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Debate
Prostitution and Human Rights
An attack on human dignity or a legitimate profession?
Definitions
Prostitution:
The vast majority of legal systems agree on three distinct criteria
defining prostitution:
- sexual contact
- payment
- repeated or habitual action
Pimping:
Most legal systems do not give a general definition of pimping but
list a series of characteristics which we may group under two main
headings:
- direct pimping, ie furthering prostitution or debauchery or profiting
by it.
- Indirect pimping, ie knowingly supplying public or private rooms
to those involved in prostitution.
Extract from
Prostitution and Pimping in Europe, La documentation française
(1995)
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Few issues have
generated as many clichés and truisms as prostitution. Two theories,
underlying two distinct legal systems, stand opposed with a virulence
seldom equalled in other arenas. On one side, there are those who feel
that the very nature of prostitution is an attack on human dignity and
therefore every effort must be made to stamp it out altogether. They target
two categories of people: pimps and clients. On the other side, there
are those who think that it is the conditions under which prostitution
is conducted which can be an attack on human dignity and we must therefore
accept prostitution as a reality of our society and regulate it to guarantee
the prostitutes' basic human rights.
Why should we re-open this debate? Firstly, globalisation has changed
the face of prostitution. Today all its parameters are becoming international:
whether it be the demand (waves of rich men flowing towards poor women,
whether the women move to western countries or the men travel as sex tourists),
the pimp networks, or the prostitutes themselves forming organised groups
to defend their interests.
Also, new forms of communication, particularly the internet, have created
new forms of "paid sexual activity". Street prostitution alone
no longer reflects the reality of the sex industry.
Furthermore, the definition of prostitution has changed: we are witnessing
a growth in male prostitution, a growth in female demand in certain countries,
which prompts us to rethink the link between the struggle for female emancipation
and the struggle against prostitution.
Finally, the basic human rights of the prostitutes, male or female, whichever
legal system they find themselves under, are often ignored or treated
with scant respect. For all these reasons, we feel it necessary to re-open
the prostitution debate, where much is at stake, in terms of human rights,
in the rift between two theories so radically opposed as to be at times
Manichean. The simplified table below outlines the basic tenets and areas
of contention of the two opposing theories, which are defended in the
two following articles.
| Theory
1: Prostitution is by its very nature an attack on human rights |
Theory
2: Prostitution is a reality of our society |
-
The very nature of the activity is attacked. Prostitution in itself
constitutes an attack on human dignity and thus on human rights.
- Prostitution is in effect selling a part of one's body. The human
body is not a piece of merchandise. Prostitution cannot be considered
as a normal profession.
- No one freely chooses prostitution. Consent is always determined
by economic, personal, cultural, family or social considerations.
- Prostitutes are seen as victims and should not be prosecuted.
- Prostitution must be combated. Pimps, and indeed clients,
must be prosecuted. |
.-
It is only the conditions under which prostitution is conducted
which make it possible to categorise this activity as a contemporary
form of slavery.
- It is a service, not the human body, which is for sale. Prostitution
may be considered as a profession.
- An individual may freely choose prostitution. A distinction
must be drawn between free and enforced prostitution. The individual's
right to do as the will with their own body must be paramount.
- Prostitutes should not be seen as victims, nor should they be
prosecuted.
- Prostitution must be regulated. Only those who force a minor
or a non-consenting adult into prostitution should be prosecuted. |
"The
Human Body is Not For Sale"
The Beijing
establishment of the term "forced prostitution" is often
cited as a victory for the pro-"sex industry" camp or as
a bitter defeat for the defenders of "free prostitution".
However, even in 1985, at the World Women's Conference in Nairobi,
the term "forced prostitution" appeared in the Action Programme
(paragraphs 290 and 291). The Declaration on the Elimination of Violence
to Women pronounced by the United Nations General Assembly in December
1993 (article 2) defined "forced prostitution" as a form
of violence.
The Beijing Action Programme takes up this definition and identifies
pimping and "forced prostitution" as a form of violence
against women at the heart of society (section D(a)). Since Beijing,
the notion of "forced prostitution", implying there is a
contrasting free prostitution, seems to encompass the spirit of the
Human Rights High Commission which compares "forced prostitution"
to a contemporary form of slavery.
Finally, the statutes of the International Court of Justice recognises
"forced prostitution" and "sexual slavery" as
war crimes. |
Is prostitution
a profession like any other? This is the underlying assumption of those
who espouse regulation as the best means of dealing with the problem,
who see state recognition of sex workers as the best means to guarantee
their economic and social rights and to avoid marginalisation. Although
one cannot fail to concede the efficiency of this argument, its coherence
is nonetheless questionable. In the end, the regulation argument turns
out to be condemned either by contradicting or negating the very principle
it seeks to defend--respect for human dignity.
The debate between regulation and abolition[1]1 does
not simply come down to the traditional opposition between pragmatist
and idealist, although it is certainly true that this level of argument
does come into play. It is "utopian" to want to abolish prostitution,
"the oldest profession in the world", men "being what they
are". We sigh, expound in saddened tones on human nature and so at
last resign ourselves to legalising the evil we cannot eradicate, in the
name of unchangeable human nature in general, and the insatiable libido
of man in particular. This argument is at best astonishing. Evil done
to a human being is no less evil for having existed for centuries. No
war has ever been considered more legitimate for having been preceded
by a thousand others; no act of torture in any jail has gained legitimacy
because the same torture had been carried out there for two thousand years;
no human exploitation has ever become more acceptable because it followed
centuries of oppression. On the contrary, the essence of human rights
specifically sets rational legitimacy (the intrinsic dignity of each individual)
in opposition to the historical longevity of abusive and discriminatory
practices, the ideal of respect for humanity against the historical reality
of exploitation, so as to force that reality to change. If we seek to
legalise prostitution, the argument that it has "always existed"
is too weak.
Thus pragmatism, if it is not to become cruel cynicism, can and must bring
its influence to bear on the methods employed to eradicate any attack
on human dignity, but never in so doing compromise its principles _ which
is the issue here, since the regulation and abolition camps are not only
opposed over the methods (how should the rights of prostitutes be respected?)
but also over the principles (is prostitution, even under decent conditions,
an attack on human dignity?).
Just another
profession?
At the heart of
the debate, therefore, is the problem of the act of prostitution: is it
in itself an attack on human dignity, or an activity like any other manual
labour? Is prostitution intrinsically an attack on human dignity or is
it a manual service like any other? One would call on a prostitute _ male
or female[2]2 - for certain physical services, just
as one would call on the strong arms of a removal man for different physical
services. Essentially, the prostitute rents out their body as do thousands
of other manual labourers, and it would be only in the name of a reactionary
social or religious morality that one would withhold the status of "workers"[3]3
from prostitutes "working" in good conditions. Here lies the
crux of the debate. The whole argument on both sides hangs on the response
to this question, particularly as regards the essential point of free
choice. The basic problem prostitution raises is not so much that it implies
remuneration for physical activity, but remuneration for the particular
form which is sexual activity[4]4. This sheds new
light on the particular position of sexual activity amongst other physical
activities. Why is sex not quite the same thing as moving a fridge, when
in both cases one is basically hiring a body?
The human body is not simply a material object like any other. It is that
by which I exist in the world, that by which I act and interact with others.
It is the very definition of the word "me". Thus even if it
is true that I own my body, I do not own it as I do some external thing,
but as the definition of myself, an integral part of my identity. It is
in the light of this coexistence of my body and my being that an attack
on the body is a violation of human rights. To attack an individual's
body is to attack them entirely, to violate their very being. Torturers
are well aware of this and seek through physical suffering to annihilate
their victim's identity[5]5. This point is the basis
for the majority of national legislative statutes which take the view
that the body is not available for use, in the sense that I cannot give
my body away as I would an object. This is why blood and organ donations
cannot be commercial transactions. Taken to its logical conclusion, the
regulation argument must defend the individual's right to sell their organs
and blood to tide them over to pay day.
The human body
is not just an object like any other.
This comment is
not based on any particular social or religious morality. It is linked
to the very notions of the identity and autonomy of the human being in
its entirety, as recognised for example by French law and reiterated frequently
by the National Consultative Committee on Ethics (CCNE). For example,
the CCNE's document no. 21 of 13 December 1990 on the non-commercialisation
of the human body states: "If we hold that the human body has no
part in a commercial transaction and thus no part in a market, we are
setting forth two complementary propositions: on the one hand, the human
body, or body parts, cannot be the object of a contract. On the other
hand, its price cannot be negotiated. The dignity of human beings demands
that no financial gain should come from even a temporary diminishing of
the body's status."
| Abolition:
The Example of France
In France,
the epitome of the abolitionist country, prostitution is not a criminal
offence.
Prostitution is a part of each individual's private life and liberty.
This liberty is nonetheless strictly limited by defining a series
of offences in the industries surrounding prostitution, such as
solliciting or pimping.
There are five distinct legal categories of pimp: instigator, accomplice,
intermediary, distributor and accommodation provider.
The right
to housing is inevitably affected, since no one would dare rent
out a flat to a prostitute for fear of being seen as an accommodation
provider, and because prostitution can be used to terminate a room
leasing contract.
The right
to health is equally jeopardised by the fact that prostitutes
are only covered by social security if they register as self-employed.
In reality, prostitutes have difficulty gaining access to justice:
their claims regularly end up as accusations of solliciting, while
those originally accused of violence against them, in most cases,
are cleared. Nor is their right to physical protection ever defended.
Prostitutes who are victims of violence are not protected by the
police.
Profits from prostitution are subject to individual income tax (IRPP)
under the heading of non-commercial profits. The State even taxes
profits from pimping, an illegal activity. It is no surprise that
the State has been cast as "the biggest pimp in France".
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The Regulatory
System: The Example of the Netherlands
The Dutch
system seems the most liberal in terms of prostitution, although
it had for a long time been abolitionist.
In 1996, the Netherlands adopted legislation decriminalising brothels
and giving them the status of companies.
Their policy is based on a distinction between forced and voluntary
prostitution. Only trafficking in prostitutes and other types of
offences are still criminal. Those who profit from the prostitution
of others are subject to fairly light penalties.
The
regulation of prostitution is delegated to regional and local government
who
decide on licences to be granted to sexual establishments in their
region
The prostitutes themselves are not obliged to register. The obtaining
of a licence depends on respecting certain rules, such as the forbidding
of consumption of alcohol with clients and the fact that all prostitutes
must reside legally in the Netherlands.
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If this is the
case, however, why can the removal man or the cleaner hire our their bodies?
Are they not the object of a commercial transaction? No _ for the vast
difference between the removal man or cleaner and the prostitute is that
in the case of the first two, it is not the body itself which is hired
out, but the work it does: if a machine could perform the same tasks with
the same accuracy, there would be no problem in replacing the people.
Of course this is not true of the prostitute, where the human body cannot
be replaced by plastic dolls and other substitutes. In other words, with
other manual labour, the body is used in so far as it can produce something,
take action, alter its surroundings, that is, as a subject. The autonomy
of the body is preserved, which is why being a removal man or a cleaner
is not in itself an attack on human dignity (with the proviso that where
their working conditions are degrading, one should strive to change them).
In each case, we are looking at work.
However, the prostitute
hires our their body not to do work but as the passive object of their
client's desire[6]6. Since prostitution (as well
as organ or blood donation) involves offering the human body in all is
intimacy, its status changes fundamentally and cannot be compared to other
forms of manual labour[7]7. The very notion of work
is problematic, and by extension, the term "sex worker". It
is precisely because sexual intercourse reaches the most intimate core
of a body and of a human being that it is also a unique means of relating
to another person, an exceptional means of each offering themselves entirely
to the other. This type of interaction cannot happen unless it is entered
into freely and with full consent on both sides, a relationship of equal
partners _ evidently not the case with prostitution, which in its very
essence is a relationship of power.
The fundamental
question of choice.
For the same reason,
it is doubtful whether prostitution is ever a free choice. What proportion
of prostitutes, given the possibility of earning the same or better in
acceptable working conditions and in which they did not need to sell their
bodies, would choose nonetheless to continue in prostitution? A study
made among prostitutes in San Francisco shows that nearly 90% want to
leave the industry.
It is worth noting that the regulation camp, to prove that prostitutes
choose their profession freely, cite the fact that they prefer prostitution
to, say, working in a sweat shop for 15 hours a day. Of course they do.
But a choice between two forms of exploitation is not a free choice, nor
ever has been, but is purely and simply an abuse of the term. Article
23 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights could therefore only have
been proposed by the regulation camp by misrepresenting the very notion
of "free choice".
Having raised the
issue of "consenting prostitutes", we must return for a moment
to the notion of "free and clear consent". According to the
CCNE's 58th pronouncement of 12 June 1998, "The act of consent implies
two areas of ability (or aptitude or capacity): one must be able to understand
(clear comprehension or intellect), and to be able to freely choose (free
will). Those whose ability to understand is weak or disturbed or those
whose freedom of choice is limited[8]8 are considered
to be unable to give such consent []" (our emphasis). The issue is
the extent of the prostitute's freedom of choice. One could consider,
in fact, that she became a prostitute by lack of choice rather than by
choice.[9]9 When a woman becomes a prostitute to
feed her family and children, as is so often the case in developing countries,
was that free choice? Is it not on the contrary the last resort _ when
no other option is open for survival, when all the conditions allowing
free choice have been eliminated? Studies reveal that in the West, more
than 70% of prostitutes have been sexually abused as children, and that
the average age of entering prostitution is 16 (14 in the United States)[10]10:
how can we avoid the conclusion that the "choice" of prostitution
"logically" flows from a situation of many years of exploitation,
where the identity and autonomy of the individual have already been broken
or damaged? Far from being free, prostitution seems on the contrary in
every case to be the result of pressures and constraints _ psychological,
social, family-related and of course, economic. "Freelance"
prostitution, where the individual is independent and keeps their earnings,
is rare indeed: the constraints suffered on entering prostitution are
exacerbated by the daily constraints of those who profit from the prostitution
of their "protégé(e)s".[11]11
Thus the distinction between free and forced prostitution has no basis
in fact.
The solution is not therefore to claim that that which was originally
a non-choice will by some miracle become free choice. On the contrary,
and infinitely more complicated to achieve, it is to create a political,
economic, social and legal framework such that each individual has real
freedom to choose an activity in line with their own aspirations, in which
he or she will not be exploited in any way. Human rights are concerned
with exactly this: allowing truly free decisions, decisions not dictated
by misery, social conditioning, culture or traditions - decisions which
are fully autonomous. This means that the "abolitionist" position,
however coherent, cannot be content with simply wanting to "abolish"
prostitution. Clearly this can only be a long-term process, with programmes
set in place offering prostitutes viable alternatives. The "abolitionist"
position is thus revealed as a highly demanding one, particularly of governments:
it requires them to take seriously their obligations in terms of economic
and social rights, while compelling them to mobilise all economic, social,
administrative resources to allow the prostitutes, at last, to have a
free choice. For prostitutes, rather than focusing on workers' rights,
would it not be better to address the right to work?
It is therefore unavoidable to agree with Mr Dottridge when he wrote that
we must take into account "the experience acquired by the international
community in other areas of unacceptable exploitation, which recommends
a gradual approach: identify the worst abuses, and concentrate efforts
on eradicating them." The only difference is that our own conclusions
are different: a developing approach, certainly, so as to allow prostitutes
gradually to find ways out of their situation; but this gradual nature
in no way means that we should recognise as legitimate in principle that
which remains fundamentally the exploitation of human beings.[12]12
Anne-Christine
Habbard
ENDNOTES********************************
[1]1 A singularly
inappropriate term, given that it is not simply a question of "abolishing"
prostitution without at the same time offering other options to the prostitutes,
and since in any case there can be no question of punishing the prostitutes.
Contrary to popular understanding, there is no inconsistency in a legislator
forbidding the exploitation of prostitutes but not prostitution itself
(as in French law, for instance: article 6 of the CEDAW can be understood
this way). We must not make an individual who is essentially a victim
of economic, social and psychological injustice into a guilty criminal.
[2]2 I have deliberately
emphasised the gender issue since although the vast majority of prostitutes
are women (and one could therefore add a specific comment on prostitution
as a small cog in the machine of tradition exerting power over women),
the argument here applies to both genders.
[3]3 The comment
of Mr Dottridge of the NGO Antislavery International if a typical example:
"Is there a fundamental difference between accepting paid work []
such as a cook or cleaner in a private home, and offering a sexual service?
Clearly, some argue that there is no significant difference [] that all
women who earn their living in the informal sector, including prostitution,
are simply doing what they can to survive. Others, of course, feel that
sexual intercourse outside of marriage, whether paid or not, is intrinsically
wrong." The question is not exactly that of "sexual intercourse
outside marriage", which has no relevance here, but that of a contract
whose terms cover a sexual service against payment. Prostitution is not
adultery, thankfully we are beyond this stage of the debate.
[4]4 The question
of defining the limits of prostitution is clearly posed here. Do we include
pornographic actresses, sex phone line employees, etc ...? It is fair
to assume that there are differing levels of earning profit from sexual
services, and the task of setting a line of demarcation would occupy a
whole study in itself. The fact remains that the existence of other activities
with potential similarities to prostitution, or which are degrading to
human dignity, makes prostitution itself legitimate.
[5]5 Amply demonstrated
by F Sironi in Torturers and Victims _ The Psychology of Torture, Paris,
O Jacob, 1999.
[6]6 Jo Bindman's
argument (Redefining Prostitution as Sex Work in the International Agenda,
CSIS, 1997), according to which a prostitution transaction would regain
its dignity if the prostitute were not unconditionally subject to the
client's wishes ("the sex worker has no reason to accept a particular
client or to subject themselves to acts to which they do not consent")
is insufficient.
[7]7 The psychoanalyst
would reply, "everything is sexual", that is that every physical
activity is sexualised. This is not the place to respond to this interpretation,
but the psychoanalysts will concede nonetheless that there is a difference
between explicit physical sexuality (fellatio, coitus) and a particular
(and debatable) reading of symbolic sexuality in behavioru which his not
explicitly sexual.
[8]8 Cf. I Berlin,
Four Essays on Liberty, Oxford Univ. Press, 1969 for an interesting reflection
on the subject of free will in consent.
[9]9 In Amsterdam
(where prostitution has been legalised), 80% of prostitutes are immigrants,
and 70% are illegal immigrants. This places a question mark over the free
nature of their prostitution, and also implies that prostitution encourages
traffic in illegal immigrants rather than discourages it.
[10]10 Cf. D Leidholdt,
"Prostitution: a form of modern slavery", in Making the Harm
Visible, p52. Recognising prostitution as a legitimate profession also
means that it will become difficult for young women to refuse it in the
face of a range of pressures.
[11]11 N. Hotaling
("What happens to women in prostitution in the United States"
in Making the Harm Visible, p244) describes the psychological manipulative
game to which pimps subject their prostitutes. An important stage in this
game is the changing of identity--a logical move, given that they wish
to make the prostitutes lose their sense of personal identity.
[12]12 For example,
the programme initiated by UNICEF in Bangladesh to eliminate child labour:
on the basis of the assumption that banning all child labour overnight
would further jeopardise the situation of families who were already in
extreme poverty, and for whom the children's work was often indispensable
for survival, UNICEF, in partnership with the companies concerned, has
put in place a programme which aims to reduce the number of hours of work
at the company gradually, alongside a schooling programme, with the goal
of eventually eliminating all child labour. The gradual nature of this
approach, and the understanding of the social and economic realities of
the people, have not brought with them a legitimisation of the basic principle
of child labour.
"Sex workers
do not sell their bodies.
What they sell is their services."
Introduction
to Interview with Jo Bindman Jo Bindman is the author of a report entitled
"Re-defining Prostitution as Sex Work on the International Agenda" published
in 1997 jointly with Jo Doesema of Network of Sex Work Projects. This
report shows how international norms on human rights and labour law in
particular must be applied to prostitutes. Jo Bindman worked at the time
for Anti-Slavery.
The report
"Re-defining Prostitution as Sex Work on the International Agenda"
is available on the Network of Sex Work Projects website at
the address below www.walnet.org/csis/groups/nswp |
1. Are sex workers
unique?
Do sex workers really sell their bodies? Isn't that just an outmoded phrase
conveying an outmoded stigma? Sex workers do not sell their bodies any
more than factory workers or doctors do - what they sell is their services.
All workers, even office workers (as the growth of Repetive Strain Injury
testifies), sell the use of parts of their bodies - the skill of their
hands, the strength of their backs or legs.
Of course human
beings should not be sold - only human labour, not a human being, may
be a commodity. Chattel slavery, where people are traded as goods, and
the contemporary forms of slavery which allow people to treat others as
goods, are real problems in our world, across all industries - including
the sex industry - and all continents. But it simply defies clear thinking
to cast an entire worldwide industry, with enormous variation in employment
practice within and between countries, as slavery, and distracts from
the very real task of ending exploitation in all industries.
If the word 'body'
here was euphemistically intended to indicate the intimacy of physical
contact with another person which is supposed to set the sex worker apart
from all others, I would say that it is in fact social stigma which separates
the physical contact offered by a sex worker to her, or his, clients from
that intimacy experienced by other workers in personal services: beauticians,
medical professionals, carers for the incapacitated or some domestic workers.
The fact that some people outside the sex industry recoil from the idea
of this intimate contact in a commercial sex context - what one sex worker
called the 'ick' factor - is not a sufficient basis for the designation
of sex work as a special human rights issue. Personally, I am revolted
by the idea of cleaning someone else's toilet, but I hardly think that
has a bearing on national or international law, or that domestic workers
would thank me for holding them up to public pity or disdain. Sex workers,
like domestic workers, do not seek to be 'saved' or 'rehabilitated' -
they want less romantic things like fair wages and fire escapes.
Why is it so important
to see sex work as comparable to other work, for sex work to be considered
in terms of similarity rather than difference? Because distinguishing
sex work from other forms of labour reinforces the marginal, and therefore
vulnerable, status of the sex worker. It is the marginal position of sex
workers in society which excludes them from the international, national
and customary protection afforded to others as citizens, workers or women.
Their vulnerability to human and labour rights violations is greater than
that of others because of the stigma and criminal charges widely attached
to sex work. These allow police and others to harass sex workers and to
fail to intervene to uphold their most elementary rights against the abuses
of others.
2. Why does
prostitution need to be redefined as sex work?
The concept of 'prostitution' has come to describe a moral, social or
psychological condition or class of person, with an implied pathology,
rather than an economic activity. The persons so affected have been defined
firstly and above all else by this condition. How can we move to securing
full human and civil rights for people identified by society as socially
degraded at worst, pitied and patronised at best? 'Sex work', by contrast,
describes an activity, not an identity. In this way, by presenting sex
work as a job, it becomcs possible for sex workers, like, for example,
health workers, customer service workers, or even human rights workers,
to describe what they do for a living without being defined exclusively
by it. It should become possible for people in the sex industry, like
others, to be viewed primarily as parent, citizen, customer or patient
as appropriate, outside the context of their work.
But more than this,
so long as we consider the sex industry to be a problem rather than an
industry, we will continue to see attempts to restrict or eliminate -
to put it on the wrong side of the law. Although such measures are invariably
intended, in good faith, to protect women, in fact the result time after
time and in place after place is to make life worse for sex workers. The
stricter the laws, the more the labour problems associated with the 'informal
sector' intensify: the workers are hidden from public or official view,
and they must rely on intermediaries to find customers for them - intermediaries
who will in any case require a share of the sex worker's earnings and
in some cases may be able to exploit the sex worker's vulnerable position.
It is the illegality of sex work, first and foremost, which contributes
to the particular vulnerability of sex workers to contemporary forms of
slavery, since as criminals or marginals they cannot seek the protection
of the law.
3. Prostitution
and contemporary forms of slavery.
Again, there is confusion here. I'd like to look at the relationship between
sex work and slavery: what constitutes slavery: what constitutes prostitution;
and the logical difficulties attached to defining prostititution simply
in terms of slavery.
Slavery, in traditional and contemporary forms, exists. The sex industry
exists. There is some overlap in that some of the contemporary forms of
slavery - most notably debt bondage and child labour - are very clearly
present in the sex industry. However, it is far from evident that these
are exclusive to the sex industry, being more clearly associated with
the disadvantaged social and economic position of the victims than with
the ultimate destination of those victims. The poor in countries with
limited protection for human rights are at risk of exploitation in every
industry, particularly in the informal sector. Wherever sex workers are
to be found in these conditions of contemporary slavery, so too are domestic
workers or manufacturing workers in sweatshops.
The 1956 Supplementary Convention on Contemporary Forms of Slavery recognises
four such forms: bonded labour, that is where labour is demanded as repayment
for a loan or debt forced labour, that is under the threat of violence
or other penalty; child labour early or forced marriage.
The Convention is not of course infallible and will no doubt be amended
as years go by, but I think that the definitions presented here together
demonstrate one of the conceptual problems with the definition of the
entire sex industry as slavery. Three of the definitions of contemporary
forms of slavery in the Convention are based on the different ways in
which the employment relation may be corrupted: by force; by exploitation
of the social relations attached to debt; by inappropriate treatment of
minors. The fourth, early or forced marriage, similarly focuses on the
relation of power between the victim and the family members.
In each case, the
form is defined by the nature of the corruption of the power relation,
not by the particular activity undertaken by the victim for the economic
gain of the enslaver. This is the major conceptual problem with the definition
of the sex industry as slavery. 'Prostitution' in no way fits this paradigm
- the sex industry is defined by the services it provides, not by the
power relations which obtain within it. The industry itself, like most
other industries, encompasses every possible variation in employment or
power relations. Sex work can and does take place outside employment relations
of any kind. The relationship negotiated between sex worker and client
in the commercial transaction is limited: this is not an employment relationship
as the client does not have enduring power over the worker. Sex work can
take place in the context of exploitative employment relationships, even
slavery, where someone with enduring power over the worker constrains
her power to negotiate with the client. But this case does not support
an assertion that all sex work is akin to slavery, as slavery and its
contemporary forms are defined.
4. Might not
the definition as 'work' have a negative impact on the issue of trafficking?
This is a very fair question. I can see a pragmatic need to present sex
workers as victims in the light of current, highly restrictive, immigration
practices. I would rather see women patronised as victims than subject
to police persecution or deported.
5. What link
do you see between trafficking and the legal status of prostitutes in
the country of destination?
It is suggested that legal toleration of the sex industry - the Netherlands
are commonly cited as an example - encourages 'trafficking'. (I prefer
to avoid that word: like 'prostitution', it may never lose its fragrance
of nineteenth century assumptions about the nature and role of women).
This is locating the problem of the exploitation of migrants in entirely
the wrong place. People are smuggled, and threatened with exposure to
the authorities, in many industries. The problem lies with restrictive
immigration, not with the sex industry. The logic of restricting the sex
industry to prevent abuse of illegal migrants would surely demand that
we attempt also to curtail or eliminate the textile and agricultural industries
of the richest countries of any region. These industries are also typically
engaged in the abusive exploitation of illegal migrant labour.
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