The Dynamics of Sex Trafficking: Victims, Perpetrators, Solutions

Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children: Prostitution & Sex Trafficking Donna M. Hughes, PhD Professor & Carlson Endowed Chair Women’s Studies Program University of Rhode Island

Dignity House October 5, 2006

The Trade in Women and Children

• Based on supply and demand from sending and receiving countries, regions, or cities

Supply of Victims

• Sending/Source countries, regions, or cities – Kidnapping and raids during armed conflict – Traffickers target cities, regions based on the ease of recruiting/capturing victims

Lords Resistance Army – Uganda

Pader, giugno 2005 - Centro di riabilitazione per l'accogllienza di vittime del conflitto - Disegni di bambini - (c) Contrasto

Supply of Victims

• Easy recruitment of women and girls – Poverty – Unemployment – War – Lack of opportunity or a promising future – Love and security – Eager for Western lifestyle

Domestic Victims in the U.S.

• 25% grew up without a mother in the house • 59% grew up without a father in the house • 40% someone died in their home while they were growing up • 22% the person who raised them leave for more than one year • 33% someone in the household incarcerated

Domestic Victims in the U.S.

• 27% someone in the home had a major illness or disability • 62% someone in the home was frequently hit, slapped, pushed • 40% someone in the home was kicked, beaten, raped, threatened and/or attacked with a weapon

Domestic Victims in the U.S.

• 83% drug or alcohol abuse in home • 86% used drugs or alcohol themselves • 56% ran away from home at least once, mean age 13 • 28% were told to leave home by parent or guardian, mean age 15

Domestic Victims in the U.S.

• 33% someone in home in prostitution regularly • 71% people in the neighborhood or friends in prostitution regularly • 71% someone suggested to them they should become a prostitute

Domestic Victims in the U.S.

• 65 - 80% victims of child sexual abuse, rape, or incest • 50 - 75% victims of physical abuse as a child

Memories of a Child Prostitute

, Judith Schaechter, 1994

Recruiting the Supply of Victims from Abroad • Offers for jobs abroad – “Friend,” family member, “boyfriend” or acquaintance • Operate though employment and tour agencies • Previous trafficked woman return to recruit new victims • “Marriage” agencies • Most crucial factor: Activity of traffickers – Traffickers take advantage of poverty and desire for a better future

Recruiting the Supply of Domestic Victims • Pimps prey on emotionally vulnerable girls • “Groom” girls with attention, gifts, and “affection” • Give them drugs, alcohol • Create an emotional bonding/loyalty • Become violent when girls resist

The Demand Side of Sex Trafficking • Receiving/destination countries, regions, cities – Legal or tolerated sex industries and prostitution • Sex trafficking process begins with the demand for victims • Few women will enter prostitution if they have other choices • Pimps cannot recruit enough local women

Political Criminal Nexus

• Extends from the highest levels of government to lowliest criminals • Government officials, law enforcement personnel, legal and illegal businesses, individual criminals, organized crime groups, foreign governments, nongovernmental organizations

The Global Sex Trade

• Turnover of victims is high • Steady supply of victims needed

Demand for Victims

• Victims have a limited useful life – Poor physical health; disease, infection, or injury; emotional collapse; addiction St. Petersburg Florida Police Department

Demand for Victims

• Victims are murdered Tiffany Mason, San Francisco, murdered by “john” at age 15 (August 2001)

The Global Sex Trade

• Victims are d eported

Nigerian deportees from Italy

Demand for Victims

• Victims are lost due to illness, loss of appearance, and death from AIDS • Mortality rate is 40 times that of persons of similar age and race Ador , 23, Akha Hill tribe in Thailand Myrna Balk

Demand Factors

• 1) Men who purchase sex acts • 2) Exploiters who make up sex industry and supporting services – Profiteers • 3) States (countries) that profit, particularly the destination countries • 4) Culture that glamorizes, eroticizes & romanticizes the sex trade

Men Who Purchase Sex Acts

• Usually faceless and nameless • The ultimate consumers of trafficked women and children • Many myths about men who buy sex acts • They are seeking sex without relationship responsibilities • They do not respect women • Seeking power and control over those they purchase for a short time

The Exploiters

• Traffickers, pimps, brothel owners, mafia members, corrupt officials, support services – hotels, taxi drivers • They make money from the sale of sex acts, providing rooms, transportation, & services – Can be a significant part of the tourist industry of a country

The Business of Trafficking

• Goal is to make money • Low risk, high profit enterprise • Criminal penalties are relatively low compared to the amount of profit made and the harm done to victims

Profit from the Global Sex Trade • $75,000 to $250,000 per victim/year (INTERPOL)

Profit from the Sex Trade – Southeast Asia • Thailand: Estimated income from prostitution from 1993 to 1995 was $22.5 billion - $27 billion/year • Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, & Philippines: 2 – 14% of the Gross Domestic Product

Profit from the Global Sex Trade - Japan • Japan: ¥10,000bn (US$83 billion/year • Estimated 150,000 foreign women in the sex industry • Many trafficked from the Philippines, Korea, Russia, and Latin America Hostess Clubs

Profit from the Sex Trade - Germany • Germany: Annual turnover of €14 billion (US$18 billion) • Estimated 400,000 women serve 1.2 million men a day • Majority is trafficked from Eastern Europe Berlin Window Brothels

Profit from Domestic Sex Trafficking • 2002, Oakland, California: – 218 minors prostituted by 155 pimps – Girls were 11-15 years old – Quota of $500 a day – 218 girls multiplied by 330 days a year at $500/day = $35,970,000/year • - “Oakland fights to turn tide of rising child prostitution,” Oakland Tribune, July 31, 2004

The State

• By tolerating or legalizing prostitution, the state helps create a demand for victims – Thailand and the Netherlands – sex tourist industries • Some governments tax sex businesses to make money from it, i.e. Germany • Strategies are created to protect sex industry – Canadian exotic dancer visa

The Culture

• Culture, mass media play a role in normalizing prostitution

The Culture

• Pimp culture in music & video • Pimp celebrities

The Culture

• Internet increased availability and amount of pornography, marketing of prostitution, & online live sex shows

Approaches to Prostitution: Impact on Sex Trafficking

Is Prostitution Harmful? • No: View of those who support legalization or decriminalization – Oppose forced prostitution only • Yes: View of those who see prostitution as form of violence against women, abolitionists, Bush administration – ” inherently harmful and dehumanizing”

Trafficking & Prostitution: Are They Linked?

• No: View of those who support legalization or decriminalization, Clinton administration • Yes: View of those who see both prostitution and trafficking as form of violence against women, abolitionists, Bush administration – “Prostitution and related activities…contribute to the phenomenon of trafficking in persons”

Approaches to Prostitution • Four approaches to prostitution – Prohibition – Regulation – Decriminalization – Abolition

Prohibition • Prostitution is a criminal activity – “vice” • All activities are criminalized: soliciting, procuring, pimping, and brothel keeping • All persons engaged in these activities are criminals Russian women

Prohibition, cont.

Prohibition in practice: – Prohibition in law, but tolerance in practice – Gender neutral laws, but women arrested the majority of the time – Children are arrested & treated like criminals – Less than 1% of arrests are pimps, brothel keepers, traffickers

Regulation/Legalization • Prostitution is legalized • Redefined as sex work • Regulations control when, where, and how of sexual services

Regulation/Legalization • The state collects tax revenue • State approach in the Netherlands, Germany, and some states of Australia • Counties in Nevada

Regulation/Legalization, cont.

• Redefinition – Prostitutes = sex workers – Purchasers of sex acts = clients – Pimps = managers – Brothel owners = business people – Traffickers = employment or travel agents who assist migrant sex workers

Results of Legalization

• The Netherlands – illegal prostitution went underground, expanded • In Germany – criminals have not been turned into tax payers • Big profits for exploiters • Organized crime activity continued • No reduction in prostitution or trafficking

Decriminalization • All laws and regulations concerning prostitution are removed – Most popular approach supported by sex work advocates – In reality: A transition to regulation or abolition • New Zealand

Tolerance, Decriminalization & Legalization • Legitimizes prostitution and the sex trade – allowed to advertise, grow, expand, market their services • Creates a demand for victims • Legal sex trade increases illegal sex trade, i.e. the Netherlands, Australia

Abolition • Prostitution a harmful activity • Distinction is made between victims and perpetrators

Abolition

• Persons used in prostitution or sex trafficking are victims & offered services • Johns, pimps, brothel keepers & traffickers are perpetrators & criminalized

Swedish Abolitionist Law, 1999

• Redefined prostitution as a form of violence against women – “…one of the most serious expressions of the oppression of discrimination against women” • Purchasing a sex act became a crime • Disruptive effect on men seeking to buy sex acts • Reduced street prostitution by 80 percent

US Trafficking Victims Protection Acts • Federal laws passed in 2000, 2003, 2005 • Supported by broad coalition of feminists, conservatives and faith-based groups • Victim-centered approach • Opposed by those who wanted to regulate trafficking and legalize prostitution

Abolition: National Philosophy • Sweden: Prostitution is seen as a form of violence against women (1999, Redefined prostitution) • US at Federal level (TVPA 2000): Sex trafficking of minor or using force, fraud, coercion is a form of slavery • Different conceptualizations – violence against women or slavery -- but the impact is similar

U.S. Government Action

• 2001-2005: DOJ opened 480 new investigations • Assisted 766 victims remain in US to assist with law enforcement efforts – “continued presence” • 926 victims from 55 countries – eligible for benefits under TVPA 2000 – Unaccompanied minors – Already have legal status – Self petitioners

U.S. Policy on Prostitution

• Congress voted to deny funding to groups that advocate for the legalization or regulation of prostitution or support prostitution as a legitimate form of work for women • Bush administration supported & enacted this policy

U.S. Government Action

• March 2001: AG Ashcroft made trafficking a top civil rights priority • 2002: President Bush signed NSPD – made combating trafficking a priority for all governmental departments • 2001–2005: DOJ prosecuted 287 traffickers – A 260% increase - 1996-2000: 80 prosecutions – 228 traffickers charged with sex trafficking

Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act 2005 • Passed unanimously by U.S. House and Senate, Dec 22, 2005 • Signed into law by President Bush, Jan 10, 2006

Deborah Pryce, Sam Brownback, George Bush, Chris Smith, Carolyn Maloney

TVPRA 2005, Title II

• Combating Domestic Trafficking in Persons provides funding for research, conferences, and programs relating to “ sex trafficking sex acts ” as defined in the TVPA 2000, not just “severe form of trafficking” involving commercial • Provides funds to local and state authorities to enforce anti-pimping, pandering, procuring laws. These laws do not require force, fraud, coercion

Future Work of Abolitionist Approach • Distinguish between victims and perpetrators • Reduce demand factors – Criminalize and penalize the demand – purchasers of sex acts & exploiters – Eliminate state practices that facilitate trafficking – Education and awareness for cultural change • Increase awareness of harm caused by prostitution and sex trafficking – Men who purchase sex acts – Pimps, traffickers & states who profit

Global Abolitionist Movement

• Abolitionist movement growing around the world • Feminist issue • Human rights struggle of our time

Surviving Sexual Slavery

“It is no small achievement to survive sexual slavery. Survivors are split into pieces, fragmented, broken, filled with despair, pain, rage, and sorrow. We have been hurt beyond belief … But we endure. We survive …We stay alive because we are women in search of our lives; we are women in search of freedom”

Christine Grussendorf, 1997

Contact Details

Donna M. Hughes 316 Eleanor Roosevelt Hall University of Rhode Island http://www.uri.edu/artsci/wms/hughes [email protected]