port of call. These organisations have also material poverty and need, but also at the been very active in raising awareness, poverty of rights and entitlements. This is lobbying for change, and providing consistent with a commitment to the assistance and support services for victims. empowerment of women and to their Marina Tzvetkova argues that despite the agency in achieving human rights and high profile of gender issues within the overcoming inequality and oppression. A development and human rights sector, rights-based poverty strategy tackles the some well-meaning organisations treat causes of inequality, in which trafficking trafficked men and women as passive and slavery are rooted, and works with victims incapable of making reasoned local, national, and international agents to judgments, and needing to be rescued and achieve changes in families and rehabilitated. Jordan and Jana et al. argue communities and the national and that in reality, trafficked people may be international legal and policy agendas. strong, risk-taking individuals who have Whilst this collection demonstrates the made rational choices and exercised their variety of perspectives and strategies own agency in deciding to migrate. towards trafficking in people and slavery- Non-governmental organisations (NGOs) like practices, there is a common thread. It have initiated a variety of assistance is clear that the Trafficking Protocol and programmes for trafficking victims, other international instruments that deal survivors, and those at risk at local, with the various elements of trafficking national, and international levels. and slavery need to work. Those who Tzvetkova provides an overview of this legislate or intervene on behalf of victims, NGO activity around the world, survivors, and those at risk also need to particularly that against trafficking in incorporate human rights considerations women for sexual exploitation. and initiatives to eliminate gender Wennerholm highlights the anti-trafficking discrimination into their work if these strategies undertaken by Kvinnoforum, a practices are to end. Swedish NGO that focuses on research, information provision, and networking to Suzanne Williams is a Policy Adviser at Oxfam raise awareness of the complexity and GB, 274 Banbury Road, Oxford 0X2 7DZ. serious violations of human rights that E-mail: [email protected]. uk Editorial

Notes References 1 In this article, the terms 'prostitution' Coalition Against Trafficking in Women - and 'sex work' are used interchangeably. Asia Pacific (CATW) (1995) Trafficking in 2 Personal communication with Lorraine Women and Prostitution in the Asia Pacific, Corner, Regional Economic Adviser, Manila: CATW UNIFEM Asia Pacific and Arab States, 6 Human Rights Web (1997) 'Universal February 2002. Declaration of Human Rights', http:/ /www.hrweb.org/legal/udhr.htrnl (last checked January 2002) International Organization for Migration (IOM) (2001), 'New global figures on the global scale of trafficking' in Trafficking in Migrants Quarterly Bulletin 23: April 2001, special issue, http:/ / www.iom.int/ /documents/ publications/en/tm_23.pdf (last checked February 2002) Leggett, I. (2001) Uganda: An Oxfam Country Profile, Oxford: Oxfam GB UNIFEM East and South-East Asia (2001) 'Trafficking in Women and Children: Mekong Sub-Region', http:/ /www.unifem-eseasia.org/ Resources/Traffick2.html (last checked January 2002) United Nations Office for Drug Control and Crime Prevention (UNODCCP) (2000) 'The Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons', http:/ /odccp.org/ /trafficking_protocol. html (last checked February 2002) 10 Crossing borders and building bridges: the Baltic Region Networking Project Carolina Johansson Wennerholm

'16 year old Lithuanian girl found dead on a highway outside Malmo in southern Sweden.' She committed suicide after escaping from an apartment where she earned her living selling sexual services. 'Czech girls kept as sex slaves at a hotel outside Stockholm calling their mothers for help.' Headlines like this concerning the trafficking of women and girls occur in many countries of the world every day. Some trafficked women are seeking to improve their lives or feed their children, while others have been abducted and forced into 'slave' labour. Occurrences of violence and human rights violations are common. This article gives an overview of the reasons for, and mechanics of, trafficking.1 It also highlights the anti-trafficking approaches and activities undertaken by the Swedish NGO Kvinnoforum in partnership with five NGOs in the Baltic Sea and Nordic Region. These projects address trafficking through research, information, and networking to create awareness of the complexity of trafficking, and the serious human rights violations that it involves.

rafficking of women has been a forced labour, and slavery-like practices, or feminist issue since the beginning of the removal of organs.2 Tthe 20th century when advocates for change like Josephine Butler fought against A global phenomenon the 'white slave trade'. They recognised that women and girls have been the Global political and economic processes majority of all victims of trafficking. It is and developments influence trafficking. only recently that the magnitude and Economic crises and disparities between complexity of trafficking has increased its countries fuel supply, while demand for importance on the international agenda. cheap labour attracts desperate migrants. This process has been assisted by a Economic liberalisation relaxes controls and widening of focus to encompass trafficking opens borders between countries, facilitating for bonded labour in sweatshops, domestic population mobility. Conflict, transnational work, adoption, and marriage, in addition crime, and political transitions and upheavals to trafficking for prostitution. are also contributory factors. The definition of trafficking in human The International Organisation for beings has been hotly debated amongst the Migration has estimated that between anti-trafficking movement. The debate 700,000 and two million women are trafficked reflects many differing approaches or foci. across international borders annually (IOM However, in December 2000 the UN 2001). Accurate numbers are difficult to adopted a definition which covered the ascertain for various reasons. Firstly, the diversity of means and mechanics used, the definition of trafficking is contested. issue of violence and abuse of power for Secondly, the criminal nature of the problem purposes of exploitation, as well as the has consequences for what is measured and many purposes for trafficking - including how. Thirdly, it has not been a priority in exploitation of others through prostitution, many countries to make the problem visible. Crossing borders and building bridges 11

Trafficking occurs both within domestic America also arrive in Western European borders, and across countries, regions, and destinations. These women are usually continents. Countries of origin, transit, and involved in the sex business, and sometimes destination are intertwined and overlap. in domestic work. The international A single country may export women, girls, presence in the Balkans as a result of the and boys abroad, may temporarily harbour war there has led to an increase in the arrivals from other countries, and act as the demand for sex services within these destination country for others. countries, and an increase in the trafficking In South and East Asia, trafficked of women into countries such as Kosovo. persons originate mainly from Thailand, Children are also trafficked into and within China, the Philippines, Burma/Myanmar, Western Europe, such as Albanian children Vietnam, Cambodia, Bangladesh, and to Greece and Italy for begging and drug- Nepal. Transit and destination countries dealing (UNICEF 2000 in Swedish Ministry include Thailand, Malaysia, Japan, India, for Foreign Affairs 2001). and Pakistan. While the provision of The USA is a major destination country, workers for the sex industry is the main particularly for women and children from purpose of this traffic, women from these South-East Asia, Latin America, and regions are also trafficked for domestic increasingly from FSU countries. While work and other forms of bonded labour. again the main purposes are the sex As a result of the burden of dowry, some industry and bonded labour, other women are trafficked for marriage trafficking industries include mail-order purposes. In some communities in India bride companies, maid schemes, domestic and Nepal, commercial sexual services servants, and illicit foreign adoption have religious and cultural links, increasing (O'Neill 1999). Canada is a receiving the complexity of the problem (O'Neill country, as well as transit country for those 1999). Trafficking in children - girls and travelling to the USA (McDonald et al. boys - for purposes of sexual exploitation, 2000). adoption, begging and other forms of Latin America has a long tradition of bonded labour, is mostly reported from trafficking. Countries of origin include East, South-East, and South Asia (Swedish Dominican Republic, Colombia, Cuba, Ministry for Foreign Affairs 2001). In Sri Mexico, Brazil, Ecuador, Surinam, Lanka the majority of the children offering Venezuela, Uruguay, Peru, Argentina, and sexual services are boys (O'Neill 1999). Paraguay. Destination countries include Former Soviet Union (FSU) countries in mostly Western European countries, but Central Asia are also origin countries. also Japan and the USA (STV 1996). The Women from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyszstan, purposes include prostitution, domestic and Tajikistan are trafficked to the Middle work, and marriage. East, Turkey, Greece, and Ukraine (IOM There is growing concern over the 2001), often via Russia. increasing numbers of trafficked persons Trafficking has increased dramatically within and from Africa, but as yet there is in Europe since the fall of the Iron Curtain little data available. Countries of origin in 1989. Most trafficked women come from include Ghana, Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Mali; former communist countries such as destination countries include Nigeria, Cote Russia, Ukraine, Albania, Kosovo, the Baltic d'lvoire, Western Europe, and Middle States, the Czech Republic, and Poland, and Eastern countries - Lebanon, Libya, are destined for Western European Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia - as well as the countries (IOM 2001). However, women USA (IOM 2001). In Central and West Africa, from South-East Asia, Africa, and Latin women may be trafficked as domestic 12

workers, and children for plantation work, and babysitters. In some cases, women domestic work, and sex services. The answer advertisements for work in the EU, Middle East receives women from Africa or trust 'friends of a friend' to arrange such and Central Asia. Israel has received work. Women are told that all they need to women from Russia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, do is sign a contract, and that the expenses Moldova, Kazakhstan, Turkey, the of the trip are to be paid when they start Dominican Republic, Brazil, and South earning. Upon arrival, however, some Africa (Gruenpeter Gold et al. 2001). women find that the promised job does not exist, and are forced to perform sexual services or take part in pornographic films, Exploring the causes of often in conditions of slavery. trafficking Social constructions of gender relations The causes of trafficking are complex, and sexuality facilitate trafficking for sexual intertwined, and context-specific, with exploitation. Girls may feel a sense of duty poverty and unequal gender relations as to repay their parents' care and protection. key underlying root causes. The situation of In some poor rural households in South- women and children in countries of origin, East Asia, remittances from daughters who the profit motive, the ease with which have entered prostitution represent the trafficking occurs, and the demand sole source of financial support (Lim 1998). for women and children for different Girls sold into prostitution have sometimes exploitative purposes are principal supply returned home with honour, because they and demand factors. brought money, goods, and security to the family (Belsey 1996, cited in Lim 1998, 13). The situation of women, girls, and boys In some areas in South-East Asia, in countries of origin prostitution is socially accepted as an The socio-economic and cultural context inevitable evil 'necessary to satiate an underpinning women and children's lives uncontainable male sexuality' (D'Cunha determines their choices, strategies, and 1992, 36, cited in Lim 1998,12). coping mechanisms. Women's unequal Psychological problems owing to rights and access to formal labour, the unpleasant encounters and their social restricted control they exercise over their impact can drive women away from home own lives, and the gendered aspects of and into prostitution. In the Philippines, poverty all lead women to seek work abroad. unmarried women who lose their virginity - In middle and low-income countries, many some as a result of rape - enter prostitution women face high unemployment, low believing it is what they deserve (Lim wages, lack of child care, and a high 1998). Women who endure violence at frequency of sexual harassment in the home or at work, who suffer from sexual workplace as well as gender violence. Some harassment, or who were sexually abused women opt to enter the prostitution as children, may enter prostitution, and business, sometimes encouraged by their are often easy targets for traffickers husbands. Others seek trafficking (Kvinnoforum 1999). mechanisms for domestic, catering, or other Evidence from countries as diverse as work, and end up in prostitution against Mali, the Baltic countries, Ukraine, their will (Strandberg 1999). Moldova, and Thailand show that some Traffickers can exploit women's desire girls and women enter prostitution or seek to create a better life for themselves in other trafficking mechanisms longing for a more countries by luring them with promises of materialistic life style or to participate in the jobs as waitresses, maids, dancers, models, urban nightlife (MAHR 2000; Diakiti 1999). Crossing borders and building bridges 13

Of those who migrate for sex work, few for most of the demand (ibid.). Thus, the realise that at best they will keep only a expansion of attitudes and lifestyles where small proportion of their earnings, and buying sex is acceptable are a key factor in most are unaware that they will be locked the increased demand for women and up, beaten, and have no control over the children in the sex business. number and nature of services they will Trafficking has an ethnic dimension. have to provide. Debt-bondage, violence, Minorities often experience difficulties in threats, physical bondage, guilt, and the the formal labour market and may be threat of harming their families, keep discriminated against. In Estonia and women in compliance. Because they risk Latvia, ethnic Russians find it difficult to arrest for prostitution or illegal immigration, find formal employment. As a result, there women seldom seek help from the police. are large numbers of Russian women A frequent inability to speak the local prostitutes in Riga and Tallinn. Similarly, language makes these women additionally Thai and Sri Lankan children from the hill vulnerable and powerless (Strandberg tribes are trafficked for sex exploitation 1999, 7). (Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs In some cases, girls, boys, and women 2001). It has also been reported how are kidnapped or abducted into the modern 'slave markets' in the Balkan trafficking trade. In some regions, parents region contain women from a wide range sell their children, and partners or relatives of ethnic origin whose value and marketing sell women. depends largely on their skin colour, racial characteristics, and the prevailing perception Demand for services about what is 'exotic'.3 Increasing demand for commercial sexual services in an expanding industry fuels Organised trafficking and profit trafficking. The argument that addressing Trafficking is a lucrative business, and - poverty would on its own inhibit unlike arms and drugs - trafficked women trafficking is questionable. Where economic and children can be sold many times. The growth has created an expanding middle UN estimates that the trafficking industry class, for example in Indonesia, Malaysia, is worth US$5-7 billion annually (CATW and the Philippines, the capacity and even 2001, 1). The main beneficiaries are the the motivation for men to buy" sexual various actors involved in the trafficking services has increased. This has expanded chain, and profits earned by pimps are the industry to the extent where aspects often laundered. like age, ethnicity and race, virginity, and The increase in criminal networks sexual health are key considerations for dealing with trafficking has a direct link customers and thus traffickers, with with the levels of profit, the ease with increasing emphasis on trafficking younger which trafficking can be undertaken, and persons who are less likely to have the low penalties for those caught (Europol contracted HIV/AIDS and other STDs. 1999). In many cases, traffickers also deal in Thus, to buy sexual services may in this drugs, arms, and animals. However, it is context be seen as a lifestyle choice, safer to trade with human beings. It is which adapts to economic circumstances relatively easy for traffickers to set up (Lim 1998). undercover businesses such as model and Although the growth of tourism has film agencies and marriage bureaux, drawn an increasing number of women through which women and children are and children to the sex industry in these contracted and traded. Women may also countries, local people continue to account enter countries on a tourist visa or with a 14

false passport. Corruption among state Health effects officials, police officers, migration staff, and Rape and other violence, drug use, and lack others further facilitates the commerce of food and sleep are commonly (Kvinnoforum 1999). experienced by the victims of trafficking. Traffickers operate both within small- The consequences of these include trauma, scale informal networks and as part of depression, and even suicide. Women and well-organised international criminal children forced to sell sexual services networks (Europol 1999). In Northern risk contracting STDs and HIV/AIDS. Europe, Russian and Estonian women cross Trafficked sex workers, many working on the border to Finland, Sweden, and the street, endure violent and unsafe sex as Norway every weekend, sometimes a result of the fact that they have no encouraged by husbands or other relatives. negotiating position, and are often illegal Bus drivers, hotel and camp-site owners, immigrants. Sexual exploitation can lead to and pimps all earn from this. The actors in post-traumatic stress disorders as well as the trafficking chain may or may not know unwanted pregnancies and unsafe each other. However, these informal abortions, the most common reason for criminal networks may be as dangerous as maternal deaths among women mafia groups. In small villages where worldwide. Trafficked women and everybody knows each other, threats and children also have limited or no access to harassment can have a tremendous impact healthcare services. on women and children, keeping them in compliance with the traffickers. The stigma Social effects that women and girls who are trafficked Victims of trafficking transported to distant fear or experience may inhibit their return or unfamiliar surroundings are vulnerable, to their own communities if they escape.4 particularly if they do not speak the language of the destination country. These women and children become frightened Measuring the impacts of and have difficulties building trust-based trafficking social relationships. Many feel that they will be stigmatised for the rest of their lives The impacts of trafficking on societies and may not wish to return home, even if require further research. Communities they could. The children born to women in where trafficking is frequent lose young, trafficking circumstances may be adopted, productive women. Where these women placed in orphanages, or abandoned. return, they may in turn become traffickers themselves. Negative socialisation may also Legal effects become a major problem for abused Trafficked women and children often have children. The costs of supporting rescued an illegal immigration status in destination women and children, and of training and countries. Since legal frameworks relating prosecuting traffickers are high. to trafficking and prostitution vary, victims The impact of trafficking on victims, of trafficking are commonly deported who often face unexpected harsh without adequate support, or imprisoned. conditions, is better understood. For Law enforcement may trap the victim of women and children trafficked into trafficking rather the trafficker. prostitution, the effects on their psychological, reproductive and sexual Economic effects health, and well-being can be devastating. Many women undergo trafficking in order to improve their own and their family's economic situation. Where women succeed Crossing borders and building bridges 15 in remitting some income to their family, against trafficking, with the aim of finding this encourages the sale of other women or what kinds of activities were being children to the traffickers. However, in far undertaken, and what the needs of too many instances women and children trafficked women were, within the Nordic become indebted to the traffickers and have and Baltic States, Russia, and Belarus.6 to work for years to pay back unforeseen The results of a questionnaire sent to 'contract costs'. NGOs, researchers, and government organisations, and interviews held with Kvinnoforum: the key informants indicated the following: "Crossing Borders and • a lack of awareness of trafficking in the Nordic region, despite the existence of Building Bridges' large numbers of women and children networking project in the experiencing trafficking-related human 5 Baltic Region rights violations; • a limited capacity to address trafficking, Since the break up of the FSU there has with few NGO or government actors been a dramatic increase in the numbers of undertaking this work; women travelling to Sweden from the • discrepancies and contested views on neighbouring eastern Baltic countries. The the problem and solutions; worsening economic situation in these countries, and its gendered impact, is a • a need for sharing information and contributory factor. Many women are experiences as well as networking and attracted by employment opportunities in co-operation; richer neighbouring countries. While some • an increasing interest in trafficking issues access 'normal' jobs, others are lured or and their incorporation into NGO work. forced by traffickers into the sex business. Until recently there was little awareness Objectives and methodology of the dimensions and mechanisms of Informed by the findings, Kvinnoforum has trafficking in Scandinavian and Baltic continued its work against trafficking in the countries. Trafficking was regarded as a Baltic Region with a series of projects and particularly Southern phenomenon. The activities. The overall objectives are: increasing visibility of foreign prostitutes reported on the streets of Scandinavian • to learn more about, and raise awareness cities in the last decade demonstrated to of, the many dimensions of trafficking in Scandinavian countries that they too had women and children; become part of the trafficking trade, with • to invite new actors and build a national police and politicians becoming alarmed at and regional network around the Baltic the increasing trafficking of women and Sea across organisational, geographical, girls into a region that prided itself as one and ideological borders; of the most gender equal in the world. • to develop strategies and specific The Swedish NGO Kvinnoforum, which activities to counteract trafficking and works with disadvantaged women, was support victims, and to bridge the gap alarmed by the increase in this particular between differing ideological positions manifestation of gender inequality. on trafficking. Kvinnoforum mobilised NGO resources to Kvinnoforum employs three analytical cater for the needs of these women and to approaches to understanding trafficking: publicise their plight. It conducted a a gender perspective, a human rights survey of organisations actively working perspective, and a diversity perspective. 16

Gender perspective governments, can collaborate as part of a Understanding the supply and demand network despite ideological differences. aspects of trafficking is an important part At the regional level, Kvinnoforum of the identification of solutions. A gender collaborates with NGOs from five Baltic perspective is a useful analytical tool for nations incorporating very different understanding why women, girls, and boys languages, cultures, and socio-economic voluntarily seek or are easily lured into circumstances. Each NGO also focuses on trafficking, and why there is a market and different aspects of the problem: street demand for it. Trafficking in women, girls, work with women in prostitution, and boys is viewed as an outcome of HIV/AIDS prevention, academic research, unequal gender relations in both origin and development of social work, intercultural destination countries. A gender analysis support for women with foreign highlights the differences among women backgrounds, and strategies for women's and between men and women in terms of empowerment. Locally, diverse actors such needs, capabilities, vulnerabilities, and as the police, social workers, politicians, strategies, and a gender-aware approach is researchers, and NGO activists have part of a multifaceted approach which can attended strategy workshops to discuss help us to address this complex problem at trafficking and propose measures against it. global and local levels.

Human rights perspective Information sharing and The human rights perspective focuses on networking the violation of the individual's rights to Following the initial research, Kvinnoforum freedom, health, development, absence of initiated partnerships with the Latvian violence, and so on, and distinguishes Gender Problem Centre and Monika, the trafficking from smuggling and illegal Multicultural Women's Association in migration. It implies a shift to supporting Finland.8 Three persons from each of the victims of trafficking instead of labelling three organisations travelled to the Baltic them as criminals. It provides a broad and and Nordic states to meet with NGOs, common platform for contesting views and 7 government representatives, and the media, approaches to trafficking and prostitution, to disseminate and gather information on and can access legislation, including regional trafficking in women and girls. International Human Rights Instruments, in many cases. Publication of a resource book on trafficking in women and girls Diversity perspective This project identified 80 organisations The diversity approach is closely linked to working, or interested in working, against the gender perspective, recognising the trafficking in the Baltic Region. Trafficking heterogeneity of women and men and their in Women and Girls in the Baltic Sea different needs, vulnerabilities, capacities, Region, A Resource Book was published in and coping strategies. Diversity implies 1999. It includes articles, printed and openness to social difference, which on-line references, websites for networks promotes tolerance and is therefore an and organisations, and information on all important methodological bridging 80 organisations. It thus provides useful approach for a highly contested issue such information for cross-border anti- as anti-trafficking work. trafficking work. Diversity has in practice meant that an array of organisations, such as NGOs and Crossing borders and building bridges 17

Local, regional, and global networking The network services include keeping the Following this, Kvinnoforum expanded the members informed via e-mail about relevant collaboration to include NGOs in Finland, news, reports, upcoming events, and Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Denmark, and activities.10 Sweden. These NGOs have conducted training workshops in their respective countries for central actors working against Conclusions and next steps trafficking. The workshops have helped to The human rights of trafficked women and create national networks against trafficking girls are violated in many ways. Trafficking in each of the countries. An advantage of in women is a complex issue linked to working in partnership is that there is more development, poverty, health, and gender than one 'owner' of the project and its aim, inequality that demands multifaceted thus enhancing the credibility and responses. It is a contested problem, both in sustainability of the work.9 As a joint terms of its definition and in the attempts activity, the network will update the to formulate appropriate response Resource Book. strategies. The present paper has given an Each organisation further undertakes overview of trafficking, highlighting its separate projects in its respective country. complexity, the various actors, its causes The Gender Problem Centre in Latvia runs and consequences, and the international a shelter for returning women and is also statements condemning it. involved in preventive work among Kvinnoforum and its partners aim to adolescents. The AIDS Prevention and strengthen the network at national, Information Centre in Estonia provides regional, and global levels. The reproductive health services and Kvinnoforum projects and activities have information to women in prostitution. In contributed to an enhanced awareness on Lithuania, PRAEITIES PEDOS has trafficking in the Baltic Sea Region. There published a book and a film on trafficking. are now more anti-trafficking actors than In Finland, Monika has initiated a hotline there were in 1997, but there are not for foreign women experiencing problems enough, and there is a need for more of violence. In Sweden, Kvinnoforum gives concrete activities to prevent trafficking lectures and discusses training with the and to support its victims. Finally, if we are police and migration services. These to achieve long-term and sustainable projects represent a regional network of change, anti-trafficking work must be more than 250 members involved with or framed in a gendered development interested in anti-trafficking activities, as perspective. well as national networks in each of the six participating countries. Carolina Johansson Wennerholm, Kvinnoforum, Tomtebogatan 42, 113 38 Stockholm, Sweden. An internet resource base Tel: + 468 56 22 88 00; fax: + 468 56 22 88 50 The project website provides contact details E-mail: [email protected] for organisations, as well as references, http:/ /www.kvinnoforum.se on-line material, and relevant links. http://www.qweb.kvinnoforum.se/trafficking Kvinnoforum and its collaborating partners are frequently invited to hold lectures, and to provide information and advice. The Notes information gathered for the Resource Book 1 The overview part of this article is a was also presented on a project web-site, shortened version of the background http:/ / www.qweb.kvinnoforum.se/trafficking. paper 'Trafficking in Women and 18

Children, an Overview' prepared for the in Denmark, the AIDS information and UNFPA, 2001, and published with Support Centre AIDSI TUGIKESKUS in UNFPA's permission. Estonia, the Latvian Gender Problem 2 Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Centre, Latvia, and the Lithuanian Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women's NGO PRAEITIES PEDOS, Women and Children Supplementing Lithuania. the United Nations Convention against 6 The study was funded by the Swedish Transnational Organized Crime, Article 3: Minstry for Foreign Affairs. 'Trafficking in persons shall mean the 7 Although trafficking occurs for domestic recruitment, transportation, transfer, work, bounded labour in sweatshops, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of adoption, organ trafficking, marriage, the threat or use of force or other form of and other purposes, the most common coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, purpose is for the sex business. Thus the of the abuse of power or of a position of international debate related to vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of prostitution has considerable impact on payment or benefits to achieve the consent of the general trafficking debate. The a person having control over another person, abolitionist view sees prostitution as an for the purpose of exploitation. Exploitation expression of violence and works to end shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation it. At the other end of the spectrum, the of the prostitution of others or other forms of Sex Workers Rights movement does not sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, see prostitution per se as a problem, but slavery or practices similar to slavery, rather the violence within the industry, servitude or the removal of organs; and it aims to ensure that sex workers b) The consent of a victim in person to the have legal rights as any other working intended exploitation set forth in group. Although both coalitions agree subparagraphs (a) of this article shall be that trafficking must be addressed irrelevant where any of the means set forth internationally, they do not co-operate, in subparagraph (a) have been used; as their different ideological positions c) The recruitment, transportation, transfer, entail that discussions tend to end in harbouring or receipt of a child for the opposing definitions (Strandberg 1999). purpose of exploitation shall be considered "trafficking in persons", even if this does not8 The project 'Crossing Borders Against involve any of the means set forth in sub Trafficking' was carried out in 1998-9 paragraph (a) of this article; with funding from the European d) Child shall mean any person under Commission's Daphne Initiative and the eighteen years of age.' Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. 3 Reported by the Swedish NGO Kvinna 9 The project 'Training and Capacity till Kvinna, which has extensive Building against Trafficking in Women and experience of trafficking in the Balkan Girls in the Baltic Sea Region' was Region. implemented during 1999-2000 with 4 Reported by the Estonian NGO AIDSI funding from the European TUGIKESKUS and the Latvian NGO Commission's Daphne Initiative and the Genders. Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. 5 The networking project in the Baltic 10 The trafficking work is thus integrated Region was initiated and run by in Q Web, an internet-based global Kvinnoforum in partnership with network for women's health and Monika, the Multicultural Women's empowerment run by Kvinnoforum. See Association in Finland, the PRO-centre http:/ / www.qweb.kvinnoforum.se Crossing borders and building bridges 19

References Kvinnoforum (1999) Trafficking in Women and Girls in the Baltic Sea Region, A Coalition Against Trafficking in Women Resource Book, Stockholm: Kvinnoforum (CATW) (2001) 'Guide to the New UN Lim, L.L. (ed.) (1998) The Sex Sector, The Trafficking Protocol', North Amherst, Economic and Social Bases of Prostitution in MA: CATW South-East Asia, Geneva: ILO D'Cunha, J. (1992) 'Prostitution laws: Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights ideological dimensions and enforcement (MAHR) (2000) 'Trafficking in Women: practices', Economic and Political Weekly Moldova and Ukraine', Minneapolis: (Bombay), 24 April, cited in L.L. Lim MAHR (ed.) (1998) McDonald, L., B. Moore, and N. Diakiti, F.S. (1999) 'Prostitution in Mali', in Timoshkina (2000) Migrant Sex Workers D. Hughes and C. Roche (eds) (1999) from Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet EUROPOL (1999) 'Trafficking in Human Union: The Canadian Case, Toronto: Beings', General Situation Report, Open Centre for Applied Social Research, version, File-No: 2565-35 rev. 1, The University of Toronto Hague: EUROPOL O'Neill Richard, A. (1999) 'International Foundation against Trafficking in Women Trafficking in Women to the United (STV) (1996) 'International Report States: A Contemporary Manifestation of Project on Trafficking in Women: Latin Slavery and Organized Crime', America and Caribbean Region', Draft, Washington, DC: Centre for the Study of August 31, Utrecht: STV Intelligence, http:/ / www.cia.gov/csi/ Gruenpeter Gold, L., N.B. Ami, S. Rosen, monograph/ women / trafficking.pdf and N. Levenkron (2001) 'National (last checked by author 5th May 2000) NGOs Report to the Annual UN Strandberg, N. (1999) 'What is trafficking Commission on Human Rights: and what can be done?', in Kvinnoforum Evaluation of National Authorities (1999), http://www.qweb.kvinnoforum. Activities and Actual facts on the se/papers/tic-whatistrafficking.html Trafficking in Persons for the Purpose of (last checked by author 11th January Prostitution in Israel', on behalf of 2002) Awareness Center and Hotline for Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs (2001) Foreign Workers, March, Tel Aviv 'Trafficking in Women and Children in Hughes, D. and J. Raymond (2001) Sex Asia and Europe, a Background Trafficking of Women in the United States, Presentation of the Problems Involved International and Domestic Trends, and the Initiatives Taken', Stockholm: Kingston, Rhode Island: CATW Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs Hughes, D. and C. Roche (eds) (1999) Global United Nations Office for Drug Control Sexual Exploitation of Women and Girls, And Crime Prevention (UNODCCP) Speaking Out and Providing Services, 'Trafficking in Person: the New Protocol', Kingston, Rhode Island: CATW http: / / www.odccp.or/ trafficking_proto International Organisation for Migration col_backround.html (last checked by (IOM) (2001) Quarterly Bulletin 23 author 28th May 2001) 20

Who gets to choose? Coercion, consent, and the UN Trafficking Protocol Jo Doezema

This article explores the difficulties around using the notion of consent to define 'trafficking in women'. It does this through an examination of the recent negotiations around the UN Trafficking Protocol. 'Consent' was a highly contentious topic at the negotiations. One feminist lobby group argued that all prostitution, regardless of consent, should be considered trajficking. Another feminist lobby group insisted that coercion was a necessary element to any definition of trafficking. Government delegations tended to one or other of these positions. The final document attempts to compromise between these positions, with both lobby groups claiming victory for their position. This article looks at the arguments behind the interpretation of 'consent' in the negotiations, placing them in the historical context of early 20th century campaigns against white slavery. It suggests that views of female sexuality that see women as both more virtuous and more dangerous than men influence both historical and contemporary campaigns. It argues that current notions of 'consent', reflected in the ambiguity of the Protocol, are inadequate to serve as the basis for political strategies to protect the rights of sex workers and migrants.

In December 2000, over 80 countries against sex workers, migrant sex workers, signed the Protocol to Suppress, Prevent and immigrants.J Several activists from the and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Network of Sex Work Projects (NSWP) Especially Women and Children (The joined the Human Rights Caucus in their Trafficking Protocol) in Palermo, Italy. This lobby efforts, in the hope of ensuring a event was the culmination of over two result that would not damage sex workers' years of negotiations at the UN Centre for human rights. This paper reviews the International Crime Prevention in Vienna. arguments made by both lobby groups at The Trafficking Protocol was the target of the negotiations. It focuses in particular on heavy feminist lobbying. These lobby how trafficking came to be defined, and the efforts were split into two 'camps' pivotal role played by the notion of espousing differing views on prostitution. 'consent'. It examines how 'consent' One group, the Human Rights Caucus, emerged as the international standard for viewed prostitution as legitimate labour. determining 'trafficking in women', placing The other, represented by the Coalition current debates in historical context. Against Trafficking in Women (CATW), Finally, it assesses the potential for the considered all forms of prostitution to be a Trafficking Protocol to be used to promote violation of women's human rights. sex workers' and migrants' human rights. Sex worker rights activists including myself were concerned about the impact of a new international trafficking instrument on the lives of sex workers. Historically, anti-trafficking measures have been used Coercion, consent, and the UN Trafficking Protocol 21

Consent or coercion: Other governments opposed the negotiating the definition attempts to define trafficking in women of trafficking and children as essentially the same. Their position was endorsed by the Human In Vienna, the differences between the Rights Caucus, who stated: lobby groups became most apparent 'Obviously, by definition, no one consents to during the most controversial part of the abduction or forced labour, but an adult Protocol negotiations: deciding just how woman is able to consent to engage in an 'trafficking in persons' should be defined. illicit activity (such as prostitution, where CATW's lobby group argued that this is illegal or illegal for migrants). If no 'trafficking' should include all forms of one is forcing her to engage in such an recruitment and transportation for activity, then trafficking does not exist.... prostitution, regardless of whether any The Protocol should distinguish between force or deception took place (CATW 1999). adults, especially women, and children. It This is in line with their view of should also avoid adopting a patronizing prostitution per se as a violation of women's stance that reduces women to the level of human rights. The Human Rights Caucus, children, in the name of 'protecting' women. who supported the view of prostitution as Such a stance historically has 'protected' work, argued that force or deception was a women from the ability to exercise their necessary condition in the definition of rights.' (Human Rights Caucus 1999, 5) trafficking for sex work and for other types of labour. They also maintained that The argument that sex work is inherently a trafficking for prostitution should not be human rights violation, and thus cannot be treated as a different category to other consented to, is one that I disagree with. other types of labour. This was based on But it is not my intention in this paper to the recognition that men, women, and repeat the arguments for treating sex work children are trafficked for a large variety of as a legitimate profession.2 Rather, I want services, including sweatshop labour and to focus on the harmful political agriculture (Human Rights Caucus 1999), consequences of arguing that coercion as well as fear of the potentially repressive (including deception) is not an essential consequences of attemps to turn the part of any definition of trafficking. The Protocol into an anti-prostitution document. argument that women cannot consent to These two positions ended up revolving commercial sexual interactions coincides all around the notion of 'consent'. Several too easily with anti-feminist ideas about government delegations, backed by female sexuality, and particularly with that 3 CATW's lobby group, argued that the of the threat of women's sexual autonomy. definition of trafficking specifically had to It also can be used to give what are include situations in which a person both basically anti-immigrant prejudices and consented to travel and consented to do sex policies a more palatable gloss, borrowing work, even if no force or deception was terms from human rights and feminist involved. This position has at its root the argumentation. assumption that a woman's consent to undertake sex work is meaningless. This Consensual history definition of trafficking differed little from the proposed definition of trafficking in Historically, efforts to combat trafficking children: in this view, neither women or have ended up justifying repressive children can be said to 'consent' to travel measures against prostitutes themselves in for work in the sex industry. the name of 'protection' for women and 22

children. Modern debates around the 'necessary evil' of prostitution should be relationship of consent to 'trafficking in controlled by stringent state regulations. women' have a long history. At the Dr. Parent-Duchatelet, whose 1836 study of beginning of the last century, there was a French prostitutes was a model for great public outcry against 'white slavery' regulationists, wrote: 'Prostitutes are as in Europe and America. 'White slavery' inevitable in a great conurbation as sewers, referred to the abduction and transport of cesspits and refuse dumps. The conduct of white women for prostitution.4 In a manner the authorities should be the same with similar to today's campaigns, the issue was regard to each.' (in Roberts 1992, 223) covered widely in newspapers, a number Harnessing rational scientific arguments to of organisations were set up to combat it, moral disapproval, 'regulationists' argued and national and international legislation that state regulation was the only way to was adopted to stop the 'trade'. The control venereal disease. 'Innocent' women international debates around 'white and girls needed protection from immorality; slavery' were highly concerned with the however, once fallen, it was society that issue of consent. Many campaigners needed protecting from the immoral against the white slave trade saw all woman. The best way to protect society, prostitutes as victims in need of rescue; argued regulationists, was to register and others argued for the importance of medically control prostitutes. distinguishing the 'willing' prostitute from Other campaigners, particularly the victimised white slave. women's rights activists, made little The distinction between 'white slaves' distinction between 'white slavery' and and willing prostitutes was maintained by prostitution itself. These early feminists' campaigners of differing ideological bent. attempts to break down the distinction On the one hand were so-called 'purity' between 'innocent' victims and 'immoral' campaigners, who aimed to rid society of prostitutes started with Josephine Butler's 'vice' and who focused in particular on campaign against the regulation of youthful sexuality. For example, the US prostitution through the Contagious District Attorney Edwin W. Sims wrote in Diseases Acts in Great Britain. Under these the preface to the influential 1910 tract, Acts, any woman who was suspected of Fighting the Traffic in Young Girls or War on prostitution could be detained by the the White Slave Trade, 'The characteristic police and forced to undergo an internal which distinguishes the white slave traffic examination. Butler and other 'abolitionists' from immorality [prostitution] in general is argued that men were responsible for that the women who are the victims of the prostitution, placing the blame for traffic are forced unwillingly to live an prostitution squarely on the shoulders of immoral life. The term "white slave" unbridled male lust. No women could be includes only those women and girls who said to truly consent to prostitution: if a are actually slaves.' (Sims 1910, 14) 'Purity' woman appeared 'willing', this was merely reformers' relationships with prostitutes the result of the power that men held over themselves were ambiguous: while her. By turning all prostitutes into victims, professing sympathy for the lost innocents Butlerite feminists undercut the rationale sacrificed by white slavers, they were for regulationist systems. When the severe in their judgement of girls and Contagious Diseases Acts were repealed in women whose immodest behaviour led 1886, Butler and her followers turned their them into a life of shame. attention to the fight against 'white On the other hand were the so-called slavery'. In the abolitionist vision, 'regulationists', who believed that the prostitution and white slavery would come Coercion, consent, and the UN Trafficking Protocol 23 to an end if laws targeted those who made According to Addams, these moral money from prostitutes, rather than the failings made young working-class and prostitute herself. No woman would enter immigrant girls 'easy prey' for white prostition of her own accord, they slavers. Certainly, belief in these girls' reasoned: with no one to lure or deceive innate moral weakness made them the her, woman's innate moral superiority ideal target of the reforming impulses of would ensure her purity. In this, feminist middle-class feminists. abolitionists shared a view of women's sexuality that was common to all the various anti-white slavery campaigners. The consequences of Women were considered sexually passive, denying consent which made them more 'virtuous' than The first international agreement men, but, paradoxically, once that virtue against 'white slavery' was drafted in 1902 was 'lost' through illicit sexual behaviour, women's sexual nature became dangerous. in Paris and signed in 1904 by 16 states. Consequently, calls for the need to protect Largely due to the input of regulationist women's purity alternated with attempts to countries such as France, the International reform and discipline prostitutes. Agreement for the Suppression of the White Slave Trade did not equate 'white Feminist abolitionists displayed a slavery' with 'prostitution'. The agreement curious mixture of a progressive refusal to only addresses the fraudulent or abusive condemn prostitutes, and a moralistic, recruitment of women for prostitution in middle-class urge to protect the virtue of another country. In 1910, a new agreement young, working class, and immigrant broadened the scope of the crime to include women. This ambiguity is clearly recruitment for prostitution within national illustrated in the work of the notable US boundaries. Both of these conventions were feminist campaigner, Jane Addams. In her limited to the traffic in 'unwilling' women, book on 'white slavery', A New Conscience and covered only recruitment, not conditions and an Ancient Evil, Addams argues 5 in prostitution workplaces. It was not until forcefully against police harassment of 1933 that an international agreement was prostitutes and for improved wages for drafted that reflected the abolitionist working women. While she relates with position. The International Convention for heart-rending pathos the stories of poor girls whose only hope of feeding their the Suppression of the Traffic in Women families is by giving in to the condemned all recruitment for prostitution blandishments of 'white slavers', she is in another country. It obliges states to scornful and dismissive of those girls who punish 'any person who, in order to gratify would contemplate selling their virtue in the passions of another person, procures, slightly less desperate circumstances: entices or leads away, even with her consent, a woman or a girl of full age for immoral 'Although economic pressure as a reason for purposes to be carried out in another entering an illicit life has thus been brought country' (in Wijers and Lap-Chew 1997, out in court by the evidence in a surprising emphasis added).6 number of cases, there is no doubt that it is often exaggerated; a girl always prefers to If it took until 1933 for the abolitionist think that economic pressure is the reason position to become encoded in inter- for her downfall, even when the immediate national law, abolitionist influence on causes have been her love of pleasure, her national legislation in several countries was desire for finery, or the influence of evil much more marked. Throughout Europe companions.' (Addams 1912, 60) and in the USA, anti-white slavery activists were successful in their campaigns for 24

abolitionist laws aimed at protecting legal redress in cases of violations of their prostitutes from 'white slavers', 'pimps', labour, civil, and human rights. and 'profiteers'. These new laws neither If there is one lesson that we can learn ended prostitution nor improved from history, it is that increased state prostitutes' working conditions: rather, power to repress prostitution ends up these laws were used against prostitutes being used against prostitutes themselves. themselves. Thrown out of brothels and Has history repeated itself in the red-light districts, prostitutes were forced Trafficking Protocol? The answer is not yet into illegality, and arrests of prostitutes clear, but the Protocol has the potential to actually increased. Prostitutes' husbands be used for repressive as well as for and boyfriends were targeted as pimps, emancipatory ends. On the one hand, the especially if they were black or 'foreign'. In final definition of trafficking in the Protocol a famous case in the USA, the 1910 Mann can be considered a victory for those who Act (The White Slave Traffic Act) was used argue that the only way to protect sex to punish Jack Johnson, a black boxer, for workers' rights is to recognise prostitution his marriage to a white woman.7 In Britain, as a legitimate profession. The use of force the Criminal Law Amendment Bill of 1921 or coercion is included as an essential (The White Slave Act) was used against element of trafficking in the definition. This prostitutes and working class women is a significant departure from the (Walkowitz 1980). Greece fought 'white abolitionist stance of the 1949 Convention, slavery' by passing legislation in 1912 and leaves states free to recognise sex work forbidding women under 21 to travel as labour and regulate it according to abroad without a special permit (Bristow labour standards. On the other hand, while 1977,178). the Protocol makes an implicit distinction between 'coerced' and 'non-coerced' migration for prostitution, it offers very Ambiguous standards little in terms of human rights protections The legacy of abolitionism is still being felt for trafficking victims, and nothing at all today. In international law, the abolitionist for (migrant) sex workers who were not standards of the 1933 Convention were coerced. If the Protocol leaves the way free reiterated in the 1949 UN Convention for for governments to treat sex work as the Suppression of the Traffic in Persons labour, it also in no way prevents and the Exploitation of the Prostitution of governments from persecuting, criminalising, Others. In this agreement, prostitution is and denying equal protection of the law to considered incompatible with the dignity sex workers in the name of fighting of the person. Until the adoption of the 'trafficking'. Trafficking Protocol, this was the only international document to deal compre- Conclusion: beyond hensively with trafficking and prostitution. Though signed by few countries, the 1949 'trafficking'? Convention served as a model for much Despite the potential of the Trafficking domestic legislation. In a large number of Protocol to be used to protect (migrant) sex countries, abolitionist laws are still on the workers' human rights, recent government books: preventing prostitutes working actions seem to indicate that the repressive together (lest one be arrested for pimping), potential of the Protocol will prevail. In a blocking prostitutes' attempts at union- number of countries, anti-trafficking forming (considered as unlawful 'promotion measures have led to restrictions on of prostitution'), and barring them from movement and migration for women, Coercion, consent, and the UN Trafficking Protocol 25 increased surveillance of sex workers, and have varying amounts of power as clients, increased deportation of migrant sex sex workers, and associates. It would grant workers. This point was made forcefully by Third World women the same degree of Radhika Coomaraswamy, the UN Special self-awareness, autonomy, and agency that Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, is taken as self-evident for Western women. its Causes and Consequences, at a recent Most importantly, this new framework conference.8 Arguing that 'trafficking' and may be able to move beyond the legacy of 'prostitution' should not be linked, she repression clinging to the trafficking described how many Asian governments framework because it will be developed by were responding to trafficking fears by sex workers themselves. legislating to restrict women's freedom of movement. Deportations of sex workers are Jo Doezema is studying for her doctoral thesis commonplace. One recent example is in the at the Institute of Development Studies, UK, where the police raided London University of Sussex, Brighton BN1 9RE, UK. brothels, and migrant sex workers were Tel: +44 (0)1273 606 161 ext. 4153 deported. In the Netherlands, trafficking fears have led to a law which requires all sex workers to carry identification papers - Notes the only occupational group for whom this 1 See NSWP 1999. is required. 2 For discussions of prostitution as sex The lessons from history about the work, see P. Alexander and F. Delacoste repressive consequences of anti-trafficking (eds) (1987); G. Pheterson (ed.) (1989); laws have led some activists to search for a W. Chapkis (1997); Bindman and new way to conceptualise migration and Doezema (1997); J. Nagle (ed.) (1997); prostitution. The contours of a framework Doezema (1998). to replace that of trafficking have begun to 3 See Doezema 2001. emerge, sketched out in discussions, 4 Historians who have studied the period demands, and demonstrations from Delhi have almost all come to the conclusion to Detroit by sex workers and those who that there were actually very few cases support their agenda. This new framework of white slavery (see Connelly 1980; would reject both the neo-abolitionist Grittner 1990; Guy 1991). There was, position that would deny women the however, a large increase in migration ability to consent to prostitution, and a neo- from Southern and Eastern Europe to the regulationist perspective that condemns USA and Latin America. Many of those 'forced' prostitution but offers nothing in who migrated were prostitutes, who the way of rights for the 'guilty', carried on working in their new lands. 'voluntary' prostitutes. This new While these women certainly enjoyed no framework would incorporate elements of 'rights' as we would term them, neither labour rights, insisting that sex workers be is there evidence that they were the sex treated as legitimate workers, rather than slaves of popular myth. Historians such as moral reprobates. It would challenge the as Grittner (1990) argue that 'white mentality that demands that women bear slavery' was a 'cultural myth': a responsibility for the moral guardianship of collective belief that simplifies reality society. It would recognise that gender and that expresses deep societal fears relations in the sex industry are not a and anxieties. 'White slavery' as a simple matter of oppressed women and cultural myth stood for fears about oppressive men, but that men, women, and immigration, racist anxieties, fears about transgenders take up varying positions and industrialisation and urbanisation, and 26

about women's increasing independence. Rights, Resistance and Redefinition, New For an examination of 'trafficking in York and London: Routledge women' as a cultural myth, see Doezema Doezema, J. (2000) 'Loose women or lost (2000). women? The re-emergence of the myth 5 See Wijers and Lap-Chew (1997) and of white slavery in contemporary Haveman (1998). discourses of trafficking in women', 6 The abolitionist position continued to Gender Issues 18(1): 38-54 dominate international law until the Doezema, J. (2001) 'Ouch! Western 1980s, when a number of agreements feminists' "wounded attachment" to the began to recognise a distinction between "third-world prostitute"', Feminist 'voluntary' and 'forced' prostitution. See Review 67:16-38 Doezema (1998). Grittner, F.K. (1990) White Slavery: Myth, 7 See Roberts (1986) for an account of the Ideology and American Law, New York Jackson case. and London: Garland 8 'Prostitution, Trafficking and the Global Guy, D.J. (1991) Sex and Danger in Buenos Sex Trade in Women', NYU Law School, Aires: Prostitution, Family and Nation in March 2, 2001 Argentina, Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press References Haveman, R. (1998) Voorwaarden voor Strafbaarstelling van Vrouwenhandel, Addams, J. (1912) A New Conscience and an Doctoral Thesis, University of Utrecht, Ancient Evil, New York: Macmillan Utrecht: Gouda Quint Alexander, P. and F. Delacoste (eds) (1987) Human Rights Caucus (1999) 'Recommend- Sex Work: Writings by Women in the Sex ations and Commentary on the Draft Industry, Pittsburgh: Cleis Press Protocol to Combat International Bindman, J. and J. Doezema (1997) Trafficking in Women and Children Redefining Prostitution as Sex Work on the Supplementary to the Draft Convention International Agenda, London: Anti- on Transnational Organised Crime', Slavery International and the Network http:/ /www.hrlawgroup.org/site/ of Sex Work Projects programs/traffic (last checked by author Bristow, E.J. (1977) Vice and Vigilance: December 2001) Purity Movements in Britain since 1700, Nagle, J. (ed.) (1998) Whores and Other Dublin: Gill and Macmillan Feminists, New York and London: Coalition Against Trafficking in Women Routledge (CATW) (1999) 'Prostitutes Work, But Network of Sex Work Projects (1999) Do They Consent?', http:/ / www.uri.edu/ 'Commentary On The Draft Protocol To artsci/wms/hughes/catw (last checked Combat International Trafficking In by author May 2001) Women And Children Supplementary Chapkis, W. (1997) Live Sex Acts: Women To The Draft Convention On Performing Erotic Labor, New York and Transnational Organized Crime' London: Routledge (A/AC.254/4/add.3), Connelly, M.T. (1980) The Response to http:/ / www.walnet.org/nswp Prostitution in the Progressive Era, Chapel (last checked by author December 2001) Hill: University of North Carolina Press Pheterson, G. (ed.) (1989) A Vindication of Doezema, J. (1998) 'Forced to choose: the Rights of Whores, Seattle: Seal Press beyond the free v. forced prostitution Roberts, N. (1992) Whores in History: dichotomy', in K. Kempadoo and Prostitution in Western Society, London: J. Doezema (eds) Global Sex Workers: HarperCollins Coercion, consent, and the UN Trafficking Protocol 27

Roberts, R. (1986) Papa Jack: Jack Johnson and the Era of White Hopes, London: Robson Walkowitz, J. (1980) Prostitution and Victorian Society: Women, Class and the State, Cambridge: CUP Wijers, M. and L. Lap-Chew (1997) Trafficking in Women, Forced Labour and Slavery-Like Practices in Marriage, Domestic Labour and Prostitution: Utrecht and Bangkok: Foundation Against Trafficking in Women (STV) and Global Alliance Against Trafficking in Women (GAATW) 28

Human rights or wrongs? The struggle for a rights-based response to trafficking in human beings Ann D. Jordan

A unique opportunity for non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and advocates to contribute to the development of a human rights-based response to the trafficking of human beings now exists. Many governments have signed a new international treaty on trafficking and are in the process of adopting domestic anti-trafficking laws. However, as explained in this article, most government officials are uninformed about the causes and consequences of trafficking, and the appropriate rights- based legal responses. NGOs can bring their expertise and a human rights framework to the debate by working with government officials to draft and implement new trafficking laws and policies. This article offers a brief introduction and guidance to some of the challenges that NGOs will face in their advocacy work

rafficking of human beings is the means that the burden of poverty and the movement of persons within or direct and indirect consequences of Tacross borders by any means (such as violence impact disproportionately on force or fraud) into forced labour, slavery, women. This has resulted in an out- or servitude. It has always existed; migration of women from poor countries however, its phenomenal growth in the last and conflict areas, larger than any before. quarter of the 20th century has caused alarm Many of these women are particularly around the world. It is now a multi-billion vulnerable, and end up being trafficked. dollar industry run by individuals and At the same time, the absolute or relative small and large organised criminal prosperity and peace in industrialised and networks. Although precise statistics do not newly industrialising countries act as 'pull' exist, anecdotal evidence and studies factors in international migration. Growing indicate that hundreds of thousands - if not economies create increased demand for several millions - of people are trafficked imported labour as citizens increasingly worldwide annually. Experts agree that a refuse to take low-paying jobs. Young disproportionate number of trafficked women are in particular demand because persons are women and girls. they are considered to be more compliant This phenomenal growth has resulted and detail-oriented, and less likely to rebel from the simultaneous existence of a against the conditions of forced labour. number of push, pull, and facilitating Some young women are pulled into factors. The push factors include the migration by the prospect of marriage and increase in civil wars since the fall of Soviet a better life abroad. Some of these Union, the collapse of the Chinese socialist marriages are arranged by unscrupulous system, environmental damage, natural brokers, with women being trafficked into disasters, violence in the family, and servile marriages. uneven economic growth. Women's These push and pull factors lay the unequal status in societies worldwide causal foundation for trafficking. In additon, Human rights or wrongs? 29 there exist a number of facilitating factors trafficking and all persons.3 The new law is that make trafficking possible. Growth in not perfect - some trafficked persons will the industrialised economies has been not be protected - but it is better than most accompanied by a quantum leap in low-cost other countries' laws at present. transportation and communication There are four primary reasons for technologies. Many traffickers with legal inappropriate or inadequate responses to status abroad fly to their countries of origin trafficking. to find new recruits for forced labour. They use modern technologies to transport their 1. Denial of the problem victims with little risk of detection. Many governments are unwilling to Corruption plays a crucial facilitating acknowledge the existence of trafficking, or role. As the socialist systems and economies only recognise trafficking of women into of the former Soviet Union and elsewhere forced prostitution. Even when presented collapsed, some civil servant salaries fell with incontrovertible evidence of extensive below the poverty level. As a result, trafficking of all forms, many governments criminal activities in many countries are still refuse to acknowledge that trafficking organised by, or with the co-operation of, is a problem. officials. Corruption is so extensive in some A number of means are necessary to countries that victims who escape and force governments to act. Research has the report to the police risk being sent back to potential to reveal the scope of the problem, the traffickers. Under these conditions, if not the exact numbers of people traffickers no longer need to build walls or involved. Research should cover all forms put bars on windows. of trafficking, e.g., trafficking of women into forced prostitution, forced marriages, Xenophobic, tightly controlled immi- and forced domestic work, and of men, gration laws in destination countries also women, and children into forced labour or facilitate trafficking (Morrison 2000). slavery in factories, fields, streets, and Countries of destination grant visas for homes. Undercover videos, high-profile highly-skilled workers but not for unskilled media campaigns, and international workers despite the existence of millions of pressure are important tools that have been low-skilled jobs. The gap between strict successful in many countries. immigration policies and the need for migrant labour provides a perfect environ- 2. Objectifying victims and failing to ment for trafficking. Trafficking will consider their human rights probably increase, for example, in Europe, Governments consistently fail to consider where the demand for labour will continue the crime from the perspective of the to grow as birth rates continue to decline. trafficked person and are particularly inept at understanding the problem from the Weaknesses of domestic perspective of trafficked women. They legal responses view trafficking as a problem of organised crime, migration, and/or prostitution, The common thread running through rather than as a human rights abuse. Thus, government responses to trafficking is the advocates bear the burden of educating prevalence of inappropriate or inadequate authorities on the rights and needs of laws and policies. Governments either trafficked persons. A particularly difficult provide some protections to some victims,1 aspect of this work involves demonstrating or no protections at all.2 A partial exception to authorities that women who are to this bleak picture is the recent US trafficked into forced prostitution, forced legislation, which covers all forms of domestic work, and other forms of forced 30

labour should not be deprived of their upon citizenship. This approach allows rights on the grounds that they are governments to treat trafficked persons and undocumented migrants who 'knew' what undocumented migrants in the same to expect and so deserved what they 'got'. manner - to deport them immediately. As a Even governments and NGOs that are result, traffickers are not prosecuted; sincerely concerned about the situation of instead the victims may be prosecuted for trafficked women often treat the women as immigration and labour violations. Some vulnerable and passive objects who are governments only prosecute trafficking into incapable of making reasoned judgments forced prostitution, and may deport and, consequently, need to be rescued and trafficked persons when their testimony is 'rehabilitated'. The reality often stands in no longer needed. stark contrast. Trafficked women, and men, Advocates are constantly forced to are likely to be strong, risk-taking educate officials on the difference between individuals who have made rational trafficking and smuggling. Their work can choices and exercised their own agency in be supported by gathering stories about the deciding to migrate. Unfortunately, they negative consequences of failing to become victims of traffickers. They often distinguish between the two, for example, have compelling reasons for leaving home, about returnees who are harmed or and those reasons remain once they are retrafficked as a result of summary freed. From the trafficked person's deportations. However, unless underlying perspective, their need to feed a family or causes such as unemployment, political send siblings to school may be stronger instability, gender discrimination in than their desire to see their traffickers education, employment, the family, and the brought to justice. political arena, and unrealistic immigration The human rights framework shifts the laws, are addressed, undocumented labour focus away from seeing trafficked persons migration will continue to increase, as will as objects towards understanding them as trafficking of women. people bearing human rights. It also overcomes anti-immigrant bias, misogyny, 4. Improper definition of the crime and contempt towards those trafficked Most governments (and some NGOs) only persons who are also voluntary sex address the trafficking of women (and workers. The human rights framework children) into forced prostitution. This is dictates an empowerment approach to especially a problem in Western Europe, assisting trafficked persons in retaking where other forms of trafficking are ignored control over their lives and in ensuring that completely. This approach privileges one women are treated as adults, not children. gender-specific group of victims. It ensures that women, men, and children who are 3. Conflation of trafficking with trafficked into other forms of forced labour, undocumented migration slavery, or servitude, and young men who Governments consistently conflate are trafficked into forced prostitution are trafficking with undocumented migration. not protected, and that their traffickers are They argue that undocumented migrants not prosecuted. and trafficked persons should be treated in The tendency to objectify trafficked the same way in order to discourage future persons is doubly problematic when the undocumented migration. They adopt a focus is only on women (and children) who two-tiered approach to human rights are trafficked into forced prostitution. This wherein only citizens have rights, despite gendered focus and conflation of trafficking the fact that international human rights law with forced prostitution is especially does not predicate the majority of rights problematic in Western Europe, where Human rights or wrongs? 31 governments and NGOs ignore other forms It has also led to increased trafficking of of trafficking as well as the trafficking of non-Western European women into forced men. Women trafficked into forced prostitution. prostitution are treated as 'madonnas' In sum, current legal responses are (innocent, vulnerable) who need assistance discriminatory, and violate the rights of and support or as 'whores' (conniving, some or all trafficked persons. They also tainted) who need redemption and fail to increase prosecutions or reduce rehabilitation. Governments and some undocumented migration because they fail NGOs are eager to help 'madonna' victims to observe the rights of trafficked persons, but not 'whore' victims. Objectification can or to treat them with dignity and respect. also lead to laws and policies depriving young women of their right to leave their countries of citizenship (often with the The lost opportunity for an support of local NGOs) by withholding international human rights passports or stopping women at the border. framework A human rights approach would lessen the Until recently, no international legal potential for such discriminatory responses. framework existed specifically to address Another negative consequence of all forms of trafficking,5 even though all of conflating trafficking with prostitution is the human rights violations that occur in the development of abolitionist proposals trafficking are covered by existing human to criminalise prostitution and clients (but rights instruments.6 An historic opportunity not the sex workers). Abolitionists believe to incorporate those rights into a new that, by magically prohibiting prostitution, international treaty recently occurred when all forced prostitution and trafficking into the United Nations adopted the Protocol to 4 prostitution will disappear. On the Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking contrary, criminalising prostitution and in Persons, especially Women and Children clients simply gives more power to (United Nations 2000b, c). The complete criminals. It forces independent sex Protocol (United Nations 2000d) consists of workers into the hands of third parties who three documents: the Protocol itself, offer protection from arrest and police relevant provisions of the new Convention abuse. Once the industry is pushed Against Transnational Organized Crime underground, organised crime takes over, (United Nations 2000a), and the Inter- and trafficking into forced prostitution pretative Notes to the Protocol (United increases. Nations 2000e). For example, trafficking in Sweden has The Protocol was created at the UN increased since January 1999, when Sweden Commission on Crime Prevention and began criminalising clients of sex workers. Criminal Justice in Vienna rather than at A National Criminal Police Report found one of the human rights bodies located in that, 'Sweden's sex trade was in danger of Geneva. The NGO community was becoming more violent in the future, as the represented by the Human Rights Caucus,7 law in fact encouraged more women to be which had two goals: to ensure that the brought in from overseas.' It concluded first international definition of trafficking that the new law is protecting the criminals recognises that women, men, and children who now control the industry (Goldsmith are trafficked into forced labour, slavery, 1999). Conversations by the author with sex and servitude; and to incorporate a human workers in Sweden confirm that the new rights framework into the final document. law has forced independent Swedish and The Human Rights Caucus was other European sex workers underground. successful in achieving the first goal. 32

The first international definition of defined in the Protocol, which is therefore trafficking reads: without prejudice to how States Parties '"Trafficking in persons" shall mean the address prostitution in their respective recruitment, transportation, transfer, domestic laws.' (United Nations 2000e) harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of Thus, the compromise recognises the the threat or use of force or other forms of difference between forced (or involuntary) coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, and voluntary adult participation in sex of the abuse of power or of a position of work. Governments can choose to define vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of the terms in any way they choose. payments or benefits to achieve the consent However, there is no reason to include the of a person having control over another two undefined terms in domestic legislation person, for the purpose of exploitation. because they only add unnecessary Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, confusion. Additionally, all possible forms the exploitation of the prostitution of others of trafficking are included in the terms or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced 'forced labour or services, slavery and labour or services, slavery or practices servitude'. Involuntary sex work (like other similar to slavery, servitude or the removal forms of involuntary or forced labour) is or organs.' covered by the term 'forced labour or Slavery, forced labour or services, and services'. Furthermore, voluntary migrant servitude are all defined in other sex work (like other forms of voluntary international instruments8 and cover all migrant labour) is covered by the Smuggling forms of trafficking. The terms 'exploitation Protocol. of the prostitution of others' and 'sexual Countries that decide, nonetheless, to exploitation' are not defined in the Protocol include those two terms in their domestic or anywhere else in international law. They laws will have to define them. Every are undefined and included in the element of a criminal prohibition must be definition as a means to end an clearly stated so that the public is given unnecessary yearlong debate over whether or not voluntary adult prostitution should notice about the prohibited activity, and be defined as trafficking. Delegates were judges and juries will be able to determine unable to reach any agreement on this guilt or innocence. Undefined crimes point and so finally compromised on the violate international human rights norms last day of the negotiations by leaving the and most (or all) of the world's constitutions. terms undefined. This ensures that The Human Rights Caucus was less governments will be able to sign the successful in achieving its second goal. Protocol, despite their different laws on sex Delegates insisted that the Protocol is a work. 'law enforcement' instrument, and that protections must be linked to law The compromise is explained in the enforcement goals, such as witness Interpretative Notes (Travaux preparatoires) to the Protocol: protection. Despite the best efforts of the Human Rights Caucus and a few 'The Travaux preparatoires should delegations to raise the human rights indicate that the Protocol addresses the issues, there was no time to discuss exploitation of the prostitution of others andprotections because so much time was other forms of sexual exploitation only in thewasted on the yearlong debate over context of trafficking in persons. The termsprostitution. "exploitation of the prostitution of others" or The final Protocol, then, is primarily a "other forms of sexual exploitation" are notlaw enforcement tool. Governments Human rights or wrongs? 33

'shall adopt' laws to criminalise trafficking, existing international human rights norms. share information, and extradite suspected The Human Rights Standards document traffickers. They only 'shall consider' and contains specific recommendations on 'shall endeavour' to provide assistance and measures that governments should adopt protections. The Protocol perpetuates the in order to avoid re-victimising trafficked two-tiered approach to human rights. persons. The main goal of advocacy would A unique opportunity to bring human be to ensure that all of the Protocol rights to the foreground of the international provisions (including relevant sections of legal response to trafficking was thus lost the Convention) and all. of the protections and another similar opportunity is highly called for in the Human Rights Standards unlikely. Consequently, the focus now are adopted into domestic law. shifts to the national level, and the burden Advocates can also refer to legislation in of advocating for rights-protective national other countries, but with a highly critical legislation and policies shifts to domestic eye, as bad practices unfortunately far NGOs. outnumber good practices. Paternalistic attitudes or anti-immigration policies are Opportunity and challenge the norm. Advocates might consider encouraging for rights-protective their governments to incorporate the domestic legislative following measures, at a minimum, into the responses trafficking law and policy responses: NGOs can seize this unique opportunity. Equality Never again will so many countries be Trafficking laws must be interpreted and focusing at one time on trafficking applied in a non-discriminatory manner to legislation and policies. All countries that all persons,9 which means that women and ratify the Protocol are obliged to adopt men should have equal access to justice, legislation implementing the Protocol and protections, assistance, and immigration relevant provisions of the Convention. relief in origin and destination countries. Many countries are already drafting new Governments must address the root causes laws and most have little understanding of of trafficking, particularly discriminatory the problem, or what appropriate responses laws and practices that result in higher should be. NGOs can provide much- illiteracy for girls, higher unemployment needed insights on the gender-based causes for women, denial of women's rights to and consequences of trafficking and choose a spouse and plan a future, and lack appropriate legal responses. of protection of women and children from However, most NGOs are unfamiliar violence in the home and in society. with the Protocol and need training, education, and advocacy materials, and Access to justice access to networks with expertise. NGOs The Protocol obliges governments to can study the new Protocol, including the criminalise trafficking10 and corruption, Convention and the Interpretative Notes and vigorously to investigate and prosecute (United Nation 2000d), and the Human officials at all levels.11 Rights Standards for the Treatment of Governments must also ensure that Trafficked Persons (GAATW et al. 1999). trafficked persons have the right to sue The Human Rights Standards were their traffickers for the harm they have developed by organisations worldwide that suffered. Governments must 'ensure' that work with, or advocate on behalf of, trafficked persons have 'the possibility of trafficked persons. They are based upon obtaining compensation for damage 34

suffered'.12 The Convention requires regain control over their lives. During this governments to confiscate the assets of the period, they should be able to contact a traffickers,13 but is silent about how to use doctor and a lawyer, analyse legal options, the assets. Delegates to the negotiations and contact family members and friends at refused to adopt a Human Rights Caucus home to determine whether it is safe to proposal to use confiscated assets, first, to return. pay compensation and reintegration costs The Protocol's immigration provisions to trafficked persons;14 second, to pay for are weak and allow governments to choose whether or not to provide temporary services to trafficked persons in origin and 18 destination countries; and, third, to fund residence. However, governments should anti-trafficking programs in origin and not summarily deport trafficked persons destination countries. who, by definition, have been subjected to Trafficked persons must not be horrific abuse. Summary deportation denies trafficked persons access to justice, and may prosecuted for undocumented entry or place them at risk of retaliation back home. unauthorised work. Specific language may be necessary to ensure that trafficked The law should also provide for longer persons are never prosecuted for stays for witnesses in criminal prosecutions prostitution-related offenses, even if and for trafficked persons who file civil prostitution is prohibited. claims against the traffickers. It should grant permanent residence if returning Protection of trafficked persons home is unsafe or reintegration into the Governments have an obligation to ensure home community would be extremely 19 the security of every person.15 The Protocol difficult. The Protocol language is very and the Convention call upon governments weak on this point but it does encourage to protect the identity and privacy of governments to offer permanent residence 20 trafficked persons, to keep legal 'in appropriate cases'. Provisions should proceedings confidential,16 and to protect also be adopted to permit family members 21 witnesses.17 Domestic law should incorporate to join trafficked persons, if necessary. these protections and also provide Governments should take steps to protections for relatives who are similarly prevent trafficking of migrant domestic threatened. Government should also workers and foreign fiancees. For example, protect trafficked persons who are not women should be given information about witnesses but who are threatened. their legal rights in the destination country. A mechanism might be developed to Immigration law ensure that, upon arrival, foreign domestic Governments must reform their workers and fiancees are placed in contact immigration laws to allow people to with supporting NGOs. migrate legally to meet the domestic Additionally, individuals who facilitate demand for labour. Research and the importation of domestic workers and scholarship are needed to document the fiancees should be required, under criminal link in order to gather support for sanctions, to disclose fully to women the appropriate immigration law reform. background of their potential employer or Immigration laws should not be used to husband, including providing women with punish trafficked persons. Trafficked official government reports on any criminal persons must not be subjected to the same background, financial situation, and treatment as undocumented migrants. present and prior marriages, particularly They should be allowed to remain for a the existence of any prior marriages to reasonable period of time so that they can immigrant women. Human rights or wrongs? 35

Lastly, governments must adopt and • financial or other assistance, for enforce a policy ensuring that all persons example, for food, clothing, and with diplomatic immunity who traffic telephone calls home; domestic workers are expelled from the • a means to return home safely. country. At present, trafficking diplomats are totally exempt from prosecution, are not prevented from bringing in more Conclusion domestic workers, and are rarely expelled Trafficking in human beings is high on the (Connor 2001). international agenda at present. Despite this, NGOs face significant difficulties in Provision of basic services overcoming official reluctance to accept Governments at the Protocol negotiations responsibility for the protection of the refused to accept an obligation to provide rights of trafficked persons. However, by services to trafficked persons despite the working together to bring their voices and existence of human rights principles that the voices of trafficked persons to the 'recognize the right of everyone [including highest national and international levels, non-citizens] to an adequate standard of they can make a difference. They will living..., including adequate food, clothing, ensure that this unique opportunity to and housing', 'the fundamental right of 22 impact on the lives of hundreds of everyone to be free from hunger', and the thousands, perhaps millions, of people obligation to create 'the conditions which worldwide is not lost. would assure all medical service and medical attention in the event of sickness.'23 Some delegates objected in principle and Ann Jordan is Director of the Initiative Against other raised financial concerns. Trafficking in Persons at the International Human Rights Law Group, 1200 18th Street Delegates from poorer countries NW, Washington, DC 20008, USA. pointed out that their governments cannot Tel: +1 202 822-4600, ext. 27; afford to pay for services for their own fax: +1 202 822 4606; citizens, let alone for immigrants. A http://wivw.hrlawgroup.org/initiatives/ Human Rights Caucus proposal to exempt traffickingjpersonsl poor countries from providing services until they are financially capable of doing so was not adopted.24 Notes If governments fail to provide any 1 For example, anti-trafficking laws in services, then NGOs will face the entire Belgium, the Netherlands, and Italy only burden of providing services and seeking cover trafficking into forced sex work. financial support from the government and 2 The majority of countries do not have other sources. The following services, laws criminalising trafficking into forced which could be funded - at least in part - labour, slavery, or servitude. from confiscated assets, should be provided 3 Victims of Trafficking and Violence or funded by the government: Protection Act of 2000 (HR 3244) • basic medical and mental health care; 4 An analogous approach would be to • shelter that is not a form of prison or criminalise all domestic or factory work because some people are trafficked into detention; those forms of labour. • protection from the traffickers; 5 The Convention for the Suppression of • access to information on legal rights and the Traffic in Persons and of the to attorneys or advocates; Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others 36

is an anti-sex work instrument. It has 14 Some countries pay compensation and had a negative impact on women other claims out of confiscated assets. because it has forced the sex industry Others have said they will not do so. underground and pushed women into 15 International Covenant on Civil and the hands of organised criminals. It does Political Rights, article 9.1 not address trafficking into forced 16 Protocol, article 6.1 labour, slavery, and servitude, hence the 17 Convention on Transnational Organized need for a new international instrument. Crime, article 24 6 For example, in the Slavery Convention, 18 Protocol, article 7 the Supplemental Convention on the 19For example, US and Belgium laws Abolition of Slavery, the Slave Trade, make permanent residence available and Institutions and Practices Similar to under certain circumstances. Slavery; and the International Labour 20 Protocol, article 8 Organisation Convention no. 29 21 For example, US law authorises visas for Concerning Forced Labor. family members under certain 7 The Human Rights Caucus members circumstances are: the International Human Rights 22 International Covenant on Economic, Law Group, Foundation Against Social and Cultural Rights, articles 11.2 Trafficking in Women, Global Alliance and 11.3 (United Nations 2002) Against Traffic in Women, Asian 23 International Covenant on Economic, Women's Human Rights Council, La Social and Cultural Rights, article. Strada, Ban-Ying, Fundacion Esperanza, 12.2(d) (United Nations 2002) Foundation for Women, KOK-NGO 24 Protocol, article 6.3 Network Against Trafficking in Women, Women's Consortium of Nigeria, and Women, Law and Development in References Africa (Nigeria). Connor, J. (2001) 'Domestic Slavery', a 8 Slavery Convention, art. 1: 'Slavery is Report prepared for the Council of the status or condition of a person over Europe Committee on Equal Oppor- whom any or all of the powers attaching tunities for Women and Men, Document to the right of ownership are exercised.' 9102, 17 May 2001, http://stars.coe.fr/ ILO Convention no. 19 Concerning doc/docOl/EDOC9102.htm (last checked Forced Labor, art. 2: 'Forced or by author February 2002) compulsory labor [is] all work or service Global Alliance Against Trafficking in which is exacted from any person under Women (GAATW) et al. (1999) 'The the menace of any penalty and for which Human Rights Standards for the the said person has not offered himself Treatment of Trafficked Persons', voluntarily.' Section I of the http: / / www.hrlawgroup.org/ initiatives Supplementary Convention on the /trafficking_persons/ and Abolition of Slavery describes some http://wagner.inet.co.th/org/gaatw/ types of 'servitude'. index.html (last checked by author 9 Protocol, article 14.2 February 2002) 10 Protocol, article 5 Goldsmith, B. (1999) 'Swedish law fails to 11 Convention on Transnational Organized curb prostitution', Stockholm: Reuters Crime, article 8 Stockholm, 7 May 12 Protocol, section 6.6 Morrison, J. (2000) 'The Trafficking and 13 Convention on Transnational Organized Smuggling of Refugees: The End Game Crime, article 12 in European Asylum Policy?', Human rights or wrongs? 37

http: / / www.unhcr.ch/ refworld / pub / Nations Convention Against Trans- wpapers/wpno39.pdf (last checked by national Organized Crime', with author February 2002) annotations: http:/ /www.hrlawgroup. United Nations (2000a) 'United Nations org / initiatives / traf f icking_persons / Convention Against Transnational (last checked by author February 2002) Organized Crime', http://www.odccp. United Nations (2000e) 'Interpretative org / crime_cicp_convention.html* final Notes for the Official Records (Travaux (last checked by author February 2002) Preparatories) of the Negotiation of the United Nations (2000b) 'The Protocol to United Nations Convention Against Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking Transnational Organized Crime and the in Persons, Especially Women and Protocols', http:/ /www.odccp.org/ Children, Supplementing the United crime_cicp_convention_documents.html Nations Convention Against Trans- (last checked by author February 2002) national Organized Crime' United Nations (2002) 'International http:/ /www.odccp.org/crime_cicp_ Covenant on Economic, Social and convention.html#final (last checked by Cultural Rights and International author February 2002) Covenant on Civil and Political Rights' United Nations (2000c) 'The Protocol to http://www.unhcr.ch/html/intlinst.htm Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking (last checked by the author February in Persons, Especially Women and 2002) Children, Supplementing the United Nations Convention Against Trans- national Organized Crime', ratifications at: http:/ /www.odccp.org/crime_cicp_ signatures.html (last checked by author February 2002) United Nations (2000d) 'The Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, Supplementing the United 38

Trafficking in children in West and Central Africa Mike Dottridge

Trafficking of children between various African countries shot to prominence in April 2001 as a result of media reports that a ship carrying 'slave children', the Etireno, had gone missing after being refused permission to land at Libreville in Gabon. When the ship eventually docked in Cotonou in Benin, the port it had first sailed from, some journalists reported that no slaves were found on board. There were 43 trafficked children on the boat, not chained or visibly enslaved. They were accompanied by adults who initially claimed to be relatives, but who, after leaving the boat, did their best to disappear from view. Many of the children remained so intimidated that they did not dare recount the truth about where they came from to social workers at the shelters they were taken to, run by Terre des Hommes and others. This article highlights media portrayal of trafficking in children in West and Central Africa, explains why girls are more likely to be trafficked, and discusses some counter-trafficking initiatives undertaken by a range of institutions.

overty is a central factor in the West African countries was being revealed decision of parents to send their to the public for the first time, and one BBC Pchildren away to work. The prospect journalist claimed that slavery was 'West of good wages in a wealthier country, such Africa's dirty little secret'. The media as Gabon or Cote d'lvoire, makes sending attention also precipitated an expensive children away seem acceptable. The programme by the cocoa and chocolate realities of what migrant or trafficked industry to put its house in order. In children have to face along the route and practice, however, it was West African once they reach their destination are not NGO activists and journalists who had widely known. However, poverty is not the done the bulk of the work in bringing the only factor influencing the pattern of pattern of child trafficking in the region to trafficking of children that occurs in West light, as well as pioneering efforts to assist and Central Africa. The majority, particularly the children concerned. of younger trafficked children, are girls. Western media reports portrayed the There exists an assumption - common in problem as one of slavery, rather than other parts of the world as well - that girls 'mere' trafficking. The reality of today's are best suited for work in the house or slave trade in most parts of the world is linked to the household economy; that girls that adults and children fleeing poverty or will leave their parental household on seeking better prospects are manipulated, marriage; and that it is consequently not deceived, and bullied into working in worth investing in their education or future conditions that they would not choose. For to the same extent as it might be for boys. this reason, the term 'trafficking' is usually more appropriate than 'slavery' - although some children and adults certainly do end Trafficking or slavery? up as slaves. The investigations in West Many media reports in 2001 suggested that Africa revealed that children, many of them the trafficking of children between different younger than 12, were being moved Trafficking in children in West and Central Africa 39 between countries at an alarming rate. with demand highest in relatively well-off While some girls are trafficked into areas such as Gabon, southwest Nigeria, prostitution, most children go into other and southern Cote d'lvoire. forms of work, with the majority of girls employed as domestic servants or street Demand for girls' labour in urban areas vendors. Some are paid, but many are not. The demand in urban areas appears to be In most cases, recruiters promise to send significantly higher for girls than boys. the children's parents some money, and in Girls are sought by adult women, to work a few cases they hand over cash straight for them in the house, or to assist them in away. However, families do not 'sell' their selling food and other products in the children: they send them away in the hope streets and markets. To some extent, that they will make their fortune in therefore, in West Africa as elsewhere, the wealthier cities or countries overseas and - employment by women of other women or mistakenly - they trust the smooth-talking girls to carry out domestic chores is a sign agents who paint a rosy picture of the of women's economic power. children's prospects. Women employers not only say that In numerous cases Western journalists girls are 'more obedient' than boys, and reminded their audiences that the region consequently preferred, but sometimes where children were being enslaved was even know which ethnic group they prefer precisely the same 'Slave Coast' visited by as the 'most obedient'. In contrast, the ships involved historically in the Trans- demand for boys seems to be lower in atlantic slave trade. They seemed to be towns, as they are less frequently employed suggesting that West Africans are as domestic servants. However, boys are irredeemably attached to slavery as a way recruited to work on farms in Cote d'lvoire of recruiting cheap labour, although the and other areas, doing work that accords sentiments were rarely voiced in such racist priority to physical strength. There is also terms. Most reporters focused on the an established pattern of trafficking of sectors where cruelty and exploitation were young Nigerian women from Edo State into most visible - the horrendous experiences prostitution in Europe, but that is not of children in transit and after arriving at covered in this article. their destinations. Very few visited the Gender inequality and child placement children's villages or towns of origin to Undoubtedly, the West African tradition of report on the factors propelling children 'placing' children in other people's away. households has been a major cultural factor encouraging trafficking (and in late 2001 Gender roles and this was said to be largely responsible for inequality: a key factor the large number of West African children living in Britain with families other than Cross-border trafficking of children got their own - reportedly around 10,000).J under way in West Africa on a significant However, other traditions have aggravated scale in the 1980s, based on the region's the situation. The custom of girls marrying traditions of migration and of 'placing' out, leaving their families and often their children to live and work with relatives and community when they get married, means in better off households as part of their up- that families are accustomed to daughters bringing. In some cases, children sent to leaving the household and community at relatives helped with housework. By the some point. Secondly, in communities late 1990s, however, it was clear that there where girls work in the home and are not was a regional market for child labour, kept in school to learn other skills, domestic 40

service and early marriage become the only 'The traffic of children especially concerns career paths available for many. Thirdly, young girls between the ages of eight and 12. rules of inheritance - particularly rules that Children as young as six have also been exclude girls and women from owning or found. There is a very distinct preference on inheriting land - tend to marginalise girls the part of parents to place girls rather than and women in their communities of origin. boys in the service of relatives, be they close An integrated strategy against trafficking or far away. According to the investigation, should encompass these factors, as well as the phenomenon affects 80 per cent of the poverty of many rural areas, the ease children in rural environments, of which 75 with which children can be moved across per cent of the girls have never set foot in a frontiers illegally, and the inclination of school. More than 50 per cent of them are employers to exploit children who are not 2 younger than 14 years old.' their own ruthlessly. The following year (April 1998) WAO- Afrique organised a seminar in Togo, to NGO research and discuss its findings. This was the first investigations occasion when officials from Benin and As early as September 1996, Constitutional Togo met together to talk about the Rights Project, a Nigerian NGO, focused problem, together with representatives of attention on child trafficking inside Nigeria, NGOs and UNICEF. While Togolese as well as into and out of the country, in a government officials were at this point report entitled 'Modernised Slavery - Child unwilling to even use the term 'trafficking' Trade in Nigeria'. At about the same time, to describe the export of children, the WAO-Afrique, an NGO based in Lome Beninois authorities indicated that they (Togo) - which for several years had been were already active in trying to prevent assisting children brought from rural areas children from being taken abroad, and had to work as domestic servants in Lome - intercepted 700 children at border points started investigating reports that large during the first seven months of 1997 alone. numbers of Togolese girls were being taken During 1998, others in West Africa took abroad to work as domestic servants, up the issue. An NGO in Benin, ESAM, principally to Gabon (Effah 1996). (supported by Anti-Slavery International Reporting to a UN working group in and Britain's National Lottery) investigated May 1997 on their findings, WAO-Afrique's the situation of Beninois children taken to director, Cleophas Mally, recalled how his work in Gabon. Its investigators interviewed organisation's investigation of human 138 trafficked children in Gabon, all but one trafficking was sparked by a letter from a of whom were girls. Other testimonies young Togolese woman in Lebanon, revealed that Beninois children were being complaining that she found herself in held in transit at fishing villages in south- conditions amounting to slavery. While east Nigeria, before being embarked in WAO-Afrique prepared to focus on the open canoes to cross the sea to Libreville. trafficking of young women to work as Also in 1998, a newspaper in Cote domestics in the Middle East, however, its d'lvoire denounced the trafficking of investigators found that many more (and children from Burkina Faso and Mali into younger) Togolese girls were being Cote d'lvoire, and claimed that boys were exported to Gabon, an oil-exporting being sold to work on farms for as little as country in central Africa. Reporting to the US$30, producing a range of commercial UN, WAO-Afrique said it had found the crops (IVOIR'SOIR 1998,18). The newspaper following pattern: publicity led the governments of Cote Trafficking in children in West and Central Africa 41 d'lvoire and Mali to set up a commission of Conclusions inquiry and, in September 2000, to sign an agreement to curb the traffic. Virtually all of the research on trafficking of children in West and Central Africa suggests that the majority of trafficked UN and government children are girls. It is clear to investigators responses that gender issues are critical in determining which children are sent away by parents, From 1998 onwards, inter-governmental and which are preferred for employment in organisations started taking an interest in urban households. Gender issues have been the issue, starting with UNICEF, which taken into account when programmes to held a sub-regional workshop on prevent trafficking have been designed - 'Trafficking in Child Domestic Workers, in programmes have stressed in particular the particular Girls in Domestic Service in West value of keeping girls in school as long as and Central Africa', in July 1998. The ILO boys - but these are in their infancy. and the World Bank also became involved, as did the UN Centre for International However, West African policy makers' Crime Prevention, working with ECOWAS sensitivity and commitment to gender (the Economic Community of West African issues are much less obvious. At a very States), to produce an ECOWAS Declaration crude level, the region's governments and Plan of Action Against Trafficking in assume that trafficking is an issue for December 2001. Suddenly it seemed that whichever ministry deals with women's the issue of child trafficking was one that and girl's issues, rather than one which every organisation had to be seen to be should be handled, for example, by the doing something about. Ministry of Labour in the context of mainstream employment and child labour Within two years these international policies. The result so far has been that organisations were virtually tripping over rather ineffective actions have been taken each other to organise programmes and on a piecemeal basis in a way that would help local organisations - but there was almost certainly be unacceptable if the (and is) little effective co-ordination between majority of trafficking victims were men them. Each agrees that its general objective and boys. is to end trafficking of children, but their strategies for doing so differ and so make contradictory demands on the government Mike Dottridge is Director of Anti-Slavery and societies involved. Rather surprisingly, International, Thomas Clarkson House, The the agencies have given very little priority Stableyard, Broomgrove Road, London SW9 to identifying the best practical ways of 9TL, United Kingdom. Tel: +44 (0)207 501 protecting trafficked children once they are 8920; fax +44 (0)207 738 4110; recognised, or to resolving the key question E-mail: [email protected] of whether to leave the children where they http://www.antislavery.org are, while improving their conditions, or whether to remove and repatriate them. One consequence is that a small and unofficial NGO based in Libreville is still tackling this challenge virtually on its own, without the resources or profile that support from international organisations could give it. 42

Notes References 1 This was reported on BBC Radio Four's Effah, J. (1996) Modernised Slavery - Child Today programme in December 2001. Trade in Nigeria, Lagos: Constitutional 2 Cleophas Mally, Director of WAO Rights Project Afrique, in a statement to the Working Diaroukou, Sangho (1998) 'Trafic d'enfants Group on Contemporary Forms of maliens - les auteurs demasques', Slavery (22nd session, Geneva, June IVOIR'SOIR, p.18,18 May 1997) of the UN Sub-commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities. 43

Child marriage and child prostitution: two forms of sexual exploitation Susanne Louis B. Mikhail

This article highlights some of the similarities between child marriages and child prostitution. Both child marriage and prostitution involve economic transactions, lack of freedom, and the violation of a child's right to consent. This is often exacerbated by social and economic vulnerabilities of children linked to limited life options. In order to capture much of the ongoing discussion and debate taking place in North Africa and the Middle East, this article draws on anecdotal evidence, limited research samples, communication with local actors, and the author's own personal experiences in the region. It also discusses some initiatives undertaken by a range of institutions with the aim of preventing these practices.

he countries in North Africa and the Shifting attitudes to early marriage Middle East differ markedly in their However, time has dramatically modified Tlevel of economic development, these general attitudes such that early political climate, degree of secularism, and marriages in general and child marriage in social structures. However, there are some particular are increasingly frowned upon in areas of social life where general attitudes many Middle Eastern and North African and beliefs are similar in many countries. countries. This change has been manifested Child marriages and child prostitution are in various international statements. The two such areas. African Charter on the Rights and of the Traditionally, child marriages and child Welfare of the Child, drafted in 1990, states prostitution have been regarded as being in that, 'Child marriage and the betrothal of moral opposition to each other. While early girls and boys shall be prohibited, and marriages have been respected and valued effective action including legislation shall as desirable and honorable, prostitution has be taken to specify the minimum age of been denounced as an absolute disgrace, marriage to be 18 years.' The Inter-African and in religious circles has usually been Committee on Traditional Practices condemned as a sin. The honour attached Affecting the Health of Women and to early marriage has traditionally been Children states that early marriage is 'any linked to its most central purpose: the marriage carried out below the age of 18, assurance of virginity at the time of before the girl is physically, physiologically marriage.1 In addition, early marriage is a and psychologically ready to shoulder the way of preventing girls from initiating responsibilities of marriage and child intimate relations with unfamiliar men. bearing'. Conversely, child prostitution endorses Not only is child marriage becoming a intimate contact with often unfamiliar men. source of criticism: the discourse of comparing child marriages with child prostitution is also taking a new course. 44

Increasingly, it is argued that the and their client. Similarly, child marriages differences between child marriage and child often involve an economic transaction prostitution are neither as many nor as between the client and supplier. This profound as they were traditionally traditional practice is however explicitly regarded to be, and that both practices prohibited by the 1956 Supplementary share a number of characteristics. This Convention on the Abolition of Slavery, the approach, once promoted by a few, avant- Slave Trade, and Institutions and Practices garde NGOs and human rights advocates, Similar to Slavery. Article 1 states the is now spreading within the general public, institutions and practices similar to slavery political establishment, and cultural elites. where, 'a woman, without the right to In October 2001, the government of refuse, is promised or given in marriage on Morocco held the 'Pan-African Forum payment of a consideration in money or in Against the Sexual Exploitation of Children' kind to her parents [or] guardian family...'. in Rabat. Delegates from 65 countries were amenable to the idea of identifying child Dowry payments marriages in general and forced child In North Africa and the Middle East, the marriages in particular as a type of institution of dowry complicates the situation. The Koraan states that the commercial sexual exploitation of children 1 (child prostitution included). Although this husband must pay a 'mahr to his future wife. approach was primarily espoused by The mahr is prevalent in all Muslim NGOs and human rights lawyers, govern- marriages, but in marriages between two ment representatives were increasingly in adults (where there is a higher degree of agreement with this outlook. equality between the partners), it has less significance and is usually channeled This article outlines ongoing discussions through practical arrangements: for concerning child marriage and child example, husbands might buy the flat while prostitution taking place in North Africa wives contribute to interior furnishing and and the Middle East. Due to the sensitivity contents. Thus, there is a sense of balance surrounding the issues, it has been difficult and the mahr is reciprocated by the bride's to conduct substantial research, and contribution. Mutual contributions to research studies and estimates are often practical items are also common among the based on anecdotal evidence and limited Christians in North Africa and the Middle samples. As a result, I have chosen to refer East. In poor areas, however, where child only sparingly to statistical data, as they are marriage is most prevalent, the dowry often inadequate and not absolutely reliable. becomes of great importance. It turns into a Instead, I have relied on personal field one-way transaction, a clear-cut payment. experiences, and communications with With both child marriages and child various local actors. As a result of the prostitution, exchanged payments are most widespread silence of national legislation frequently received by a third party, and on these issues, and their prevalence in not the girl herself. In child prostitution, the social and religious debate, I have chosen to 'owner/employer' of the child usually use religious texts and documentation as receives the payment. Normally he or she sources of reference. passes on only a small amount to the girl. In child marriages, a girl usually receives Economic transactions: nothing at all. The third party, usually her parents, receives the whole amount. beneficiaries and losers Ironically, the dowry received on the Prostitution is characterised by an economic marriage of a daughter is quite often used transaction, usually between the supplier to pay for the dowry of a son's future bride. Child marriage and child prostitution 45

Though national laws do not regulate commercial form, as broker markets have this kind of payment, the Koraan itself is emerged for young girls to be contracted quite explicit about dowry. Verse 4:004 into 'marriage' to wealthy men from the states, 'And give the women [on their Arab Gulf countries. The agents operate marriage] their dower as a free gift, but if undercover, introducing the families of they, of their good pleasure, remit any part prospective brides to their future husbands, of it to you, take it and enjoy it with right whereupon a contract is drawn between the good cheer.' Clearly, the dowry should be two parties. Since the marriage is illegal it is paid to the woman, in this case the child. not registered, the main point of negotiation being the amount of the mahr (dowry). Siqueh and short-term contract These women's social and economic status marriages does not improve after marriage. They The economic transaction in child marriages often find out that their principal role is to is more similar to that of child prostitution serve the other wives of the wealthy man, in the case of short term/short contract or they are left to fend for themselves and marriages. For example, in Iran, a man can any resulting children after their husband marry a female for a short period of time, disappears when the summer vacation is ranging from hours to months. This system over (Tilgay and Sarhan 2001). called siqueh, was originally put in place to The Ministry of Social Affairs conducted assist war widows who had had no other a study in the summer of 2001 with 35 means of supporting their families. But as women in Badrashen and Hawamdeya, the legal age for marriage is 13.8, this two districts in the municipality of Giza. In practice has actually become a way for men these two districts, broker markets are well to initiate pseudo-legalised child marriages, established. The figures - which are not that may last for only a few hours. representative for Egypt as a whole, because In Egypt there is a similar phenomenon, of the remoteness of these districts - show that which has traditionally been ignored of the 35 women interviewed, 46 per cent because of its sensitivity. However, last had married before they were 16, 29 per cent year the Ministry of Social Affairs, in joint of whom married a husband aged over 55. efforts with UNICEF, investigated this specific type of child marriage. The study Abduction and temporary marriage focused on a village near Cairo, which is In countries where there are conflicts, child well known for marrying its young girls to marriages sometimes take the form of a much older men from Arab countries. combination of child prostitution and pure Usually the men marry these girls for a slavery. In Algeria, Sudan, and Chad, short period - typically during the summer young women have been abducted by months - at the end of which the men go militias or gangsters and are subjected to back to their countries, where it is very sexual abuse and violence in what the hard to trace them. The girls remain in their kidnappers call 'temporary marriages'. In villages, and in many cases they give birth fact, this is a form of slavery in which the to children. The legal age of consent to girls have no rights whatsoever. However, marriage, which is 16, may be circum- these acts are also condemned by the vented in a number of ways, including Koraan which states in verse 24: 033: falsifying the girl's age with a doctor's '... and if any of you slaves ask for a deed certificate, using the birth certificate of a in writing [to enable them to earn their deceased older sister, or registering the freedom for a certain sum] give them such marriage only after the bride has turned 16. a deed if ye know any good in them... but A further problem is that in the last decade force not your maids to prostitution when the phenomenon has taken on a highly they desire chastity...'. 46

Lack of consent: Convention on the Elimination of All powerlessness and Forms of Discrimination against Women violation of rights prescribes for both men and women an equal right to enter marriage, choose a Very few girls are informed of where they spouse, and enter marriage only with their are heading, when they are brought into free and full consent. Finally, the prostitution. Those that have some kind of Convention of the Rights of the Child - idea of the impact it will have on their lives which has been ratified by all Middle are usually very reluctant. Girls are not Eastern and North African countries - given the opportunity to give their consent stresses 'the right of children to have their or otherwise in a decision that will affect views taken into account in matters that their entire life. Similarly, in child marriages, concern them'. girls are usually not given a chance to give The national legislation of the countries their consent. This is instead given by their in the Middle East and North Africa is parents. generally lacking in terms of the protection Few parents seek intentionally to harm of the right to consent to marriage. their children; usually the lack of the child's However, since religious authorities are consent is justified by reference to a general often more highly regarded and respected belief that parents know best in these than legal instruments, they are in a matters. But this kind of argument can only position to use their power of influence work where adult daughters have excellent with reference to verse 4:019 in the Koraan. communication and friendly relationships 'O ye who believe! Ye are forbidden to with their parents. In this situation, parents inherit women against their will.' as well as friends and others can offer Involving a girl in a marriage without substantial advice. However, in child her consent can have dramatic effects on marriages, which most often occur in poor her entire life and all her future prospects areas where parents are responsible for a to become an equal decision maker in the great number of children, the child bride- home. The lack of her consent gives a signal to-be may be just one of many children and to her husband and to society as a whole not a priority. More importantly, at the age that her opinion is unimportant. of 12 or 14 - when most girls are neither physically nor psychologically mature for Lives of bondage childbearing - no man whomsoever is suitable. Child prostitutes worldwide are often Denying children the right to consent to bonded to their owner or employer. marriage is a violation of their rights and a Children's vulnerability means that their crime according to several international freedom to choose whether to stay or leave declarations. Article 16 of the 1948 Universal is extremely restricted. In most cases, the Declaration on Human Rights states that child is seen as a possession or object that 'Marriage shall be entered into only with has been bought and is therefore not free and full consent of the intending entitled to liberty. This kind of bondage is parties.' Article 1 of the 1964 Convention further intensified in contexts where extreme on Consent to Marriage, Minimum age of social stigma is associated with prostitution. Marriage and Registration of Marriage, In other regions such as Asia or Latin states that, 'No marriage shall be legally America, some children are engaged in entered into without the full and free prostitution yet still maintain a relationship consent of both parties, such consent to be with their family, often because of the expressed by them in person as prescribed child's role as a family supporter and by law.' Moreover, article 16.1 of the 1979 financial contributor. In the Middle East, Child marriage and child prostitution 47 however, this is exceptionally rare. A child similar legal rights. In those countries engaged in prostitution is deprived of all where legal mechanisms are being ties to their community, rejected by their developed, for example, Egypt (which is family, and is left with few or no options granting similar legal rights to women), other than to stay in prostitution. practical implementation is very difficult Similarly, when a girl has been given for social and economic reasons. A girl may away as a bride, she is considered to be her find herself trapped within a marriage husband's possession and bonded for life. because she sees no other means of survival. This is particularly the case in societies Loss of adolescence, forced sexual where considerable stigma attaches to relations, and the denial of freedom and divorce. Some North African and Middle personal development have profound Eastern countries, such as Egypt and psychological and emotional consequences Tunisia, give girls the right to divorce, but (UNICEF 2001). Nevertheless, most girls in in reality this is difficult. More often, they such situations have nowhere to go as they are trapped, experiencing early and are surrounded by people who endorse frequent childbirth, and vulnerable to their situation. domestic violence. In Egypt, 29 per cent of married adolescents have been beaten by their Economic and social husbands and, of these, 41 per cent have vulnerability been beaten during pregnancy. In Jordan, Children engaged in prostitution, and those 26 per cent of reported cases of domestic who are married, encounter tremendous violence were committed against wives difficulties in changing their situation. under 18. The dangerous effects of early Some few girls show exceptional strength pregnancy and childbirth are widely (or exceptional desperation), either accepted to include increased risk of dying, persuading their husbands to divorce them, and increased risk of premature labour and or simply running away. However, those severe complications during delivery. few who manage to escape - whether Pregnancy-related deaths are the leading prostitutes or married/divorced - often cause of mortality for 15-19-year-old girls find that their future is characterised by (married or unmarried) worldwide. Those extreme economic and social vulnerability. under age 15 are five times more likely to die than women in their twenties (UNICEF Economic vulnerability 2001). According to the Egyptian Ministry Economic vulnerability exists because of of Social Affairs, the mortality rate of the lack of alternative work and livelihood adolescent mothers is 60 per cent higher opportunities for girls who are usually than that of mothers over 24 (Tilgay and under-educated and under-skilled. Child Sarhan2001). prostitutes and married children have often The general public has little consideration been deprived of substantial education for (or is simply unaware of) international opportunities. A girl who marries becomes declarations that support women's right to a housewife with limited opportunities to divorce. Article 16 of the 1948 Universal continue her education. While child Declaration on Human Rights states that, prostitutes have a theoretical possibility of 'Men and women of full age have the right attending school, as their 'working hours' to found a family. They are entitled to are usually during the night, in practice this equal rights as to consent to marriage, is difficult for various reasons. First, the during marriage and its dissolution.' In 'owner' usually refuses to expose the child most Islamic societies, men are entitled to to the public for fear of people noticing the ask for divorce, while women do not have kind of activity that the child is engaged in. 48

This is particularly the case in Middle prisons. As these girls are seen as public Eastern and North African countries where goods, they become subjected to physical the penalties connected with prostitution violence and sexual abuse in the very are extremely severe - in some cases the institutions that are supposed to protect death penalty - and prostitution occurs them and help them in the recovery undercover as a result. In addition, child process. prostitutes are often involved in household work during the day, or lack the energy and capacity required for schoolwork. Conclusions Child marriage and child prostitution In comparison with other regions such as deny children of school age their right to South-East Asia, Eastern Europe, or Sub- the education. This in turn hinders Saharan Africa, child prostitution is still their potential to earn an income. very limited in North Africa and the Consequently, child marriages and Middle East. Not surprisingly, poverty is prostitution contribute to the 'feminisation the major contributory factor to children's of poverty' (UNICEF 2001). vulnerability to sexual exploitation. Child marriage is also linked to a high Children of the middle and upper classes, degree of wife abandonment, which leaves and educated children in big cities such as girls in a vulnerable situation. This case is Cairo, Amman, and Beirut have more particularly relevant for short term /short protection and can be better informed of contract marriages. The study that was their rights. Children in war-torn countries conducted by the Egyptian Ministry of are more at risk of sexual exploitation, as Social Affairs revealed that of the 35 they live in societies where some degree of women interviewed, 67 per cent had anarchy and breakdown of social protection subsequently divorced. None of these and controls prevails. There are links women received any of the financial between conflicts in Algeria and Sudan and assistance to which they were entitled by the increase in sexual vulnerability of the Koraan. Verse 002:241 assures that 'For children. divorced women maintenance [should be Cultural and social taboos in many provided] on a reasonable [scale].' Middle Eastern and North African Social vulnerability countries have hindered the practical Child prostitutes and married children may administration of sound and adequate both be exposed to community exclusion research. Child prostitution is practised to and/or physical threats. Girls who insist on a much lesser extent than child marriage. divorce usually experience isolation or Most countries have realised the paramount abandonment. In many cases they are importance of protecting children from punished through family-related violence, commercial sexual exploitation, and some and in extreme cases their lives are very harsh penalty measures have been threatened. They run the risk of the so- introduced to combat child prostitution. called 'honour killing'. Lately, however, Despite the rising awareness of the harm there have been some serious efforts by associated with child marriages, very little governments to outlaw such practices. has been practically implemented to Egypt and Jordan have been frontrunners combat this form of exploitation. in combating 'honour killing' through The above-mentioned legal situation tougher legal measures. creates an extraordinary and contradictory Child prostitutes, on the other hand, climate where a man who sexually abuses a often break free from prostitution only to child can on the one hand be sentenced to find themselves placed in institutions or death (if it is a matter of child rape or child Child marriage and child prostitution 49 prostitution), but on the other backed up by been genuinely interested in the well- legal instruments and social approval (if he being of their child, the husbands have chooses to marry the child). been caring and supportive, and the However, as demonstrated in Rabat in children have been given a chance to October 2001, most governments are give their consent, and had the currently in the process of reviewing their opportunity to complete their education. national legislation to offer stronger and But these cases are rare. In the best more comprehensive support for children. circumstances the girl is indifferent, and In addition, NGOs and human rights mostly she is discouraged and wants to groups are progressively and courageously escape, but is unable to do so. I have committed to upholding the rights of the listened to several first-hand stories and child, while religious authorities become many child complaints, and they all increasingly critical of child marriages.2 express similar fears and distress. It is important to bear in mind that boys are also subjected to child prostitution and child marriages, and that they too need the References same kinds of protection. However, as this Tilgay, C. and D. Sarhan (2001) 'Early article has demonstrated the social marriages amongst girls in Egypt; a construction of women's and girls' roles, hidden phenomenon!?', Insight Magazine, responsibilities, and relations mean that March, p.49 they typically have less control over their UNICEF (2001) 'Early Marriage, Child lifes, and fewer life choices and options. Spouses', Innocenti Digest 7: March

Susanne Louis B. Mikhail is Regional Officer for North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia at ECPAT International, 328 Phya Thai Road, Ratchatevi, Bangkok 10400, Thailand. E-mail: [email protected]

Notes 1 The significance of virginity is further manifested by other practices such as female genital mutilation (FGM) - which has been prohibited in a number of Middle Eastern and North African countries, such as Egypt and Mauritania - and 'virginity reconstruction', a practice intended to reconstruct female sex organs to give the impression that a girl is a virgin, though she has had sexual intercourse. Both operations pose considerable risks to girls' health. 2 I feel obliged to mention that though all cases of child prostitution I have encountered have been destructive, some child marriages have appeared to be happy. In these cases the parents have 50

Slavery and gender: women's double exploitation

Beth Herzfeld

For many people, the word slavery conjures up images from history - of the transatlantic slave trade, the practice of buying and selling people that the modern world is supposed to have left behind, and of the 19th century abolitionist movement. But the reality is that not only does slavery exist today, it is expanding. An estimated 27 million women, children, and men are currently enslaved around the world (Bales 1999, 8): Eastern European women are bonded into prostitution in Western Europe; children are trafficked between West African countries; and men are forced to work as slaves on Brazilian agricultural estates. Contemporary slavery can affect people of any age, sex, or race on every continent and in most countries. This article is an introduction to what constitutes slavery. It focuses on bonded labour (the most widespread form of slavery today), and on the worst forms of child labour. It provides examples of the way in which socially constructed expectations can increase women's and children's vulnerability to slavery-like practices.

What is slavery? their children. For example, in the case of bonded labour (also known as debt bondage) Contemporary slavery takes many forms: a debt that keeps individuals or families bonded labour, forced labour, forced and enslaved can be passed on from generation early marriage, the worst forms of child to generation. labour, human trafficking, and 'traditional' slavery. All types of slavery share some of the following key elements, with persons Gender-specific forms of being: slavery • forced to work through the threat or use Poverty, greed, marginalisation - particularly of violence; of women and girls and of minority groups • owned or controlled by an 'employer', - social complicity, and lack of political will usually through mental, physical, or to address the issue, are central to slavery's threatened abuse; existence. Although slavery affects men, • dehumanised, treated as a commodity, women, and children, there are particular or even bought and sold as 'property'; slavery-like practices that are gender- specific. • physically constrained or having Female ritual servitude, which is found restrictions placed on their freedom of in West Africa, is one example of this. movement and freedom to change Under the system of Trokosi in south- employment. eastern Ghana, girls as young as seven are A person can be subject to more than one given by their family to a shrine in order to form of slavery at a given time. In some atone for a family transgression. The family cases, a person is enslaved for several believes that if they do not do this, they months, in others they may be enslaved for will be cursed; this 'contract' can last for their whole lives, passing the status on to generations. Slavery and gender: women's double exploitation 51

As one former Trokosi recounted: Bonded labour and gender 7 was sent to the shrine when I was nine years issues old because my grandmother stole a pair of earrings. I was made to work from dawn until According to the United Nations Working dusk in the fields and when I came home there Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery, was no food for me to eat. When I was 11, the at least 20 million people around the world priest made his first attempt to sleep with me. are affected by bonded labour (United I refused and was beaten mercilessly. The Nations 1999, 36). Bonded labour is most other girls in the shrine told me it was going prevalent in South Asia, but it is also found to keep happening and if I refused I would be in other regions including the Americas beaten to death and the next time he tried and Europe. I gave in. The suffering was too much so I People become bonded when their tried to escape to my parents but they labour is demanded as a means of repayment wouldn't accept me and sent me back to the for a loan, or for money given in advance. shrine. I couldn't understand how my parents Usually they are forced by necessity or are could be so wicked.' tricked into taking a loan in order to pay (Anti-Slavery International 2000,11) for such basic needs as food, medicine, and for social obligations such as the costs of a Although the girls themselves have not wedding or funeral. Some take loans in committed any crime, they are obliged to order to finance their migration, in search work all day in the priest's fields and are forced to act as a wife to him, including of a higher income elsewhere. To repay the providing sexual services. The priest keeps loan, bonded labourers are typically forced several Trokosi at a time. In effect, the priest to work long hours regardless of their age exercises ownership over them. or health, sometimes for seven days a More generally, social and cultural week, 365 days a year. factors play a role in gender decisions over In South Asia, entire families can be whether girls or boys are sent out to work bonded, requiring children, as well as in order to send money back to the family. adults, to work. And once the loan is taken, Because it is expected that girls in many bonded labourers are deprived of their rights societies will leave the home at a future to negotiate terms and conditions of work. date by marrying into another family, girls They are charged high rates of interest, and are often less valued and seen as more because they do not even receive a minimum dispensable than boys. In some cultures, wage, the cycle of interest and debt keeps dowry payments are considered a financial them enslaved. Most have no proof of their drain, meaning that a daughter is seen as a agreement and, if a contract exists, few can burden to (and by) her family. Sending read it, leaving them vulnerable to continued young girls away to work is a way of exploitation. lightening the burden of a poor household. The practice has its roots in South Asia's The work they go to do is seen as suited to caste system, and a disproportionate number girls and women; often it is house-based are dalits (those at the bottom of the caste work (domestic labour), involves making hierarchy) and members of tribal groups. and selling food, or is sex work. In all forms In industries such as agriculture and of slavery, women and girls are subject to quarrying, in some South Asian countries, particular abuse and treatment because of the vast majority of those working as their gender. In the next section, bonded bonded labourers come from those groups. labour, and the additional hardships faced by women who are bonded, are examined. 52

Women's additional hardship The worst forms of child Although all bonded labourers are vulnerable labour to abuse, women suffer additional hardship due to their low social status. They not only The International Labour Organization have to work long hours in the fields and estimates that of the 250 million (ILO 1996) undertake domestic chores in their husband's children aged between five and 14 who employer's home, but they must also fulfil work in developing countries, 120 million domestic duties in their own home. (op. cit.) work full-time, and 80 million (ILO When a husband becomes a bonded 1999, 2) are in work that is harmful to their labourer, it is not unusual for his wife's mental and physical well-being. These labour to be automatically included with figures do not include the number of the man's as repayment by an employer. children who are engaged in the worst And among bonded labourers, women and forms of child labour in Europe and North America. girls are particularly vulnerable to rape by landlords. According to the International Labour Pultalingamma, aged 45 (interviewed in Organization's Convention No. 182, on the 1999), has worked as a bonded labourer in Worst Forms of Child Labour (1999), India for more than 25 years. a child includes anyone under the age of 'My husband died five years ago as a bonded 18, with no exceptions (Article 2) (Brown 2001, 5). The definition of the worst forms labourer. Now I bear the responsibility of of child labour includes: repaying both of our loans / go to work at 6am, cleaning the cattle shed and performing • all forms of slavery or similar practices, domestic chores in the landlord's house. Then such as debt bondage, trafficking, and I go to work in the fields, and return at the end forced or compulsory recruitment of children for use in armed conflict; of the day to resume domestic chores. I return home between six and eight pm to cook for my • the use of children for prostitution and own children I will make sure my pornography; daughter stays in school. I won't let her go • the use of children for illicit activities, and work for the landlord because he will such as the production and trafficking of "spoil" her.' drugs; (Anti-Slavery International 1999) • all work which is likely to endanger the The feudal aspect of bonded labour means health, safety, or morality of children that the person who owes the debt is (Article 3) {ibid). effectively owned while the debt is held. Although some types of work can While a man may nominally take a loan contribute positively to a child's develop- himself, his wife and children may in fact ment as well as providing a vital source of be included in the contract. The slave- income helping to sustain the child and their owner sees the slave as there to satisfy all family, millions of children around the of his needs - labour and otherwise, world are forced into work that is damaging meaning that women are particularly or extremely exploitative. They are denied vulnerable to abuse their right to education, and their physical In addition to women, children are also and mental health - and even their lives - vulnerable, as they are seen as easy to are put at risk. control. They are subject to exploitation that can harm their health and welfare. Gender differences in child labour practices Work in this category constitutes the worst Exploitative employers often prefer forms of child labour. children to adults because they are more Slavery and gender: women's double exploitation 53 vulnerable, easier to control, cheaper, and or no pay and in many cases they sleep less likely to demand better working where they work. Roushan [not her real conditions and higher wages. Most working name], now 14, was trafficked from children around the world work in Bangladesh to India when she was ten agriculture, although the single largest years old. She was taken to the border and form of employment for girls worldwide is sold to a woman for 500 taka (US$6) who domestic work in the homes of strangers. then sold her to a bangle factory. This reflects the general cultural view that 'I didn't know how to make the bangles very girls are well-suited for employment in well, which caused me to be beaten up. There domestic work. They also sell food in open were also older girls there who were markets, and are 'sold off into sex work. threatened that if they didn't work well, they Boys are more likely to be involved in would bring men who would abuse them....' farming and animal herding, quarries (though girls in Nepal also work as stone- Between 100-150 girls and young women breakers), fishing, and some factory work. were locked in the house where they In South Asia, however, girls make worked. They worked long hours and slept bangles, and both boys and girls make there. No beds or pillows were provided, carpets in small 'factories'. so Roushan slept sitting against the wall, In some cases the children or their she said (Anti-Slavery 2001). parents are tricked by traffickers' false promises of good, well-paid work and Working towards ending training, in others they are abducted, as is slavery the case with some child camel jockeys and the children forced to fight for Uganda's Despite the scale of slavery, change is main insurgent group, the Lord's Resistance possible. Anti-Slavery International, the Army (LRA). Boys as young as four from world's oldest international human rights Pakistan, Bangladesh, and parts of Africa organisation, works at the local, national, are abducted and taken to the Middle East and international levels to eliminate forms to be camel jockeys. Desired because they of slavery around the world. are small and light, they are not paid. At the international and national levels, Before a race, they are deprived of food to Anti-Slavery presses governments that are keep them as light as possible. There are not enforcing existing legislation to examples of abuse, severe injuries, and implement it. International and domestic death. laws prohibiting slavery do exist. Key In northern Uganda, abducted children international standards include the 1948 - boys and girls - are believed to constitute Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 90 per cent of the LRA (Coalition Against which applies to all United Nations the Use of Child Soldiers 1999, 114). Boys member states. It prohibits the practice of are used for fighting, looting villages, and slavery in all of its forms. The UN abducting other children. Girls, who are Supplementary Convention on the Abolition also trained as soldiers, are mainly of Slavery, the Slave Trade, and Institutions distributed to LRA soldiers as sex slaves (or and Practices Similar to Slavery (1956), 'wives') (op. cit., 115). If they refuse, they which most states have ratified, and the are killed. International Labour Convention No. 29 Children who work away from their concerning Forced or Compulsory Labour families are particularly vulnerable because (1930), form the key international they are under the complete control of their instruments banning bonded labour. employer. They work long hours for little But the lack of political will to enforce these 54

laws and develop or implement domestic Conclusion legislation allows such slavery as bonded labour to continue. If the elimination of slavery is to be Children are further protected under effective, viable alternatives need to be Article 32 of the UN Convention on the made available for freed slaves, and the Rights of the Child (1989) which states: issue of poverty needs to be addressed. 'States Parties recognize the right of the In Nepal, where in 2000 the government child to be protected from economic declared bonded labour illegal, thousands exploitation and from performing any of freed bonded labourers were forced off work that is likely to be hazardous or to the land. They have had to live in makeshift interfere with the child's education or to be camps, on roadsides, and in forests because harmful to the child's health or physical, the government has both failed to provide mental, spiritual, moral, or social develop- assistance and to allocate land despite its ment.' In 1999, the International Labour promises. As a result their freedom has Organization's Convention No. 82 on the little meaning. Worst Forms of Child Labour defined Slaves need to be empowered to free which of 'the worst forms of child labour' it themselves. This is particularly relevant in is an absolute priority to eradicate. Anti- the case of women and girls who are Slavery International works with local enslaved and who live in societies where partner organisations around the world to women have low social status. In such encourage governments to ratify and situations it can be effective to challenge implement this measure. society's views of women and girls, as well In cases where legislation does not exist, as providing training programmes and we urge governments to develop workable poverty alleviation schemes to empower laws and advocate for their enforcement. In women and develop their confidence in many cases, slavery such as bonded labour themselves. and the practice of using children as The forces of poverty, marginalisation, domestics or to sell items in the market is and social complicity which lead to exploit- so established it is not perceived to be a ation need to be addressed if slavery is to problem. Raising awareness in the countries be eliminated. Solutions must take into concerned is crucial if the public is to account the super-exploitation of women, support initiatives to end this abuse. There particularly where families are enslaved, are a number of examples where raised and also the underlying low status of awareness has led to significant changes. women in many countries, which helps Anti-Slavery's partner in Togo, WAO provide the conditions in which slavery Afrique, for example, has enabled can flourish. communities to realise the dangers of child domestic labour by educating employers Beth Herzfeld is Press Officer at Anti-Slavery and children about children's rights. It also International, Thomas Clarkson House, provides former child domestics with The Stableyard, Broomgrove Road, London, training to give them alternatives and to SW9 9TL, United Kingdom. help them to avoid abusive employment. E-mail: [email protected]; http:llwww.antislavery.org Slavery and gender: women's double exploitation 55

References Anti-Slavery International (1999) Interview Coalition Against the Use of Child Soldiers with Pultalingamma, April, India: Anti- (1999) The Use of Child Soldiers in Africa: Slavery International A Country Analysis of Child Recruitment Anti-Slavery International (2000) Reporter, and Participation in Armed Conflict, Series VIII, 6:1, January London: Coalition Against the Use of Anti-Slavery International (2001) Interview Child Soldiers with Roushan, November, London: Anti- International Labour Organization (ILO) Slavery International (1996) Press Release, 12 November 1996, Bales, Kevin (1999) Disposable People: New Geneva: ILO Slavery in the Global Economy, Berkeley: International Labour Organization (ILO) University of California Press (1999) A New Tool to Combat the Worst Brown, Pins (2001) The New ILO Worst Forms of Child Labour: ILO Convention Forms of Child Labour Convention 1999: Do 182, Geneva: International Labour Office You Know...?, Geneva NGO Group for United Nations (1999) Report of the Working the Convention on the Rights of the Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery, Child Sub-Group on Child Labour, 24th Session, 1999, E/CN.4/Sub. Geneva: Anti-Slavery International 2/1999/17, 20th July, Geneva: United Nations Economic and Social Council 56

Half-hearted protection: what does victim protection really mean for victims of trafficking in Europe?

Elaine Pearson

Anna (not her real name) was trafficked into forced prostitution from Eastern into Western Europe. She was 'rescued' during a police raid for being in the country illegally, and at the moment of arrest was given two choices: either make a statement against the trafficker and gain a temporary right of residence to stay in that country in order to testify; or else return back to her home country immediately. In this paper I look at the kind of measures taken in some European Union countries to protect trafficked persons,1 particularly regarding temporary rights to stay for victims of trafficking, and suggest what else needs to be taken into account in order to combat the problem more effectively.

magine if victims of rape or torture for the purpose of giving testimony and to could only get medical attention if they receive various support services during Iagreed to co-operate with the police in that time. For those who do not testify prosecuting their abusers? Why then is however, options are generally limited to Anna's ultimatum still the standard returning home. approach by law enforcement officials to Particularly for women, the 'option' of situations of trafficking throughout the returning home presents a myriad of world today? With the introduction of a problems. The sexual violence suffered by new United Nations Protocol to Prevent, many trafficked women increases their Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, need for immediate protection and support Especially Women and Children2 in such as medical care, counselling, and legal December 2000, trafficking in people, advice. Another consideration is the effect especially women and children is an issue of moral attitudes towards sex, in their increasingly on the national agenda of countries of origin. In Anna's case, for governments everywhere. Much of this example, her family was unaware that she attention has focused on creating new laws had been trafficked into prostitution. She or ensuring that current laws are used to knew that if they found out that she had prosecute traffickers for their crimes. been forced to work as a prostitute she Protecting the interests of those who are would be shunned by her family and her trafficked has been a secondary priority, entire community at home. Thus, it is and for the most part has been prioritised important to bear in mind the specific only insofar as victims are aiding issues raised for women, who are a prosecutions. In Europe, for example, majority of those trafficked. several countries have laws allowing trafficking victim-witnesses to be given the right to stay in the country of destination Victim protection for victims of trafficking in Europe 57

Victim protection models: permits for victims of trafficking based on a right to stay the Belgian model. Again, the objective is to encourage victims to testify against their In several European countries, such as traffickers.4 Belgium and the Netherlands,3 the focus on protection of victims has been concerned with ensuring the temporary right to stay Limitations for victims. This stemmed from an early While Belgium and the Netherlands have acknowledgement that a major barrier to certainly led the way by initiating such successfully securing the conviction of protection mechanisms, some time has traffickers was the inability or unwillingness passed since the introduction of these of victims to testify. Victims were being measures in each country. The Dutch law deported or removed without any was amended in 1988 and the Belgian law opportunity to report their trafficker, much in 1995. We can now see the clear limitations less testify in court against them. Their of these measures, and these need to be unwillingness was due, amongst many addressed in any new proposed measures things, to the fear of reprisals by the to protect trafficked persons, many of traffickers against themselves and their whom are women. family, and also because victims of Firstly, the Belgian and Dutch models trafficking are often already severely draw a distinction between those who traumatised. testify and those who do not, with the end Both Belgium and the Netherlands result that those who testify are 'rewarded' introduced changes to their immigration (by temporary residence and thus access to laws to grant all victims a 'breathing space', support services in the country), and those a period of time during which they could who do not are 'penalised' (by being forced recover from their ordeal before making a to return home and potentially exposed to more informed decision about whether or threats or reprisals by the traffickers, or not to testify against the trafficker. The simply returned into the same conditions recovery period is 45 days in Belgium, and from which they were originally three months in the Netherlands. In both trafficked). Undoubtedly, the need for countries, extended temporary residence protection increases as victims make the status was offered for those victims who decision to testify against their traffickers, agree to testify. During the period of stay, but that does not mean that those who do various support services are made available not testify (out of fear, or because they are to trafficked persons, such as housing, too traumatised or lack sufficient medical and legal services, counselling, information) should simply be repatriated. language and integration courses, financial Secondly, the Dutch and Belgian models assistance, and in Belgium, the right to are for the most part temporary, tied to the work. Such measures were instituted duration of the criminal proceedings. because it was understood that if victims Under Dutch law, there is a right to were given some time for reflection, and permanent residence on 'humanitarian provided with appropriate care and grounds', but this has been so narrowly support, they would be more likely to construed that it is very rarely ever used report their traffickers. The experience of successfully to attain permanent residence both countries has shown this to be true, as for trafficked persons. In Belgium, it is more victims have reported their traffickers possible for a victim to stay longer if the under the revised laws. prosecution is successful or if s/he proves The European Union is now considering that s/he has become integrated into adopting a Directive regarding short term Belgian society. The need for protection 58

certainly does not end when the trial ends. Ways forward In a successful case, traffickers may be sentenced and imprisoned, but the nature The overarching difficulty with the Belgian of trafficking as organised crime means and Dutch systems for protection are that that victims or their families are still likely they tend to regard the victim in terms of to be threatened or attacked by other their use as a witness, as a tool for the members of the network. For protection to prosecution of the trafficker, and not as a be effective, whether in country of origin or victim of crime and various human rights violations who has been severely destination, it needs to be longer lasting traumatised and is in need of protection than the duration of a court case, and it and support, regardless of her ability to needs to extend beyond the victim to testify. include those close to her. Governments must address the harm to There has been an effort to address this which trafficked persons are subjected in Italy, where residency rights for victims when they return home, regardless of of trafficking are based on the victim's need whether they testify. This harm may range for social protection rather than on a from actions of the state to actions of the willingness to testify. Under Italy's revised immigration law (Law 40 of 1998), individual (the trafficker). It has been trafficked persons may get a renewable reported that trafficked women returning temporary residence permit for six months to Nigeria from Italy, for example, have if they participate in an assistance and been held in detention facilities, forced to integration programme, regardless of undergo medical examinations including whether they report their trafficker to the tests for HIV/AIDS, and had their faces authorities. In effect, the implementation and names exposed in the media. The end still shows a tendency for permits to be result is that families and often entire granted when victims report their communities ostracise returned trafficked traffickers, but at least it is a step in the women. In the Ukraine, Anti-Slavery right direction by removing the quid pro quo International has heard at least one report of residency in exchange for testimony. of corrupt police, given the task of 'protecting' trafficked women, extorting As countries in the European Union and money from returned women by threatening elsewhere adopt and amend laws and to tell their families that they were engaged policies in order to prosecute traffickers in prostitution. There is the additional and protect victims more effectively, we need to look closely at what this 'protection' threat posed by the trafficker or those in means for trafficked persons. Will it only their network who may threaten or harm protect victims in so far as they are co- the victim and their family. As one victim operative with authorities and testify who testified against her trafficker has said, against their traffickers? How will 'I have moved house three times already, measures incorporate the specific needs of but I still get anonymous phone calls trafficked women, especially those suffering saying, "You owe us. We'll get you." They gender-based violence? How far does always know where I am. What can the participating in the prosecution process police do? They do nothing.' empower the victim or further their interests, and how far does it merely expose them and their families to increased danger of reprisals? How can governments protect victims' families in their country of origin? And how can the state continue to protect and support victims in the long term? Victim protection for victims of trafficking in Europe 59

We need to address all of these questions if References we are to ensure that trafficked persons' human rights are protected and promoted Advocacy Net (2000) 'Deportation once they are free from their trafficker. backfires', in Trafficking in Women: Girls for Sale - Building a Coalition to Fight Trafficking in Nigeria, Elaine Pearson is the Trafficking Programme Officer for Anti-Slavery International. She is http: / / www.advocacynet.org/ cpage_ currently conducting a two-year research study view / nigtraffick_deportation_6_36.html into victim protection measures related to (last checked by author 12 February 2002) trafficking in ten countries. Berlin Senate Department of Labour, E-mail: [email protected]; Vocational Training and Women's http://www.antislavery.org Affairs (1998) 'European Strategies to Prevent and Combat Trafficking in Women', proceedings of an International Notes Conference Commemorating the Inter- national Day of Action Against Violence 1 The term 'trafficked persons' is used Against Women, 25-6 November, Berlin throughout this paper to indicate that men, as well as women, are trafficked. Niesner, E. and C. Jones-Pauly (2001) However, the vast majority of those who Trafficking in Women in Europe: are trafficked are indeed women. Prosecution and Victim Protection in a 2 This is attached to the United Nations European Context, Bielefeld: Kleine Convention against Transnational Verlag Organized Crime. The Trafficking Protocol has been signed by 100 countries to date. 3 Austria and Germany also have similar provisions, but shall not be considered in this paper. 4 For further information on victim protection models, see Berlin State Department of Labour, Vocational Training and Women's Affairs (1998) and Niesner and Jones-Pauly (2001). 60 NGO responses to trafficking in women

Marina Tzvetkova

As trafficking worldwide has become increasingly more sophisticated and widespread, some governments are implementing new legislation, hosting international conferences, and signing new and existing conventions. The United Nations (UN) and other Inter-Governmental Organisations (IGOs) are dedicating substantial resources to developing more effective solutions. However, the relative absence of government initiatives and assistance for trafficking victims, means that it is NGOs who have taken up the challenge of organising locally, nationally, and internationally to advocate for and meet the needs of victims, despite their limited resources. This article provides an overview of NGO activity against trafficking in women for sexual exploitation. It is based on an exploratory study undertaken by the Change Anti-Trafficking Programme (ATP) in 2001. The article explores why NGOs are well-placed to work with women victims of trafficking, and their responses to the growing phenomenon in countries of origin and destination. It presents a regional overview of NGO initiatives, and concludes by discussing some of the main obstacles faced by NGOs in combating trafficking for sexual exploitation, and women's and children's vulnerability to slavery-like practices.

ver the past decade many The scope of NGOs organisations - governmental, Despite their limited resources, funding, Onon-governmental and inter- training, and access to information, most governmental - have launched programmes NGOs studied take the lead in combating to address the problem of trafficking of trafficking in their respective countries. women for sexual exploitation. In order to Their anti-trafficking activities, objectives, identify these programmes, in 2001 the and orientation are linked to the social and cultural background of their respective Change Anti-Trafficking Programme (ATP) countries and regions, and reflect local conducted an exploratory study of NGO patterns of trafficking. NGO histories and anti-trafficking activity in countries of relationships with governmental institutions origin, transit, and destination. ATP vary, as does their scope to contribute to collected and analysed data received from social change and development. For 147 organisations representing 64 countries, example, most NGOs in Eastern Europe in response to a short questionnaire sent to emerged at a time of total social instability 857 organisations in Asia, Africa, Latin in the 1990s, a period characterised by America, Europe, North America, the poverty, social change, economic restrictions, Middle East, and the Pacific region. The inflation, and unemployment. Independent findings are summarised in this article. NGO culture was new for peoples who, Analysis of additional information on a until then, had been used to totalitarian further 300 organisations collected through state structures. Many NGOs faced literature reviews, networking, and internet difficulties dealing with the remains of the searches is also included. outdated and oppressive social system, and the absence of a legislative framework or administrative regulations to legitimise NGO responses to trafficking in women 61 their work. A lack of experienced personnel not a homogeneous group with similar and limited capacity constituted further interests. Their diversity is reflected in the challenges, with skills in project manage- interests and issues they promote. Many ment, fundraising, and networking largely women's organisations have worked to absent. These weaknesses and inexperience raise understanding of the importance of were manifested at a time when traffickers gender roles and relations in the national were becoming increasingly predatory and and international arena through their work better at circumventing legal restraints. on issues such as violence against women, A wide range of local, national, and promotion and protection of women's international groups and individuals are human rights worldwide, and women's involved in anti-trafficking work: women's, access to democracy and economic human rights, and development organi- decision-making. Despite the high profile sations, social services and law enforcement of gender within the development and agencies, refugee groups, academic human rights sectors over the past ten institutions, and other professionals. There years, not all NGOs are intrinsically are varied approaches toward particular gender-sensitive. Some have a more problems related to trafficking: different conservative agenda. measures and services are required Despite cultural, political, and depending on the cultural context, country geographical differences, the work and laws and policies, resources, and the services provided to victims and survivors support of local institutions and society. of trafficking by NGOs have some common features. Support for victims often includes WhyNGOs? social and psychological assistance, shelter NGOs are often viewed as being the provision, financial, return, and reinte- 'conscience of government', and represen- gration assistance, telephone advice and tatives of civil society, and have traditionally counselling, housing, vocational training, stepped in where governments have failed legal advice, and documentation assistance. to take the initiative. Trafficking is no exception. NGOs are well-placed to work with trafficked women for several reasons. NGO responses to Many trafficked persons fear and distrust- trafficking in countries of state-based organisations as they frequently origin enter destination countries illegally, or have had their documentation removed on Survivors of trafficking are referred to arrival. Concerns over their immigration support services administered by local status, fear of deportation, and fear of the NGOs on repatriation. NGOs in countries traffickers, torture, death, and being of origin are largely involved in assisting pressurised to testify translate into mistrust women on their return. They meet them at and reluctance to approach statutory the airport and provide them with first aid, agencies for support. Corrupt officials and emergency housing, food and other supplies, the involvement of the police and other law medical care, and immediate psychological enforcement officials can increase distrust. assistance. In some cases they help women Many female victims prefer to discuss to contact their families, or may contact the their situation in a more gender sensitive families directly. For example, La Strada- environment. For this reason, women's Bulgaria sometimes meets parents in NGOs have often been the first line advance of a trafficked woman's return to of action - raising awareness, lobbying explain the situation, and will pay for for change, and providing assistance. parents to come and meet their daughter. It is important to emphasise that NGOs are NGOs in origin countries have limited 62

capacity to provide all the basic needs of Many trafficked women experience returning trafficked survivors. Therefore, complex post-traumatic stress disorders, they must work in co-operation with other and require psychological assistance or professionals and organisations. Most hospitalisation. Many of the NGOs NGOs contacted by ATP reported that they identified in our study offer free had formal or informal referral systems, counselling services or run counselling often based on extensive networking and centres. Counselling centres provide a safe personal resources. The complex needs and and supportive environment for female situations of trafficked women require survivors where they can share their effective, well-established systems of experiences and receive non-judgemental referral. support and understanding. Work with Few local organisations are able to victims experiencing severe trauma is provide shelter to victims of trafficking difficult and requires trained specialists (Durand et al. 2001). Temporary shelters are working under close supervision. No often funded by international agencies and survivor of trauma can recover alone administered by local NGOs, but long-term (Herman 1994). Organisations that offer accommodation is seldom available due to psychological counselling to victims often insufficient funds and resources. Some have to deal with the other immediate shelters are primarily intended for local practical problems that the women may women survivors of domestic violence, have (such as housing, food, medical with the places for trafficking victims being assistance, and safety). There is a danger exceptional and very limited. Local NGOs that the continued social and psychological resort to emergency accommodation such problems experienced by women as renting flats or booking hotels for survivors, if not immediately or adequately women to stay in temporarily before they tackled by counsellors, will prevent them go home to their towns or villages. The from trusting service providers and from need for a long-term solution to the continuing as clients of the respective problem of providing safe accommodation service for the time necessary for them to for female survivors is crucial, particularly recover. considering the fact that while some Legal assistance in countries of origin is women are happy to return to their essential in cases where women want to families, in many cases this is a dangerous instigate legal action against their trafficker. or inappropriate solution. NGOs can offer legal advice and liaise with Assistance to trafficked women requires the respective law enforcement institutions substantial financial resources, and NGOs on women's behalf. However there is little have limited capacity to offer financial that NGOs can do to protect the victim and support. In some countries, women cannot her family if she decides to testify in court, access state support and benefits, either since witness protection is a prerogative of because such benefits are unavailable or the state. Very often, traffickers are local very limited, or because women are not people, who know the victim and her registered with the social security system. family. If the trafficker or their associates Often, returned survivors of trafficking do are not in detention, there is nothing to not have appropriate documents, or are prevent them from seeking vengeance. minors, in which case their parents or Re-integration assistance is an area of family may take responsibility for them, increasing concern that NGOs cannot even though their family may have been approach in isolation. Financial support, involved in their trafficking in the first community support, and state and place. institutional support are essential to NGO responses to trafficking in women 63 prevent women from becoming victims NGO responses to again. Without sufficient support for trafficking in countries of recovery from their traumatic experiences, destination women face difficulties regaining control over their lives and re-integrating into Much of the support for trafficked women society. The re-integration process cannot in destination countries takes the form of be carried out by a single NGO, although outreach work with sex workers, practical some Eastern European and Asian NGOs assistance to women who have managed to put a lot of effort into assisting survivors in escape trafficking, and training initiatives for women who have been granted permits this area of work. The reality is that re- to remain. integration in countries of origin is Shelter in countries of destination is confined to a small number of cases. Some provided to women who have escaped rehabilitation programmes are funded by from trafficking situations or who have the International Organisation of Migration been rescued by the police and granted (IOM) or other international organisations, temporary residence permits to decide and implemented by local organisations. whether to testify against their trafficker. Despite these difficulties, some NGOs do Shelter provision can be controversial. assist women. In Asia we have identified There is a need for a safe place under police small grant programmes for women protection where women survivors of survivors of trafficking or women and girls trafficking can be accommodated. However, at risk. They assist them in developing their women who hold the status of illegal own business or continuing their education immigrant, or who have been involved in (Durand et al. 2001). In some Eastern illegal prostitution, will be fearful of European countries, NGOs organise coming to a police shelter since they risk vocational training and other courses for detention. Those who wish to escape from women survivors. Nevertheless, compre- prostitution, but do not want to return to hensive re-integration strategies in their country of origin, cannot benefit from accommodation provision if they hold the countries of origin do not exist because of status of illegal immigrants. Trafficked insufficient social security funds and women who have decided to continue to limited resources. Re-integration also work as prostitutes indepen-dent of pimps requires improving the economic and social and brothel owners will be unable to access conditions of women, and the efforts of shelter services. Shelters may also be an various professionals and institutions to inappropriate solution for them. this end. In many patriarchal societies, such Social services provided to trafficking as Albania, Bangladesh, Iran, and others, it victims often include social, psychological, is very difficult for women to re-integrate and medical advice and assistance. Again, into their communities, as their options are women can only access these services when very limited (Association for Community they are rescued after police raids or Development 2001). Community-based passport checks and referred by the police, approaches to the sensitisation of society or occasionally if they manage to escape to gender and human rights issues from trafficking themselves or with the therefore become an essential part of the help of clients. re-integration process. Outreach work carried out by NGOs in destination countries can be an effective way to reach trafficked women. Illegal immigrants are often not aware that 64

support services are available, or are afraid who wish to testify against their traffickers to seek help. Those kept in isolation or in court. However, women often refrain imprisonment are often unable to meet any from testifying in court against their external contacts apart from their clients traffickers. There are complex reasons for and pimps. Many social and medical this, including the fear that they or their service providers use outreach workers to relatives may be in danger of retaliation talk directly to women on the streets. It can attacks. This is reinforced by weak or non- take time for such workers to convince existing witness protection schemes. trafficked women that they are not linked Current legislation on migration also to immigration services or the police. discourages trafficked women to take the Outreach work is usually organised around risks of testifying. Often, even survivors health education and medical services for who wish to testify find it very difficult to women in prostitution. Sometimes discuss what happened to them. information in different languages is Sometimes it may take considerable time circulated so foreign women can find out before women are able to talk about their about the services available. Many experiences. organisations employ foreign women as In cases where women are granted outreach workers or translators. Outreach residence permits, NGOs in co-operation service providers frequently work to try to with social services in countries of empower women who are already in destination can commence the difficult prostitution so that they are able to take process of assisting women to integrate care of themselves. into the host community. Common Legal and administrative support is assistance measures include provision of provided by NGOs to help trafficked counselling, housing, social and financial women to deal with local authorities, support, and vocational and language immigration, and police. They may support training. A network of organisations trafficking victims in court, provide legal participate in the integration process. Some advice and documentation assistance, and of them do not work specifically with produce and disseminate information on trafficked women, but assist migrants in the rights of migrant and trafficked general. women. Foreign women in destination For women who wish to return to their countries often possess false passports or home countries, some NGOs in destination none at all. They are particularly countries offer assistance through organising vulnerable where they do not speak the and paying for travel, providing support language of the country, or are not aware while a woman is awaiting to being of their rights. Even in Italy, the repatriated, liaising with the embassy of Netherlands, or Germany, where police her home country, and arranging the could help them contact relevant NGOs for necessary travel documents for her. In assistance, trafficked women are afraid of special cases, representatives of these escaping because they fear detention as organisations escort women to their country illegal migrants, and punishment by the of origin. traffickers. NGO assistance is very much dependent NGOs' role in prevention, on the national legislation on trafficking and the immigration policies of host lobbying, and research countries. Some European countries, such Many anti-trafficking organisations in as Germany and the Netherlands, have origin and destination countries play an introduced short stay permits for women important role in research, prevention, NGO responses to trafficking in women 65 advocacy, and awareness-raising. Prevention the Philippines and Thailand), Latin America activities carried out by NGOs include (Brazil, Colombia, and the Dominican information campaigns, gender education Republic), and Africa, particularly West in schools, vocational training for women, Africa. In East and South-East Asia, the training teachers and school advisers to main countries of origin are Thailand, recognise those at risk, and facilitating China, the Philippines, Burma /Myanmar, women at risk to access employment and Vietnam, and Cambodia, while Japan is a career development opportunities. major country of destination (Human An important component of prevention Rights Watch 2000). Asian women are sold work in origin countries is the tackling of to North American brothels, and are gender stereotypes, and increasing trafficked to Australia and increasingly to sensitisation on themes related to violence the Middle East and Gulf States. The against women and women's rights. NGOs following are some of the most interesting in destination countries publish findings that emerged from our research. educational materials for migrant women, and provide training and technical and Asia financial assistance to their partners from In Asia, trafficking in women has been a the countries of origin. serious problem for years. Consequently, a wide range of local and international NGOs International and local NGOs have provide services to Asian trafficking carried out valuable lobbying and victims. awareness-raising work in bringing Most NGOs contacted by ATP were trafficking issues to the attention of from origin countries. Organisations such governments, and advocating for the need as Maiti Nepal, Action Aid India, and to treat trafficking as a human rights Foundation for Women Thailand administer violation. Many local and international or support rehabilitation centres where organisations are active in writing women can have access to counselling recommendations for legislation and policy services, legal and medical assistance, or developments, and participating in political where referral to these services is available forums. (Durand et al. 2001). Asian NGOs also carry out preventative work in their local Regional overview of NGO communities, and initiatives to promote women's and children's rights. Activities responses to trafficking include educational programmes for For ATP's research, organisations in women and girls at risk, vocational training countries of origin, transit, and destination for women, and administration of grants were sent a questionnaire focused around and loans for women who want to start two basic questions about what services their own businesses. were being provided, and which activities Maiti Nepal co-ordinates diverse social developed. services for both women and girl victims of Trafficking in women and girls is trafficking, and potential victims of widespread and global, but there are trafficking. It has three Prevention Camps different country-specific and regional where children at high risk are given trends. Eastern Europe is both a region of information on what trafficking is. They are origin and destination for trafficking, with trained in different skills for a period of six the Balkans one of the important destination months, and later provided with micro- points. Western Europe is the main region funds to ensure sustainability. Maiti Nepal of destination for women trafficked from also has transit homes for short stays in the Eastern European countries, Asia (mainly border areas, and a rehabilitation and 66

protection centre which ensures that girls A few organisations work in partnership have a safe place to live. They attend a with NGOs in Asia and Eastern Europe, nearby school and return each night to the providing them with technical and financial centre, where there is an emphasis on assistance. They also carry out training improving their health and education. initiatives for partners' members and local judiciary and criminal justice systems. The Africa framework of these partnerships is to Despite the seriousness of the problem in develop culturally-sensitive responses to Africa, trafficking in women is not the prevention of trafficking or the recognised as an issue of primary concern provision of assistance to trafficked amongst the other development problems women. that Africa faces. Organisations in Africa focus on violence against women, and The Pacific gender and development. Legal assistance In the Pacific region we had respondents and primary support is provided to women from Australia, the Fiji Islands, the victims of diverse forms of violence Philippines, and New Zealand. Australia including trafficking. African NGOs also and New Zealand are major destination undertake public education and awareness countries for Asian women. In the Fiji campaigns on issues related to trafficking. Islands, the Labasa Women's Forum co- ordinates direct services to women as well Latin America as developing prevention, education, and Latin America was the most difficult region awarenessness-raising strategies. The Fiji to contact in relation to anti-trafficking Women's Rights Movement runs a gender, initiatives. The main feature of the Latin employment, and economic rights project, American NGOs working on trafficking is which focuses on women migrant workers that they aim at broader issues such as including trafficking. In the Philippines prostitution, and human rights of migrants there is a national alliance of women's and children. In fact, most organisations organisations called Gabriela. Gabriela is contacted viewed trafficking as a secondary made up of 42,000 members from 250 issue related to prostitution, sexual organisations, institutions, and women's exploitation, or illegal migration. Most desks or programmes within other NGOs work directly with women - institutions. Gabriela launched the Purple migrants or prostitutes - providing social Rose Campaign, an international campaign services, psychological and legal assistance, against the sex trafficking of Filipino and counselling. women and children. The campaign is a massive public information and education Western Europe and North America strategy intended to raise public Western European and North American consciousness of sex-trafficking issues, to organisations are more active in research, provide services to sex-trafficked women, advocacy, and lobbying. They implement and to organise the survivors. public awareness and advocacy campaigns nationally and sometimes internationally. Middle East Many organisations develop strategies for Despite difficulties in eliciting information improving and enforcing national and from the Middle East, ATP discovered that international laws related to trafficking. For a network to protect trafficking victims is this reason, they carry out research on being developed in the region, mainly sexual exploitation, and the links between through voluntary work and without much prostitution and trafficking in women and governmental support. The responses from children (Parker 1998; Farley et al. 1998). the Middle East highlight two important NGO responses to trafficking in women 67 trends in the region. Firstly, the Middle tended to focus on introducing and East is a major destination area for implementing new and existing legislation trafficked women. Secondly, there is a and hosting conferences. Recently, widespread lack of legal provision to governments have begun to provide address the issue. This significantly affects variable amounts of funding for a range of the work of local organisations. In this practical anti-trafficking initiatives. respect, in Israel, research and publications NGOs face considerable barriers in are used in particular to raise awareness combating trafficking for sexual exploitation. about the inadequacy of legal provisions Some of these difficulties arise from the that treat victims of trafficking as 'illegal lack of a strong political will to confront aliens', and place them in detention and address the problem. Governments, (Amnesty International 2000). NGOs, police, and law enforcement personnel need to work together to combat Eastern Europe trafficking. Government will and effort is The diversity of anti-trafficking activities integral to addressing both the supply and within Eastern Europe is indicative of the demand factors that underlie and fuel extent to which the region is affected by trafficking. trafficking. Two important areas of work There is also very little attention paid to include a wide range of prevention gender issues within decision-making initiatives and work on rehabilitation and processes and with regard to policy re-integration of women survivors of formulation and service provision, yet trafficking (La Strada-Czech Republic gender inequality is a major factor 2001). The La Strada network, active in contributing to the problem of trafficking of eight countries in the region, raises women for sexual exploitation. In addition, awareness and educates local communities, strong social and cultural constraints mean professional networks, and vulnerable that addressing unequal gender relations groups of women and girls about the risks and the social construction of women's of trafficking. La Strada-Poland has roles is difficult. These barriers and produced a video, 'You Have [a] Right to constraints severely limit the contributions Dream, You Have [a] Right to Know', which that NGOs can make to addressing both tells the story of a trafficking victim. It was supply and demand factors of trafficking. disseminated in several countries and used Prevention measures aimed at raising as a part of lectures in many schools in awareness of trafficking, risk recognition, Poland, Ukraine, and Bulgaria. The vulnerability avoidance, and support International Organisation of Migration networks are essential components of any (IOM) organised information campaigns in anti-trafficking strategy. Long term south-eastern Europe. Various projects in prevention initiatives require that we Romania, Bulgaria, Kosovo, and Ukraine confront and address the gender roles and are being developed to assist rehabilitation relations that exist (albeit in different of women survivors of trafficking (Reaching forms) in every society and manifest Out 2000; Minnesota Advocates for Human themselves in discriminatory practices and Rights 2000; Animus Association 2001). limited opportunities for girls and women at home and the workplace. It means ensuring that women have access to viable Conclusion economic opportunities as well as political Our research suggests that much of the decision making within their countries of anti-trafficking work that addresses the origin. Gender analysis in support of needs of trafficked victims and those at risk prevention would provide a useful is undertaken by NGOs. Governments have approach for tackling trafficking issues. 68

An additional concern is the inadequate References focus placed on the 'demand' side of trafficking for sexual exploitation. Amnesty International (2000) Human Rights Although anti-trafficking experts are Abuses of Women Trafficked from Countries divided in their considerations of the harm of the Former Soviet Union into Israel's Sex caused to women by the sex industry, there Industry, London: Amnesty International is a general consensus that the sex industry Animus Association (2001) Trafficking in is expanding rapidly worldwide. Unless Women: Questions and Answers, Sofia: there is political will to address the Animus Association connections between this and trafficking, Association for Community Development NGOs can essentially only hope to dress (ACD) (2001) 'Paradigms of Women the wound with a sticking plaster. Trafficking in Bangladesh', Bangladesh: ACD Marina Tzvetkova is Programme Officer at Durand, T., V. Lattuada, M. Tzvetkova, and CHANGE, Anti-Trafftcking Programme, Bon A. Plakantonaki (2001) Anti-Trafficking Marche Centre, 241-51 Ferndale Road, LondonProgramme, Preliminary Study Report, SW9 8BJ, United Kingdom. London: Change Tel: +44 (0)20 7733 9928; Farley, M., I Baral, M. Kiremire, and U. E-mail: [email protected] Sezgun (1998) 'Prostitution in five countries: violence and post-traumatic stress disorder', Feminism and Psychology 8(4): 405-26 Herman, J.L. (1994) Trauma and Recovery, from Domestic Abuse to Political Terror, London: Pandora Human Rights Watch (2000) Owed Justice, Thai Women Trafficked into Debt Bondage in Japan, New York: Human Rights Watch La Strada-Czech Republic (2001) Final Report, Prague: La Strada Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights (2000) Trafficking in Women: Moldova and Ukraine, Minneapolis: Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights Parker, J. (1998) How Prostitution Works, http:/ / www.prostitutionresearch.com/ parker-how.html (last checked by the author October 2001) Reaching Out (2000) Annual Activity Report 2000, Romania: Reaching Out 69 A tale of two cities: shifting the paradigm of anti-trafficking programmes Smarajit Jana, Nandinee Bandyopadhyay, Mrinal Kanti Dutta, and Amitrajit Saha

T7n's article examines the issue of trafficking from the perspective of some sex worker organisations in India and Bangladesh. It argues that inequality between classes, genders, and nations is the root cause of trafficking, and that the solution to the problem lies in a political struggle for the rights of marginalised people. To substantiate these arguments, this article draws on the life stories of trafficked people, and on the preventative anti-trafficking initiatives of sex workers' organisations. In order to understand the ways in which trafficking violates people's rights and restricts their control over their lives we need to focus on the outcomes of trafficking rather than debating.the processes through which trafficking takes place. Those who have been trafficked should not be perceived as passive victims of their circumstances, manipulated by others, but as human agents, who can - and often do -fight to gain control over their lives. The article offers a brief introduction and some guidance to some of the challenges that NGOs will face in their advocacy work on trafficking issues.

ver the last decade, the issue of ponder for a minute, it is clear that for both trafficking has dominated inter- postulations to be true at the same time, Onational development debates. The something must be wrong. Either the ways in which the dominant discourses on definitions or perceptions of trafficking and trafficking are framed are based on certain the estimates of its volume must be assumptions and beliefs which have now mistaken, or the types of anti-trafficking come to be taken as the 'truth', without initiatives intended to address it have been being challenged. These discourses usually ineffective. In this article we present our define trafficking as a process where a own understanding of this issue, based on person loses control over their own life; our experiences of working with sex they equate sex work to trafficking, and workers' organisations running anti- stress the restriction of movement of trafficking programmes. weaker and vulnerable sections of society. Police rescue and so-called 'rehabilitation' initiatives become the cornerstone of most Redefining trafficking of the programmes arising out of this In order to have an impact on trafficking thinking. At international conferences on we need to focus on two courses of action, trafficking, as well as in the popular media, namely, exploring the root causes of those who are involved in anti-trafficking trafficking, and recognising the positive efforts contend tenaciously that the role of human agency. Durbar Mahila trafficking of people across international Samanwaya Committee (DMSC) in borders has escalated dramatically in the Kolkata, one of the largest organised last decade. Equally, it is asserted that the groups for sex workers, defines trafficking funding of activities to curb trafficking has as an outcome of a process where: also grown exponentially. If we stop to 70

• people are recruited and moved within process that is instrumental in leaving the or across national borders without trafficked person with little or no option to informed consent, and coerced into a leave the place or position in which they 'job' or occupation against their will; find themselves. Trafficked persons are • the trafficked individual loses control recruited into various jobs, for which they over his/her occupation and life. can be made to work without the wages or the minimum benefits that have to be People have always left home in search of provided to regular members of the labour new lives, better livelihoods, or simply to force. If the entire employment market, in seek adventure. Traditionally, women often both formal and unorganised sectors, could had to hold back on exploring alternatives be regulated in adherence to national and because of rigid gender norms and lack of international labour laws protecting the opportunities. As a result of globalisation, rights of workers, and if all workers were the realignment of social and cultural conscious of their labour rights, were relations, and radical changes in the labour organised, and had a role in regulating the market, mean that more and more women, workplace, the demand for trafficked who were traditionally confined to the labour would cease to exist. home, are now seeking alternative, preferred, and more viable livelihood options elsewhere. Patriarchal legislation and DMSC sees this as a positive and controls potentially revolutionary development, creating a window of opportunity to Recently, in countries across the world, challenge existing gender and class more and more stringent laws have been inequalities. However, existing political introduced to curb trafficking in order to systems, combined with increasingly protect women. In effect, these laws restrict stringent anti-immigration national laws in the free movement of women. Bangladesh, most countries, make such migration which is one of the major labour exporting hazardous, particularly for poor or countries of South Asia, has enacted a law marginalised aspiring migrants who are preventing single women from travelling vulnerable to being smuggled illegally into across its borders. Not only do such laws the countries they seek to enter. As long as violate the fundamental human right to the current economic globalisation process mobility, and discriminate against women, privileges movement of finance capital they also exacerbate the vulnerability of while restricting the movement of labour or women to being trafficked: where no legal human capital across national borders, options are available to them, they must trafficking of people will continue. depend on the illicit options offered by Women, men, and children are trafficked traffickers. Special booths have been set up for various purposes, such as marriage, by the state in collaboration with NGOs at agricultural labour, working in various the borders where women crossing the informal sector industries, domestic labour, frontier are interrogated in order to verify participating in dangerous sports such as their identity and to judge whether they camel racing, recruitment in armed conflict, may be allowed to continue (CARE 2001a). and for sex work. It is often argued, in several forums, The most critical element of trafficking that restricting movement across borders, is not necessarily the process through through new legislation or more stringent which a person is trafficked, nor the nature implementation of existing laws, prevents of the job or practices for which the person trafficking. In fact, these kinds of is trafficked: rather, it is the outcome of that restrictions can work to strengthen the Shifting the paradigm of anti-trafficking programmes 71 influence of organised crime. The prime It is very critical that we look into the motivating factor that impels people to issue of participation in this regard. That move from villages to cities and from one the direct participation of those who are country to another is their aspiration to trafficked in preventing and ameliorating improve their life conditions, a basic social the effects of trafficking is both ethical and instinct that has always shaped human effective has been demonstrated by the civilisation. If people cannot migrate experiences of the Durbar Mahila legally, they will resort to illegal Samanwaya Committee (DMSC) in this mechanisms. Only large, organised criminal regard (Durbar Mahila Samanwaya networks have the resources and where- Committee 1998, 1999, 2001). Moreover, withal to bypass strict state control at DMSC's expertise, based on its achieve- international borders. This in turn leads to ments in the last couple of years, has the development of ever larger crime already been transferred to other sex syndicates, as has happened in Eastern worker organisations in Bangladesh. Europe. Stricter border control also increases the Tales from two cities: the risks for those who are trafficked, as traffickers choose increasingly hazardous realities of trafficking and routes and methods to escape detection. anti-trafficking work Moreover, such controls expose women to The following stories demonstrate the greater exploitation because of existing different realities of women trafficked into gender inequalities and social vulnerabilities. sex work. The reasons why many women Only global structural political and and girls are trafficked into prostitution economic changes can create a new include a combination of individualised scenario where trafficking becomes choices to improve their situation through redundant. For example, unrestricted seeking better lives and employment movement of labour across international opportunities in cities and other countries. borders would mean that a poor Third These choices are not afforded to them World woman could travel legitimately to a within their own setting due to poverty, First World market to seek employment, discrimination, inequality, and in some just as her richer and more qualified cases, gender-based violence. counter-part is able to. Access to legitimate avenues of migration would reduce the risk Farzana's story: seeking a better life of being entrapped by a trafficker. Farzana left her village in 1997, determined Universal education and equal access to to find new opportunities and a better life. information would also reduce the risk of She stayed with a friend in a city slum, potential migrants being deceived by who, after a couple of weeks, found her a traffickers. job in a garment factory. Within a couple of When it comes to dealing with those months her supervisor started paying her who have already been trafficked, no unwelcome attention and finally proposed attempt has been made to implement a set to her. She did not like him, so she refused. of standard rules, code of conduct, or self- The supervisor sacked her. The sense of imposed norms by the NGOs or state liberty and freedom that she had now agencies who implement rescue and experienced, especially in contrast with the rehabilitation programmes. Nor has any life she had led before coming to Dhaka effort been made to enable the participation and working, stopped Farzana from going of those trafficked in designing a back to her village. She was determined to programme of rehabilitation. find something better. 72

She got an offer to work in the The role of human agency: Farzana's neighbouring town of Narayanganj and aspirations, choices, and risks. took it up. However, she found herself Farzana's story raises a number of issues. trafficked into a brothel in Tanbazar.1 She When Farzana left for Dhaka, it was not tried to run away but was unsuccessful, mere poverty that drove her. She risked and continued to work as a bonded venturing out into the unknown because labourer. After a year she paid off her debt she could no longer accept the circum- to the brothel owner and was free to leave. stances under which she was forced to live At this juncture she pondered over what to at home. As soon as she had reached do next. Eventually she decided to continue puberty she was withdrawn from school. She was not even allowed to study at home in the sex trade, as many others do. since her father had decided it would be a In the middle of one night in 1999, bad investment, as she would eventually policemen broke open the door of marry into another family. She was not Farzana's room in the brothel and kicked allowed to play with her friends in the her out. Along with many other sex fields any longer. All she did was work at workers, she was pushed into a police van home from dawn until dusk performing and taken to a remand home. At the repetitive, mind-numbing, and unending remand home she was persistently abused, household chores. This work would never physically and sexually. Her only hope for teach her skills that could earn her a living. getting out of the remand home was to It was her aspiration to break free of the accept the rehabilitation programme boundaries imposed on her as an offered by the government. This adolescent Muslim girl in a Bangladeshi rehabilitation package included 5000 taka in village, and her determination to get more cash and a sewing machine. Farzana was out of life, that brought Farzana to the city. The fact that someone who was not told that if she did not accept the deal she allowed to leave home could make such a would have to remain in the home forever. life-changing move represents a triumph of She agreed, but then the authorities human agency. The question we have to stipulated that unless her parents came to confront now is: how far are we ready to take custody of her, Farzana would not be acknowledge and respect Farzana's human allowed to leave the home. agency, and accept her right to find her There was no way Farzana could get in own destiny? touch with her parents and persuade them In the city, Farzana found a job. For the to come and 'rescue' her. By this time, first time in her life she was independent. however, Farzana had learnt that there She acquired new skills and earned money were people who would pose as her over which she had control. With her co- parents in exchange for 4500 of the 5000 workers she could walk in the city streets taka, and the sewing machine. Farzana whenever she wanted. However, when she came out of the home with many others. decided to extend her new-found autonomy Having lost all her savings at the time of to thwart the designs of her supervisor, she the eviction, all she had with her was 500 lost her job. taka. With 500 taka in her pocket and no Farzana could have returned home at place to live, she had no other option but to this point. But knowing what awaited her take to the streets or try and find another there, she did not want to forego her hard- job in the garments industry. earned freedom. So she desperately looked for another job. It was at this juncture that she was trafficked. An agent who had Shifting the paradigm of anti-trafficking programmes 73 promised to find her another job sold her to was insulted and physically abused. She a brothel owner, making a tidy profit. The was then imprisoned in a remand home, brothel owner too made money out of once again finding herself in a situation Farzana's vulnerability by making her over which she had no control. In addition, work without wages until she had made she was sexually exploited and abused at substantial profits over and above the the remand home while under the supposed money she had invested in procuring protection of the state. Farzana now found Farzana. herself in a situation no different from the Until the brothel owner was satisfied one under which she lived when she was with her profit, Farzana was bonded and trafficked. This raises the question of could not opt out of the condition she whether forced 'rehabilitation' ought to be found herself in, however much she seen as trafficking too. wanted to. It is to be noted that after The government then unilaterally overcoming the constraints imposed on her decided on a rehabilitation deal for by social conditions against all odds on two imprisoned sex workers. None of the sex earlier instances, Farzana, not having any workers were consulted about what they resource other than her own free will and wanted, completely disregarding their determination, could no longer surmount agency. Secondly, they were offered no the material boundaries of her situation. choice in the matter: they were told that if However, the period of bondage came they did not accept the government to an end after one year. Once again, package they would have to resign Farzana was at a crossroads. She had to themselves to life-long imprisonment. The decide whether to continue working in the government then imposed the additional sex trade or to take her chances in other job condition that the rehabilitation package markets. Considering all her options, would be handed over to the sex workers Farzana decided to continue to work as a only with their parents' authorisation. This sex worker. At this point, Farzana had infantilised the sex workers, and created some control over her working conditions the conditions for further exploitation. The and was free to leave the trade whenever entire exercise clearly demonstrates how she wanted. any scheme that is designed with no What needs to be understood is that consultation with the intended users can be even in such adversity, Farzana managed counter-productive. to escape from her trafficked conditions. At this point she can no longer be considered Who is to blame? to be 'in a trafficked situation'. It is to be Farzana found herself on the streets again, noted that all trafficking situations are exposed to greater vulnerability than time-bound and usually do not extend before. We must ask ourselves, is it not the throughout someone's entire life, or inter- lack of appropriate work environment and generationally. This has significant conditions in formal and informal sectors, implications for future anti-trafficking such as the garments industry and the sex approaches and strategies. trade, that facilitates perpetual exploitation of the most vulnerable groups? Had there Farzana's experience of forced been proper protection of labour rights in rehabilitation the garments industry, Farzana would not Government policy to evict all sex workers have been sacked at the whim of her and place them .in a remand home put paid supervisor in the first place. Had there been to Farzana's prospects. In violation of her adequate trade regulations within the sex fundamental rights, she was forcibly industry, Farzana or any other sex worker evicted from her home and workplace. She would not have been made to work 74

without wages, nor would any brothel shop close to the site. They found out that owner be allowed to employ trafficked across the border in Barasat the wage rates labour. In such a case, the need for for construction work were higher, and the trafficking would not have arisen, as there working hours were shorter. The next would have been no extra gains to be made season, they paid an agent to help them from recruiting trafficked persons. The cross the border to Barasat in India without issue here is, what role did the state play - legitimate papers in order to find work on or fail to play - in safeguarding workers' a construction site. Monica heard from rights and securing workplace safety to other female workers that wages in Kolkata prevent extreme forms of exploitation of were even higher so she started looking for workers such as Farzana? Is providing ways to find work there. One morning, workers with some control over their Monica's father found that she had gone. occupation a more appropriate or effective After nine months Monica came back to strategy for governments? Satkhira bringing gifts and 5000 taka. She had been trafficked and sold into the sex Sofia's story: dealing with HFV industry, where she had worked for four Sofia, a friend of Farzana's who had also months bonded to the brothel owner who been evicted from Tanbazar and later had bought her. Once the bondage term remanded at the same home, decided to was over, she stayed on in the trade working opt out of the sex trade. She took the help for another brothel owner and sharing her of an NGO to seek an alternative liveli- earnings with her. Initially, her family and hood. The NGO put her in a shelter home. neighbours seemed appalled by the fact Immediately on her arrival, the NGO that she had 'fallen' into prostitution. The personnel took a sample of her blood, and local religious leader arbitrated that tested it for HIV without her knowledge or Monica would have to pay a fine of 150 taka consent. She was found to be HIV positive. to seek re-entry into the community. Once The NGO personnel informed her of this, she paid this amount, the rest of the and very quickly, all the staff members of members of the community accepted the shelter home came to know her status. Monica back. The rules of the shelter home were that no Gradually, Monica came to know that rescued women were allowed to meet and many women from her locality had gone communicate with outsiders without prior through the same process, through which permission from the official in charge of the they managed to accumulate considerable shelter home, and that communication wealth and improve their living conditions. could only take place at fixed hours in a From her savings, Monica bought a piece of month. This lack of communication meant land and met the costs of her mother's that nobody outside of the home knew treatment for a long-term illness. Now what was happening to Sofia. After a Monica is preparing to go back to Kolkata couple of weeks, Farzana heard that Sofia to work in the sex industry for a few years had committed suicide. Her body was not so that she can support her parents and even sent for a post mortem examination, a also save for her future. She is looking for common practice internationally following an agent who will take her across the any unnatural death (Mondol 2001). border for a fee. Monica's story: choosing to go back A survey conducted by CARE showed Monica had come to Dhaka from Satkhira that, like Monica, 22 per cent of women with her father and younger brother. Her who have experienced trafficking actually father and brother worked on a construction choose to return to the occupation into site, and Monica found a job in a small which they were trafficked (CARE 2001c). Shifting the paradigm of anti-trafficking programmes 75

Why is Monica not afraid of being and inclusion of codes of conduct while trafficked again? Quite rightly, Monica has dealing with anti- trafficking programmes identified the real reason for her (CARE 2001b). vulnerability to being trafficked. It was her lack of knowledge that made her susceptible to being deceived and trafficked. Now that DMSC's programme she knows how the sex industry works and approach has control over the capital she has, she is Following our principle objective to confident that she can determine the terms dissociate sex work from all criminal under which she works. If women at risk of associations, DMSC entered into the arena being trafficked were provided with of anti-trafficking activities in 1998, and information of how the market works, and quickly developed a strategy to stop the were guaranteed control over their trafficking of women and children into sex working conditions, the possibility of being work in Kolkata. DMSC sees sex work as a trafficked into slavery-like conditions contractual service, negotiated between would be hugely reduced. consenting adults. In such a service contract There are hundreds of Farzanas, Sofias, there ought to be no coercion or deception. and Monicas, all of whom could tell a As a sex workers' rights organisation, similar story, if we would only stop to ask DMSC is against any force exercised against them. In the course of our work in Dhaka sex workers, be it by the client, brothel and Kolkata, the numerous Farzanas, keepers, room owners, pimps, police, or Sofias, and Monicas have recounted these traffickers. experiences to us. To us these narratives DMSC's programme approach is very raise a number of important questions. simple. Members of DMSC keep a strong Should we address the process or the vigil in the red light districts through a outcome of trafficking? Should we be group of volunteers who intercept any new shocked and horrified by these stories or entrants into the area, make enquiries concerned with the interests, opinions, and about where they have come from and their life-strategies of those trafficked? If the relationship with the people accompanying basic objective of our anti-trafficking efforts them, if any, and thoroughly examine the is to enhance the well-being of the role of brothel owners and landlords in the individual and help improve her livelihood process of their recruitment. They can options, then the role of that individual and effectively stop the entry of any under-age that of other third parties involved in the woman, or women who are being coerced individual's rescue and rehabilitation into the trade. They do this in two ways. should come under thorough scrutiny. Firstly, being in the trade themselves they The processes of deceit, coercion, and are able to identify cases of trafficking exploitation, which define trafficking, are much more easily than an outsider could. not perpetrated by traffickers alone; in the Secondly, as members of a very organised name of rescue and rehabilitation, agents of labour force in the city, they can exert their the state and private actors may also power to remove or 'rescue' such women employ such tactics. There is no code of from the clutches of any unscrupulous conduct followed by all these agencies to brothel owners and pimps who have ensure the protection of the rights and procured them. In most cases, trafficked dignity of the victims while carrying out women are counselled and sent back to their work. NGOs participating in a their homes or to boarding schools (when consultative meeting recently held in Dhaka the person is a minor) with the help of the strongly recommended the development Ministry of Social Welfare, but without 76

involving the law enforcing authorities in office for counselling and other support. general. The other volunteers found Mukul lurking The process is not as simple as it appears in the brothel Madhabi was being taken to, to be. Contrary to popular belief, the and took him and his friends to the local people who usually challenge or resist police station. After a brief dialogue, the DMSC's anti-trafficking interventions are officer in charge asked DMSC members to not the traffickers, or others with a stake in hand Mukul and Madhabi over in order to the sex industry. It is the state and its law register a case of trafficking against Mukul. enforcing authorities who create the The officer argued that without taking greatest barrier. custody of Madhabi, who was purportedly being trafficked, no case could be booked Madhabi's story: 'sacrifice a life' or obey against Mukul. The volunteers returned to the law of the land? the DMSC office. A debate soon ensued, As a teenager, Madhabi had fallen in love with other members of DMSC joining in, with a distant relative, Mukul. Her parents which continued for a couple of hours did not endorse Madhabi's love affair. without reaching any conclusion. When her parents insisted that she end her What was being debated was relationship with Mukul and marry a man Madhabi's fate. Should she be handed over they had chosen for her, Madhabi ran away to the police in order that Mukul would be from home with Mukul. They rented a punished, or should she be allowed to room in the suburbs of Kolkata and started follow a course of action of her own choice? living together. Mukul had neither income DMSC members knew that putting nor the skills to find any job in the city. Madhabi in police custody could mean They managed to survive during the first indirectly 'forcing' her into the sex trade, couple of months by selling Madhabi's which she did not want to engage in. jewellery. Usually when a trafficked woman is One morning, Mukul left home in rescued from the sex trade and put into search of a job and did not return. Two police custody, the police accommodate her days later Mukul's friends turned up in the government remand home, which is saying they had come to take Madhabi to a notorious for corruption and for unofficial hospital where Mukul had been admitted linkages with the trafficking racket. following a serious accident. Travelling for In DMSC's experience, the brothel more than an hour by bus and tram, they owners who recruit trafficked women have arrived at a place that Madhabi did not a system worked out by which they can recognise. Confused, she found herself in pay a bribe to the remand home authorities an unfamiliar street. 'How could it be a in order to have the woman returned to hospital?', she mumbled. She had never them. They then extract the amount they seen so many women standing in the street, had invested - often inflating it considerably talking so loudly. - from the trafficked woman by making her As she hesitated, Mukul's friends work without wages. Moreover, the dragged her to the staircase of the nearby process through which Madhabi would building. At that very moment they heard a have to pass once put in the hands of the harsh voice from behind asking them to law enforcement system, from police stop. Unknown to Mukul's friends DMSC custody, to judicial custody, to remand volunteers had followed them since their home, is both lengthy and hazardous. arrival into the red light area, finding their The police and the caretakers of the movements to be suspicious. remand home, are likely to treat her with Madhabi was brought to the DMSC no dignity, and may sexually abuse her.2 Shifting the paradigm of anti-trafficking programmes 77

At the end of such a process, her already DMSC has reduced the economic restricted options would be reduced to vulnerability of sex workers and their none whatsoever. children by running a savings and credit None of the representatives of the programme through the sex workers' co- DMSC were inclined to hand Madhabi over operative institution, Usha Multipurpose to the police. On the other hand, not doing Co-operative Society Limited. It has a so would result in the traffickers going membership of about 3500, representing unpunished. This posed the biggest different brothels in Kolkata. dilemma to the members of the organi- DMSC also trains sex workers from sation. Their accumulated experience over neighbouring countries in order to make the period had shown them that they cross-border anti-trafficking efforts more would have to follow one or other of the effective. It acts in close collaboration with two possible courses of action. One is to sex workers' organisations and supporting obey the norms and rules of the state. The NGOs in Bangladesh and Nepal, particularly other is to respect Madhabi's wishes and in the repatriation of trafficked persons. take a stand outside the law so as to reverse the outcome of trafficking for her, and Challenges enhance her options to improve her life DMSC has faced some major challenges3, chances. Most DMSC members opted for including strong opposition from law- the second path. enforcing authorities who criticise DMSC for taking the law into its own hands and violating the constitutional boundaries Sex workers' organisation between the state and civil society. and action Although DMSC succeeded in creating a support base within local police institutions, During the last two years, DMSC has without which they could not have carried recovered 47 trafficked women, of whom out their anti-trafficking activities at the 35 were minors, and taken them to safe field level, contradictions with the legal custody. We have repatriated four minors and judicial system remain. This poses a from Bangladesh and two from Nepal, and constant threat to DMSC's intervention in have helped 12 Indian minors to return this arena, as its extra-constitutional role home. can be used against it. DMSC runs a primary prevention programme providing alternative liveli- The broader political context, which hood training to those who do not want to extends beyond the red light districts but continue in sex work, as part of its broader profits from the exploitation and trafficking aim to respect the choices of individuals. of sex workers within the sex industry, has Training has been provided to 112 started attempting, in various guises, to adolescents and 32 adults in skills such as oppose DMSC's efforts to stop trafficking silk-screen printing, toy making, and clay into the sex trade. modelling. In addition to reducing young The prevalent positions and practices of adults' vulnerability to sex work, DMSC NGOs, both local and international, also has in the last year recruited 25 daughters pose a challenge to sex workers' inter- of sex workers as teachers on their on- ventions in trafficking. This conflict is on going education programme for sex the one hand an ideological one. Sex workers and their children. They are workers and trafficked persons who take provided with on-the-job training, which the initiative to deal with their own they may later use to seek alternative problems as actors in development, rather employment. than passive recipients, are challenging the conventional role of NGOs and the 78

enlightened middle classes working on against her will; identifying those who behalf of the poor. On the other hand, there have been trafficked, and encouraging is an immediate conflict of interest. If more them to seek the help of the self-regulatory and more sex workers' organisations gain board; trauma counselling of those the capacity and the confidence to recovered, and providing them with health implement intervention activities them- services if required; repatriation of those selves, NGOs will become apprehensive who are recovered, with representatives of that their role as mediator will gradually the boards accompanying them; establishing become redundant. ways of keeping in touch with those who In fact, sex workers' and trafficked are repatriated, with the help of collaborative persons' demands for the right to self- sex workers' organisations and NGOs in determination and autonomy represent an their native countries, to ensure that they ideological challenge not just to the are not stigmatised or re-trafficked. prevalent development practices by NGOs, It seems to us that this unique approach but to all discourses that reduce margin- can open up hew ways of designing and alised people, particularly women, to being implementing anti-trafficking programmes, submissive victims of their circumstance, and can help us to think through and re- devoid of human agency, and unable to frame the development discourse and steer their own destiny unless 'rescued' practice on anti-trafficking programmes through the benevolence of others. globally.

Self-regulatory boards: a way forward Smarajit Jana is Programme Co-ordinator, To overcome all these challenges, DMSC HIV Programme, CARE-Bangladesh, and has been institutionalising the process of Chief Adviser for Durbar. 59, 7A Dhanmondi, their anti-trafficking interventions through Dhaka 1209, Bangladesh. Tel: +880 2 882 establishing self-regulatory boards. DMSC 4974;+880 2 811 4195-97; has so far established three local self- E-mail: [email protected]; regulatory boards in Kolkata, and is in the [email protected] process of setting up similar boards in all red light areas. Sixty percent of the Nandinee Bandyopadhyay is a consultant in members of these boards are sex workers, gender, politics, and organisations, and an and the rest are comprised of local elected adviser for Durbar. Flat 4C, 146 Rash Behari representatives of the people, represent- Avenue, Kolkata 700 029, India. atives of the state, legal professionals, and Tel: +91 33 543 7777; +91 33 543 7560; medical doctors. E-mail: [email protected] The primary objectives of these boards are to prevent exploitation and violation of Mrinal Kanti Dutta is Programme Director at human rights within the sex trade; to Durbar, 1215 Nilmani Mitra Street, Kolkata initiate comprehensive development 700 006, India. Tel: +91 33 543 7560; programmes for the sex workers' E-mail: [email protected] community; and to ensure the community's right to self-determination. The boards are Amitrajit Saha works for the National Polio involved in various programmes such as Surveillance Programme, India, and is an mitigating violence against sex workers; Adviser for Durbar. Flat 4C, 146 Rash Behari establishing channels of information within Avenue, Kolkata 700 029, India. the red light area through which the board Tel: +91 6456 23 390; +91 6456 24 331; members can monitor whether any E-mail: [email protected]. in children are being trafficked into sex work or whether anyone is being made to work Shifting the paradigm of anti-trafficking programmes 79

Notes References 1 Tanbazar was the largest functioning CARE (2001a) Proceedings of a workshop brothel in Bangladesh, till July 1999. on 'Cross-border Trafficking Prevention', In the middle of the night, the Law organised by CARE Bangladesh in Enforcing Department organised a Dhaka, October 17-18 2001, Dhaka: Care brutal 'raid' and evicted all inhabitants Bangladesh of the brothel, some 4500 sex workers. CARE (2001b) Minutes of a consultative The incident was widely covered in local meeting organised by CARE Bangladesh, newspapers. Dhaka, 10 September 2001, Dhaka: Care 2 Focus group discussion with DMSC Bangladesh members, held in their Kolkata office, CARE (2001c) 'Report of Ethnographic 26 November 2001. Study', unpublished report of the Anti- 3 Interview with Angura Begum, Secretary, trafficking Project of CARE-Bangladesh, DMSC, Kolkata, 27 November 2001. Dhaka: Care Bangladesh Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee (DMSC) (1998) 'Seven Years Stint at Sonagachi: DMSC, Human Development, and Social Action', Kolkata: DMSC Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee (DMSC) (1999) 'Second State Conference of the Sex Workers Report: 30th April to 1st May 1999', DMSC: Kolkata Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee (DMSC) (2001) 'Millennium Milan Mela', Kolkata: DMSC Mondol, P. (2001) 'HIV, Death and Justice: The Dhaka Experience', poster presented at the 6th ICAAP conference held in Melbourne, October 2001 80

Reducing poverty and upholding human rights: a pragmatic approach Meena Poudel and Ines Smyth

Trafficking in women is increasing in many countries around the world. This global problem is now well recognised by policy makers and aid agencies committed to poverty reduction in all its forms. This paper considers how Oxfam GB perceives the problem of trafficking of women in the context of its approach to poverty. It illustrates this position through a case study of a young woman whose human rights were violated through the process of trafficking, and provides examples of projects and programs implemented in various regions of the world to address to the underlying causes. Oxfam's broad trafficking programme objectives are: to promote the fundamental rights of women; to protect potential victims and survivors of trafficking; to influence national policies, and regional and international conventions on women's rights and trafficking.

he key argument of this paper is that 'All people are entitled to the rights Oxfam recognises that debates1 around enshrined in international laws and Tthe interpretations of what trafficking conventions: social and economic rights, civil is are important as they influence the kind and political rights, and the right to life of policies implemented to eradicate the itself, free from fear and persecution. But problem and support the victims. However, many people are denied these rights as a Oxfam adopts a principled but pragmatic consequence of neglect or oppression. approach to the issue. Pragmatic in that it Denying people their rights forces them into looks at the problem within its socio- poverty and keeps them there.' economic context. Principled in that it bases (Oxfam 2002) work in this field on Oxfam's under- In order to maximise its resources and standing of poverty as a denial of the basic achieve 'maximum impact', Oxfam focuses rights to which every human being is its policy and programme work on five key entitled, and on its perception that poverty aims: is of different kinds, all of which need to be • the right to a sustainable livelihood; understood and eradicated. • the right to health and education; • the right to life and security; Oxfam GB: poverty, rights, • the right to be heard; and the trafficking of women • the right to equity: gender and diversity. Oxfam GB's mandate is to overcome A concern about the denial of human rights poverty and suffering. In carrying out this inherent in trafficking fits well within mandate, the organisation relies on a basic Oxfam's overall understanding of poverty understanding of poverty which stresses and rights. In addition, Oxfam has prioritised that: certain areas of work and initiated specific Reducing poverty and upholding human rights 81 interventions within a global programme to One day the police raided that brothel and I end violence against women, including that managed to escape. I stayed in the Indian against trafficked women and girls within Government Observation Home for six its fifth aim (the right to equity). There is also months. I was taking medicine for a commitment to work towards 'getting tuberculosis but I could not continue my institutions right for women and over- medication because I had no money and the coming discrimination', through which observation did not provide me with any. In Oxfam tries to reach the institutional roots the end I managed to get back home with all of biases in policies and practices that problems but no money. discriminate against women and against When I went back home I found out that women, men, and children on the basis of my mother had died a year ago. My father their racial, ethnic, or other identity. loved me but my village refused to accept me 2 The case of Niru, a Nepali woman, because I was considered a bad woman. helps demonstrate the violence, human Village leaders threatened my father that he rights violations, and gender discrimination had to leave the village if he accepted me. I that characterise trafficking in women, as returned to Kathmandu and joined a group well as the role of social institutions such as of survivors of trafficking. Now I am the family, household, community, labour involved in an anti-trafficking project that market, sex industry, and the state in raises awareness of trafficking and the perpetuating this. consequences to my Nepali sisters. I know I 'A recruitment agent came to my village cannot change my life but I have hope that I offering jobs and my parents agreed to send can make a contribution to society through my brother and me. Both of us agreed Shakti Shamuha3 to providing information because we needed money to pay back our about the dangers to my sisters who are loan. I came to Kathmandu when I was 12 vulnerable to this crime. My biggest years [old] to work in a garment factory. I frustration is that I cannot get a citizenship worked there for a year then a recruiting certificate because of the social rejection, manager offered me another job in India patriarchal society, and my father being where I could get more money. They took prevented from recommending me for five girls including me to India by public citizenship. My father's permission is an bus. They asked us to stay in a room with a essential requirement. Because of my . woman and promised to bring us food. They position I cannot take up invitations from never came back. abroad to visit and establish links with other I found myself in a brothel. I had been campaigns against trafficking. To me there is sold for 50,000 Nepalese rupees [US$700]. no country, no system that can protect my I had to satisfy five to eight clients per night rights, and there is no society where I but I did not get any money - only two belong. Where are my rights? meals a day. I spent seven years there and tried to escape three times but didn't The example is a useful illustration of how succeed. During that time I could not human rights can be violated in all three contact my family. stages of trafficking: recruitment, work, and rescue. We were 20 girls staying in the same room. There were few rooms set aside for Recruitment each girl to serve clients for sex. During my In a typical situation, a woman or girl is menstruation period the owner used to inject recruited by an agent with promises of drugs into my thigh before [I went] with [a] a good or better job in another province client. Initially I had tuberculosis but later I or country, with false documents supplied, was diagnosed as HIV positive. if required. In extreme cases, girls and 82

women are abducted. Once recruited or raped and abused in custody. They are also abducted, many women and girls are forced subjected to forced medical check-ups and into sex work or controlled through debt treatments, particularly HIV testing. The bondage. Thereafter, threats and use of legal process is equally arbitrary and violence, coercion, and torture are not abusive. Women are forced to testify in uncommon. Basic needs such as food, public in long and demanding legal medicine, rest, and safe shelter can also be proceedings, with no access to independent denied to the victim. lawyers. They are often humiliated in court Abuse of authority by officials within or deported without due process. This state institutions is another form of violence violates human rights principles such as that trafficked women face, as is the freedom from torture and arbitrary arrest violation of their rights to freedom, move- and detention, and the right to protection, ment, and information during transit. liberty, security, privacy, and a fair and There is ample evidence that corrupt speedy trial. officials within the police and immigration Niru's case also illustrates the discrim- services often exacerbate the experience of inatory role of social institutions. Denial of those who are trafficked (Asia Watch 1993). citizenship and rejection by the community Countries can also benefit from tourism not only prevent women such as Niru from (including sex tourism) and, in the case of taking advantage of limited opportunities other forms of forced labour, from the for solidarity and for improvements in their avoidance of paying welfare benefits. They lives, but also raise fundamental questions are therefore less likely to take a strong about the limited rights that women may anti-trafficking position. access as citizens, both in countries of origin and destination. Work Niru's case illustrates some of the human rights violations within a work environment. Working against the These include violation of contracts, unpaid trafficking of women labour, unsafe working conditions, lack of safe drinking water, lack of safe and The realities of trafficked women and girls sufficient food, unlimited time of work, differ according to country-specific underpayment, and no right to formal contexts, reflecting the multi-faceted causes unionised labour. Debt bondage is key to and consequences of trafficking. Oxfam's the conditions of dependency and slavery engagement with the problem also varies in in which trafficked women and children different countries and regions, reflecting live. Other violations include denial of the priorities of partner organisations. The access to health services, forced use of size of the programme and types of drugs, and exposure to sexually activities undertaken depend on a variety transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS. of factors: country and regional priorities identified by partners and staff; access to Rescue necessary resources; and the historical Human rights may also be violated at the evolution of individual programmes. rescue stage of the trafficking process. With the exception of small-scale project Oxfam GB's experience of working with work in the former Yugoslavia and in Latin trafficked survivors and campaigners in America, most of Oxfam's work on Nepal shows that often the rescue of Nepali trafficking takes place in Asia. In the UK, women in Nepal and in India gives cause Oxfam also provides support to the for concern. Survivors may be illegally Refugee Council (of which Oxfam is a arrested by police and detained, and even founding member), particularly for Reducing poverty and upholding human rights 83 information and advocacy work on destroying local people's livelihoods, international refugee and asylum issues. Oxfam offered support. People in these One example of this support is a project regions were severely affected. As Oxfam funded in 1998 for research into livelihoods were destroyed there was little trafficking and smuggling of refugees, capacity to cope with the serious impacts of called 'The Cost of Survival'. In addition, a the flooding. Interruption of education, joint Oxfam GB and NOVIB (Oxfam in the erosion of incomes, and the migration of Netherlands) project supports research income earners all raised the risk of into best practice on the integration and trafficking of adolescents. In response, re-integration of women who are victims Oxfam implemented a programme that, of trafficking, through a UK-based in addition to funding rehabilitation organisation and a Dutch NGO. initiatives, focused on agriculture, cash for Most anti-trafficking activities are work, winter clothes distribution, carried out through partner organisations rebuilding housing and sanitation, and and networks, rather than by Oxfam advocacy initiatives to raise awareness and directly. For example, in Cambodia, Oxfam minimise the risk of trafficking. supports, among other national agencies, Oxfam GB recognises that the KWVC and ADHOC. KWVC is an organi- consequences of trafficking of women and sation that works to promote women's girls are exacerbated by gender biases in participation and decision-making in institutions. Oxfam GB attempted to politics, society, and economics. It aims to address this problem through support for eliminate discrimination against women Naripokkho, a women's organisation and promote laws to protect women's founded in 1983 that works for the rights. ADHOC is a local human rights and advancement of women's rights.Naripokkh o development organisation that plays a is a membership organisation undertaking significant role in rights education, advocacy, research, and training on various monitoring, advocacy, and lobbying. Both issues related to women's rights and have programmes that raise awareness of development. Violence against women has women's and children's rights on issues been a priority concern from its very like sex trafficking and domestic violence. inception. The program supported by Bangladesh is one of the many countries Oxfam monitors state mechanisms and in the world where violence against women tries to institutionalise a process of state and trafficking are both wide-spread. accountability for the prevention and Instances of violence against women such reduction of violence against women, as physical abuse, rape, killing, forced including trafficking. prostitution, trafficking for sex and sex Examples from Nepal are also useful tourism, battering, kidnapping, sexual because they demonstrate a more harassment, and acid-throwing are systematic approach to supporting local common. Oxfam GB works to fight the organisations to combat trafficking. causes and consequences of trafficking in Bangladesh. Oxfam's anti-trafficking Oxfam's emergency interventions in work in Nepal Bangladesh often include some provision for the prevention of trafficking. For While there has been no systematic example, after the heavy rains during research to determine the true extent of September 2000, when water coming from trafficking in women in Nepal, observers West Bengal resulted in unexpected floods believe that most Nepali women are in south-west and north-west Bangladesh, trafficked to India, the Middle East, and 84

other Asian countries primarily for sex with the promise of better education and a work. It is estimated that there are more job, without informing her family. The than 200,000 Nepalese women in Indian organisation Gramin Mahila Srijansheel brothels, with additional tens of thousands Pariwar (an Oxfam partner) managed to of Nepalese women in other countries who rescue Bimala from Kathmandu and return have been forced into sex work or other her to her family. While Nanu and her work in oppressive situations and mother were prosecuted, the real traffickers inhumane conditions each year (Child escaped justice. Worker in Nepal Concerns Centre [CWIN] The aim of the Oxfam programme in 1992). Nepal is to reduce trafficking in women Nepal is beset with many socio- and to work towards making a positive economic problems, and the extreme impact on the lives of women. In practice, poverty in some regions facilitates the the programme has increasingly focused on trafficking of women and girls. More than two aspects of anti-trafficking work: 70 per cent of Nepalis live below the educating communities on the mechanisms poverty line. The average per capita annual and consequences of trafficking, and income is US$180. There is widespread supporting the enforcement of existing illiteracy, especially among women, 72 per laws and the formulation of appropriate cent of whom are illiterate (Central Bureau policies, laws, and conventions to combat of Statistics 2000). trafficking. Programme activities range The flourishing trade in women is from the grassroots to national, regional (in influenced by the socio-economic context. South Asia), and global levels. This inte- Some rural families experience great grated multi-level approach aims to difficulties in trying to sustain themselves. address the problem of violation of While the deteriorating socio-economic women's rights during the recruitment, conditions affect all members of society, work, and rescue stages of trafficking, as women in particular are vulnerable to well as the institutional aspects. trafficking due to the discrimination they At grassroots level, the work focuses on face in household decision-making matters, collaboration with various institutions to and the constraints they face with regard to educate communities, and to support viable opportunities for earning a living. survivors through legal processes against Families' vulnerability to the trafficking of traffickers. Sindhupalchock is one of the their female members is a symptom of the most remote of Nepal's 75 districts, with a desperation that exists. Socio-cultural large ethnic minority population. It is pressures marginalise women from birth located in the central hilly region of Nepal, onwards, and once a woman has been and shares its northern border with Tibet. forced into sex slavery, there is no going Since this is one of the poorest districts in back. the country and among the most vulnerable Traffickers often use family members to trafficking, Oxfam GB has been working and close friends of targeted women and here with two local organisations managed girls to lure them and avoid detection by and controlled by women, and with the authorities or communities as demonstrated District Development Committee, since by the case of Bimala (in the Sindhupalchock 1998. district, 40 km north east of Kathmandu). At the national level, the work is Bimala and Nanu Maya were good friends, directed towards alliance building among studying together in grade eight at a local relevant NGOs and advocacy groups to school. Traffickers managed to convince promote law enforcement and reform Nanu to lure her friend to go to Kathmandu, based on international human rights Reducing poverty and upholding human rights 85 conventions. At the regional level, Oxfam of violence and trafficking have been has worked with several of its partners, punished. and more specifically with the Alliance Against Trafficking in Women (AATWIN) and the Asian Women Human Rights Conclusions Council (AWHRC) as well as other regional Trafficking in women is a complex and feminist groups, to lobby the South Asian extremely sensitive phenomenon, inextricably Association for Regional Co-operation linked to poverty, migration, work, sex, (SAARC) to set up regional mechanisms money, and violence. Oxfam's work in (e.g. regional courts) to address the issue Nepal and in other countries provides bilaterally. examples of a pragmatic but principled At the international level, our priority approach to the problem. has been to work with international feminist groups and advocacy networks (e.g. Global Alliance against Trafficking in Notes Women [GAATW] and the Asian Women 1 Over the years, there has been much Human Rights Council [AWHRC]) to debate about the definition of tackle trafficking issues within the UN, 'trafficking'. Even with the introduction including the optional protocol. of the Trafficking Protocol in 2001, This contextual and multi-layered disagreement remains about the approach has been successful in some interpretation of the trafficking as set areas. The Annual Impact Report, prepared out in the Protocol. by Oxfam GB (Oxfam GB 2001) summarises 2 Not her real name. some of the changes that have taken place 3 Shakti Shamuha is a campaign organi- since the programme started. There are sation formed by survivors, and an overall improvements in the participation Oxfam partner. of women in formal politics. The five major political parties in Nepal have accepted Meena Poudel is a development anthropologist that women should have 33 per cent seats and feminist activist currently working as in parliamentary structures, as against Programme Representative for Oxfam GB in 20 per cent (in village development Nepal, GPO Box 2500, Kathmandu, Nepal. committees), and five per cent (House of E-mail: [email protected] Representatives). Women's groups are lobbying to have women's names lodged as Ines Smyth is a Policy Adviser for Oxfam GB, heads of household, along with men's, 274 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 7DZ, United during the national census planned for Kingdom. E-mail: [email protected] June. Women are also starting to come forward as candidates for the next district elections. References The incidence of trafficking has Asia Watch (1993) A Modern Form of decreased by about 15 per cent in Slavery: Trafficking of Women and Girls Sindhupalchock district, as a result of legal into Brothels in Thailand, New York: Asia action and campaigning against the Watch traffickers. One hundred and fifty cases of Central Bureau of Statistics (2000) Statistical violence against women and 75 trafficking Pocket Book, Kathmandu: Central Bureau cases have been registered. Several cases of Statistics, National Planning have been heard by village and district Commission development committees, and perpetrators 86

Child Worker in Nepal Concerns Centre (CWIN) (1992) Bal Sarokar, Kathmandu: CWIN Oxfam GB (2001) 'South Asia Annual Impact Report', June 2001, Oxford: Oxfam GB Oxfam GB (2002) 'Achieving Maximum Impact: Oxfam's Strategy for Overcoming Poverty', Oxford: Oxfam GB 87

Compiled by Nittaya Thiraphouth

Publications women, and to increase political action on national and international levels. It is a Human Rights and Trafficking in Persons: compilation of different types of materials, A Handbook (2001), Global Alliance Against from descriptions and definitions of Trafficking in Women, International Co- terminology to the texts of relevant UN ordination Office, PO Box 36, Bangkok Noi documents. Office, Bangkok 10700, Thailand. This handbook is intended for NGOs, Human Rights in Practice; A Guide to Assist activists, and others who come into contact Trafficked Women and Children (1997), with trafficked persons or who are GAATW. interested in the issue of trafficking. This is This manual, the result of a collaborative a broad-based manual, containing general effort, is intended to be a resource for strategies that can be further adapted to women's and children's rights organi- local contexts. The handbook was developed sations that are either already involved in out of regional human rights training held assisting trafficked women and children or for activists in Asia, Eastern Europe, Africa, are intending to do so. It also aims to and Latin America. In GAATW's 1999 global strengthen the political and lobbying efforts meeting to evaluate the regional human of NGOs to influence national and rights trainings, participants from each of international policies to promote the rights the trainings agreed that defining specific of women and children who are trafficked actions against trafficking is very dependent or vulnerable to being trafficked. In order to upon the regional context. ensure its accessibility amongst a wide group of community workers, this manual Handbook for Human Rights Action (in the will soon be translated into other languages. Context of Traffic in Women) (1996), GAATW. This handbook is the result of an inter- Stopping Forced Labour: Global Report under national workshop on human rights, the Follow Up to the ILO Declaration on conducted in June 1996 in Bangkok by Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work GAATW, in conjunction with the Foundation (2001), International Labour Office, CH-1211, For Women, Thailand, and the International Geneva 22, Switzerland. Available on-line Human Rights Law Group, USA. The at: http:/ /www.ilo.org/declaration handbook provides knowledge about the This Global Report is the follow up to the practical use of UN human rights 1998 ILO Declaration on the Fundamental mechanisms in order to combat traffic in Principles and Rights at Work, and is 88

principally aimed at policy makers and America and Europe. The conclusion offers practitioners. Part One examines the forms suggestions for how individuals and of slavery most prevalent in the world governments can combat slavery, and today, and includes considerable analysis describes successful anti-slavery actions by of bonded labour in South Asia. Part Two international and local organisations. assesses the efforts of the ILO and other international agencies to prevent these Enslaved People in the 1990s: A Report by forms of forced labour and to rehabilitate Anti-Slavery International in Collaboration its victims. Part Three presents an action with IWGIA (1997), Anti-Slavery plan for the future. The report also contains International, The Stableyard, Broomgrove a series of questions to be discussed by the Road, London, SW9 9TL, UK, and International Labour Conference. International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs, Fiolstraede 10, DK-1171, Crossing Borders: Against Trafficking in Copenhagen, Denmark. Women and Girls, A Resource Book for This report looks at different forms of Working against Trafficking in the Baltic Seaslavery and slavery-like practices and their Region (1999), Kvinnoforum, Kungsgatan 65, consequences. It comprises a collection of SE-111 22 Stockholm, Sweden. Available case studies from Asia and South America on-line at: that focus on the slavery and exploitation of http: / / www.qweb.kvinnoforum.se / misc / indigenous people, and argues that slavery ResourceBookBody-Nov99.rtf affects indigenous people differently, Produced by Kvinnoforum, a Swedish attacks their whole collective identity, and organisation working to promote gender threatens their survival as a people. equity, this book provides general back- ground information about trafficking, Sex Slaves: The Trafficking of Women in Asia describes different approaches to the (2000), Louise Brown, Virago Press, Bretten problem, shares knowledge about victims House, Lancaster place, London WC2E of trafficking, and describes the results of 7EN, UK. Kvinnoforum's work. To facilitate the The outcome of intimate interviews with building of networks, the resource book sex workers and others involved in the sex lists more than 80 Baltic and Nordic industry including NGOs and government organisations working against trafficking, officials, this book provides an insight into or interested in incorporating this work the experience of sex workers forced into into their current activities. the trade, describing their journey from their homes to their lives in brothels. It Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global covers different aspects of the trafficking Economy (1999), Kevin Bales, University of trade, the market for prostitution, and California Press, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA. explores the identities of agents and Written in accessible narrative style, this is customers. The author overwhelmingly an investigation into the current global finds that the primary customers of sex resurgence of slavery. The author draws on workers are in fact not Western but Asian interviews with victims, perpetrators, and men, and argues that in rigidly structured public officials to describe slavery in its Asian societies where repressive sexual modern form, and the way in which it has codes are built on the subjugation of adapted to the global economy. Different women, 'sex and slavery are absolutely chapters focus on practices in particular inseparable'. Its narrative style is suitable countries, such Thailand, Mauritania, for a wide audience. Brazil, Pakistan, India, and parts of Resources 89

Making the Harm Visible: Global Sexual The Traffic in Women: Human Realities of the Exploitation of Women and Girls, Speaking Out Sex Trade (1997), Siriporn Skrobanek, and Providing Services (1999), Donna M. Nattaya Boonpakdi, and Chutma Janthakeero, Hughes and 'Claire M. Roche (eds), Zed Books, 7 Cynthia Street, London Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, Nl 9JK, UK. University of Massachusetts, PO Box 9338, This moving but unemotional account of N. Amherst, MA 01059, USA. Available on- the rapidly-expanding international traffic line at: in women reveals it as a global issue. Using http: / / www.uri.edu / artsci / wms / hughes / original, carefully-documented field studies mhvint.htm from Thailand, it explores the nature and Making the Harm Visible is a collection of extent of the problem worldwide. It writings on the global sexual exploitation of demonstrates how traffic in women and women and girls by survivors, activists, forced prostitution are aspects of trans- and service providers. The 44 pieces from national migration, and how these women Asia, Africa, Europe, South America, the also suffer grave violations of human rights. Caribbean, North America, and the Middle The book also shows how women East offer personal, insightful, and themselves can be empowered to end challenging perspectives on sexual violence trafficking, and ends with detailed and prostitution. They reveal a spectrum of recommendations for change. violence and exploitation from a variety of cultures and contexts, with the main focus Global Sex Workers: Rights, Resistance and on how prostitution industries objectify and Redefinition (1998), Kamala Kempadoo and exploit women and girls. These accounts Jo Doezema (eds), Routledge, 29 West 35th and reports describe how women are Street, New York, NY 1000, USA. resisting the violence done to them as Combining scholarly essays with personal individuals and to other women and girls in narratives, interviews, and reports, and their communities by organising protests, situating sex workers as working people building programs and movements, and who should enjoy human rights and providing services to stop the violence, heal workers' rights, this book reveals how the harm, and prevent future exploitation. ordinary women and men in prostitution define and shape their struggle for social Owed Justice: Thai Women Trafficked into Debt change and justice. Includes a bibliography Bondage in Japan (2000), Human Rights and list of contributing organisations. Watch, 350 Fifth Avenue, 34th Floor, New York, NY 10118-3299, USA. Prostitution, Power and Freedom (1991), Julia This report is the outcome of extensive O'Connell Davidson, University of Michigan research over a period of six years by Press, PO Box 1104, Ann Arbor, MI 48106- Human Rights Watch in co-operation with 1104, USA. local organisations and researchers on the Prostitution, Power and Freedom brings new trafficking of women from Thailand to insights to the ongoing debate among Japan. It traces the experiences of women scholars, activists, and others on the trafficked as 'hostesses' from recruitment to controversial subject of prostitution. travel and subsequent employment, and Sociologist Julia O'Connell Davidson's examines the response of the respective study is based on wide research from all governments and the international over the world and includes interviews community, concluding with targeted with prostitutes, clients, and procurers recommendations. active in the international sex trade. The author demonstrates the complexity of 90

prostitution, arguing that it is not simply historical, social, economic, and legislative an effect of male oppression and violence contexts, and demonstrates that or insatiable sexual needs; nor is it an prostitution has social components relating unproblematic economic encounter. The to unequal power relations between men book provides a sophisticated understanding and women, as well as children and adults. that uncovers the economic and political Authors examine the different modes of inequalities underlying prostitution, but entry into prostitution and the possibility also shows that while prostitution of making a distinction between voluntary necessarily implies certain freedoms for the and coerced prostitution. It includes a clients, the amount of freedom experienced separate chapter on child prostitution. The by individual prostitutes varies greatly. book concludes with a discussion of policy and programme lessons, and advocates for Crime and Servitude: An Expose of the Trafficthe elimination of child prostitution. in Women for Prostitution from the Newly Independent States (1997), Gillian Caldwell, Stolen Lives: Trading Women into Sex and Steven Galster, and Nadia Steinzor, Global Slavery (1996), Sietske Altink, The Haworth Survival Network, PO Box 73214, Press Inc., 10 Alice St., Binghamton, NY Washington, DC, USA. Available on-line at: 13904, USA. http://www.globalsurvival.net/femaletra Examines how women are hired in their de / 971 lrsussia.html home country and transported, left without This thorough report details the findings of money, passports, or permits, and how a two-year investigation by the Global they become trapped in prostitution and Survival Network into the trafficking of domestic slavery. Includes women's women from Russia and the former Soviet testimonies, explores international crime Union for prostitution. As well as networks which exploit women, and interviews and information collected from exposes the lack of action at regional, NGOs, law enforcement agencies, and national, and international levels. trafficked women themselves, one research method used by GSN was to establish a Profiting from Abuse: An Investigation into the dummy company in the USA that purported Sexual Exploitation of our Children (2001), to specialise in importing foreign women UNICEF, 3 United Nations Plaza, New York, as escorts and entertainers. This facilitated NY 10017, USA. Available on-line at: access to the operations of international http: / / www.unicef.org / pubsgen / prof itin trafficking networks, traffickers, and their g/profiting.pdf partners. The report targets several This report presents the stories of children 'receiving' countries and concludes with and young people from all over the world recommendations for action and policies who are involved in the sex trade, as well for preventing traffickers and providing as the informed opinions of various assistance to their victims. personalities and authorities committed to ending it. It concludes that education and The Sex Sector: The Economic and Social Bases raising awareness are vital to achieving of Prostitution in South-East Asia (1998), Lin this, and calls for laws that promote the Lean Lim (ed.), International Labour Office. welfare of children and protect them from This collection comprises country case abuse. Accessibly written and emotive, it is studies from Indonesia, Malaysia, the aimed at governments, law enforcers, and Philippines, and Thailand, but has relevance international agencies, as well as civil for many countries with a significant sex society organisations. industry. Each study covers the respective Resources. 91

Children of Other Worlds: Exploitation in the What Works for Working Children (1998), Global Market (2001), Jeremy Seabrook, Jo Boyden, Birgitta Ling, and William Pluto Press, 345 Archway Road, London Myers, Radda Barnen, Save the Children N6 5AA, UK. Sweden, S-107 88 Stockholm, Sweden. Academic in style and structure, this book Written from a child-centred perspective, argues that child labour, like poverty and this book reviews and summarises recent inequality, is structurally part of global- research and experience regarding child isation. As its basis, it uses a comparison work, and the processes of child develop- between industrial Britain in the early ment as they relate to work. It questions nineteenth century and present day widespread concepts and approaches to Bangladesh. work and childhood, and offers alternatives. This book is targeted particularly at The Human Rights of Street and Working organisations and practitioners working Children (1998), lain Bryne, ITDG with children. Publications Ltd., 103-105 Southampton Row, London WC1B 4HH, UK. Domestic Child Workers: Selected Case Studies Written both for experienced advocates and on the Situation of the Girl-Child Domestic for non-specialists in the field, this manual Workers (1997), Barbara Ojoo, Sinaga explains how to use regional and Women and Child Labour Resource Centre, international treaties and mechanisms for PO Box 71991, Nairobi, Kenya. the protection of street and working This study draws primarily on research children when national laws fail. The carried out at the Sinaga Centre, a Kenyan manual is presented in an accessible NGO that supports domestic child workers question-and-answer format, and is through integrated awareness-raising and divided into three chapters: defining rehabilitation programmes. Commissioned substantive rights; practical guidelines on by Oxfam Kenya, in collaboration with the how to use regional and international Sinaga Centre, the study examines the human rights systems; and a list of human socio-economic factors that lead to domestic rights documents by country. child work, describes working conditions, and raises policy issues for considerations Child Labour: Targeting the Intolerable (1998), by policy makers and practitioners working International Labour Organisation. on child labour issues. Available on-line at: http:/ / www.ilo.org/public/english/ Early Marriage, Child Spouses (2001), standards / ipec/ publ / clrep96.htm UNICEF, Innocenti Research Centre, Piazza Submitted to ILO member states, this SS. Annunziata 12, 50122 Florence, Italy. report is aimed at governments, employers, Part of UNICEF's Innocenti Digest series, and workers' organisations as part of the this issue focuses on early marriage, and ILO campaign to eliminate child labour. comprises a collection of short articles Targeting the Intolerable draws on the covering the causes, contexts, and impacts experience of the ILO to chronicle the of child marriage. It incorporates guidelines exploitation and abuse of working children, for organisations working to end the survey international and national law, and practice of early marriage, including an make recommendations for practical action article on working toward gender equity in through the adoption of international marriage. With the aim of raising awareness standards. It also includes a questionnaire among governments and civil society, and to solicit the view of governments on the of stimulating action, it concludes with a call proposals. for more rights-based research on the issue. 92

Servile Forms of Marriage: Women and counselling centre for sexually transmitted Property (1995), Anti-Slavery International. diseases and AIDS. Ban Ying is Thai for This paper was prepared for the UN Fourth 'house of women'. The organisation World Conference on Women in Beijing, in comprises two projects, a shelter and a co- order to bring to the fore the issue of ordination centre for women from South- women's property rights and to advocate East Asia. for the ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination CHANGE, Room 222, Bon Marche Centre, Against Women. It presents information 241-51 Ferndale Road, London SW9 8BJ, UK. from published and unpublished reports Tel: +44 (0) 20 7733 9928; fax: +44 (0) 20 by NGOs, academics, and others, and uses 7733 9923; E-mail: [email protected] case studies that were specifically carried http:/ / www.antitrafficking.org out for Anti-Slavery International in Gambia, Tanzania, and Pakistan. The CHANGE is a woman's human rights studies focus on family law, property organisation based in London, operating rights, and the division of assets. with and through contacts all over the world. Its purpose is to promote and protect women's human rights worldwide, and to effect change in all aspects of women's Anti-Slavery International, Thomas Clarkson lives including: poverty, violence, access to House, The Stableyard, Broomgrove Road, democracy, and access to economic decision London SW9 9TL, UK. making. It fulfils its aims through research Tel: +44 (0) 20 7501 8920; fax: +44 (0) 20 programmes, dissemination of information, 7738 4110; E-mail: [email protected] and lobbying and training of other http://www.antislavery.org/ organisations and individuals. Change is Anti-Slavery International was set up in undertaking an anti-trafficking programme. 1839 with the objective of ending slavery throughout the world. It works with Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking partner organisations around the world to (CAST), Little Tokyo Service Center, 231 E. collect information on the issues central to 3rd St., Suite G104, Los Angeles, California their work: traditional slavery, child 90013, USA. labour, bonded labour; and the trafficking Tel: +1 213 473 1611; fax: +1 213 473 1601; and enslavement of men, women, and E-mail: [email protected] children. It publishes this information to http: / / www.trafficked-women.org / inform the public and policy makers about slavery issues around the world, and CAST is an alliance of non-profit service works through international bodies in providers, grassroots advocacy groups, and order to promote laws to protect those activists dedicated to providing services exploited by these practices. and human rights advocacy to victims of modern-day slavery. CAST was founded in Ban Ying, Anklamer Strasse, 10115 Berlin, 1998 in the aftermath of the El Monte Germany. sweatshop case. Its mission is to assist Tel: +49 (0) 30 440 63 73 74; persons trafficked for the purpose of forced fax: +49 (0) 30 440 63 75; labour and slavery-like practices, and to E-mail: [email protected] work toward ending all instances of such http://www.ban-ying.de/ebanying.htm human rights violations. Ban Ying was founded in 1988 through the initiative of social workers staffing a Berlin Resources 93

Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, the world community to ensure that children Dr. Janice Raymond, Co-Executive Director, everywhere enjoy their fundamental rights Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, free from all forms of commercial sexual University of Massachusetts, PO Box 9338, exploitation. N. Amherst, MA 01059, USA. Fax:+1413 367 9262 Global Alliance Against Trafficking in Women, http://www.catwinternational.org International Co-ordination Office, PO Box The Coalition Against Trafficking in 36, Bangkok Noi Office, Bangkok 10700, Women is a feminist human rights NGO Thailand. that works internationally to oppose all Tel: +662 864 1427 8; fax: +662 864 1637; forms of sexual exploitation. E-mail: [email protected] http://www.inet.co.th/org/gaatw/ Committee Against Modern Slavery, 4 Place The Global Alliance Against Traffic in de Valois, 75001 PARIS, France. Women (GAATW) was formed at the Tel: +33 1 55 35 36 55; fax : +33 1 55 35 36 56; International Workshop on Migration and E-mail: [email protected] Traffic in Women held in Chiang Mai, http: / / www.ccem-antislavery.org / Thailand in October 1994. Since that time, The Committee Against Modern Slavery is GAATW has grown into a movement of a member of 'Article Premier', a collective organisations and individuals worldwide, of 33 NGOs, founded after the 50th and has coordinated, organised, and Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of facilitated work on issues related to Human Rights, and whose aim is to trafficking in persons and women's labour reaffirm the universality and indivisibility migration in virtually every region of the of human rights. world.

Dutch Foundation Against Trafficking in Global March Against Child Labour, L-6, Women (STV), PO Box 1455, 3500 BL Kalkaji, New Delhi 19, India. UTRECHT, The Netherlands. Tel: +91 11 6224899, 6475481; fax: +91 11 Tel: +31 30 716044; fax: +31 30 716084; 6236818; E-mail: [email protected] E-mail: [email protected] http:/ / www.globalmarch.org/ http:/ / www.bayswan.org/ FoundTraf.html Global March is involved in assessing and The Dutch Foundation Against Trafficking lobbying for the ratification and imple- in Women (STV) was initiated in the early mentation of the ILO Convention Against 1980s in response to the then highly- the Worst forms of Child Labour. publicised issue of sex tourism. It provides support and assistance, advocacy, training, International Labour Organisation, International and information sharing. Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour. ECPAT International, 328 Phaya Thai Road, Tel: +41 22 799 8181; fax: +41 22 799 8771; Bangkok 10400, Thailand. E-mail: [email protected] Tel: +662 215 3388; fax +662 215^8272; http:/ /www.ilo.org/public/english/ E-mail: [email protected] standards / ipec / index.htm http:/ / www.ecpat.net IPEC's aim is to work towards the ECPAT is a network of organisations and progressive elimination of child labour by individuals working together for the strengthening national capacities to address elimination of child prostitution, child child labour problems, and by creating a pornography, and trafficking of children worldwide movement to combat it. for sexual purposes. It seeks to encourage 94

International Organization for Migration Stop-Traffic (IOM), 17 Route des Morillons, CP 71, E-mail: [email protected] CH-1211 Geneva 19, Switzerland. http://www.stop-traffic.org Tel: +41 22 717 9111; fax: 41 22 798 6150; Launched by the Global Survival Network E-mail: [email protected] in March 1998, Stop-Traffic is a facilitated http: / / www.iom.int international electronic mailing list that Established in 1951 as an intergovern- deals with human rights abuses associated mental organisation to resettle European with trafficking in persons, with an displaced persons, refugees, and migrants, emphasis on trafficking in women for IOM now encompasses a variety of forced prostitution/sexual slavery, migration management activities throughout sweatshop labour, domestic service, and the world, including measures to counter coercive mail-order bride arrangements. trafficking in persons. United Nations Office for Drug Control and La Strada (a contact list by country is Crime Prevention available at http:/ / www.ecn.cz/lastrada) http://www.odccp.org/ La Strada is an international program that Contains on-line access to key policy operates in the Netherlands, Poland, documents such as the UN Convention Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Macedonia, Against Transnational Organised Crime Moldova, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and other supporting documents. Belarus, and Ukraine. It focuses on prevention of traffic in women, support of Videos victims of trafficking, influencing legislation, and disseminating information. Bought and Sold (1997), Witness, 353 Broadway, New York, NY 1001, USA. Network of Sex Work Projects, 3 Morley Rd. http: / / www.witness.org Observatory, 7925 Cape Town, South Africa. Witness partners at The Global Survival E-mail: [email protected] Network (GSN) conducted a two-year http: / / www.walnet.org / csis / groups / nswp / investigation to uncover the growing NSWP is an informal alliance that international transport of Russian women participates in independently financed for prostitution. In addition to interviewing projects in partnership with member NGOs, women who had been trafficked organisations and technical support abroad, and police and government officials agencies. in many countries, GSN established a dummy company based in the USA that purportedly specialised in importing Electronic resources foreign women as escorts and entertainers. Qweb Under that guise, GSN gained entry to the http:/ / www.qweb.kvinnoforum.se/ shadowy operations of international trafficking trafficking and produced this documentary This worldwide network on women's film, which gives an insider's perspective health and gender issues runs a on how the international trade in women networking project against trafficking. The actually works. site contains a number of references, on- line documents, links, and details of 250 members with special interest in trafficking. Resources 95

Out of Sight, Out of Mind (1999), Conferences Anti-Slavery International. Conference on Trafficking in Persons in Asia: This 15-minute video was produced by The Human Rights Challenge of Globalisation, Anti-Slavery as part of its campaign on Hawaii, USA, Spring 2002. child domestic workers in the Philippines. Made with local NGO forum Visayan, this With plenary sessions and 'hands-on' video was shown on TV and in Congress in workshops, the practical focus of the the Philippines. This has led to the drafting conference will build on monitoring and of a new law which will protect child implementing two existing international domestic workers. Contact the Publications initiatives to combat and prevent trafficking: Officer: [email protected] for the Asian Regional Initiative Against further information. Trafficking in Women and Children (ARIAT) Plan of Action; and the UN Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Sisters and Daughters Betrayed, The Global Trafficking in Persons. For further Fund for Women, 425 Sherman Avenue, information, contact Dr. Nancie Caraway, Suite 300, Palo Alto, CA 94306, USA. Globalization Research Centre, Director of This video about the realities of sex Women's Human Rights Projects, 1580 trafficking and forced prostitution was Makaloa Street, Suite 970, Honolulu, released inl995 by independent video- Hawaii 96822, USA. Tel: +1 808 945 1450, maker Chela Blitt. It examines the economics ext. 106; fax: +1 808 945 1455; of trafficking and the parallels between the E-mail: [email protected] situation in Asia and other regions. It presents interviews with activist women in Asia who are involved in campaigns against trafficking.

The Child Brides: Early and Forced Marriage (1998), Umbrella Pictures for Channel 4, available from Anti-Slavery International. Shot on location in Ethiopia, this programme reveals how many young girl are taken from their homes and are forced to marry. Unable to finish school, they often become pregnant, and face serious consequences to their health and well-being.