About Modern Day Slavery
General Overview about Modern Slavery:
The United Nations defines human trafficking as the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring, or receipt of persons by improper means (such as force, abduction, fraud, or coercion) for an improper purpose including forced labor or sexual exploitation.[vi] Victims can be forced into labor, the sex industry, bonded labor, debt bondage, involuntary domestic servitude, or forced child labor. In relation to the sex industry, a victim can be coerced into commercial sex acts by force or fraud, or if the person induced to perform such acts has not attained 18 years of age. Modern slavery is a threat to all nations and promotes the breakdown of families and communities, can fuel organized crime, deprive countries of human capital, undermine public health, or create opportunities for extortion and subversion among government officials.[vii]
For more information on modern slavery, please visit:
TIP Report 2010 – The Trafficking in Persons report is submitted annually to Congress. This report covers “severe forms of trafficking in persons,” and it also serves as a diplomatic tool through which the U.S Government persuades other countries to combat modern slavery.
UN Convention on Transnational Organized Crime and its Protocols on Trafficking in Persons and Migrant Smuggling – Adopted in 2000, the Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, also known as the Palermo Convention, is a UN sponsored multilateral treaty against transnational organized crime. This convention has two protocols: 1) The Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children; 2) Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air.
Fact Sheet: Distinctions between Human Smuggling and Human Trafficking — This report from the Human Smuggling and Trafficking Center outlines the basic differences between the crimes of human smuggling and human trafficking.
Child Sex Slavery and Exploitation:
While sexual slavery involves a variety of victims, the use of children in sexual slavery and exploitation is becoming an increasingly global problem. According to the Counter Pedophilia Investigative Unit at INTERPOL, [1] one in every seven victims of sexual exploitation reported to law enforcement were under the age of 6.[viii] What is even more alarming is the fact that roughly 67% of all victims reported to law enforcement were juveniles, a statistic that could potentially be higher when considering all of the unreported victims of sex slavery.[ix] UNICEF reports that as many as two million children are subjected to prostitution in the global commercial sex trade. The United States Department of State publishes a yearly Trafficking in Persons report that estimates that between 600,000 and 800,000 people, more than half which are minors, are trafficked across borders each year.[x] Alarmingly, these numbers do not include those victims that are trafficked within the borders of their own countries.
For more information about child slavery and exploitation, please visit:
Convention on the Rights of the Child –The Convention on the Rights of the Child was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on November 20, 1989, and it came into force on September 2, 1990. As of November 2009, 194 countries are party to the convention including the United States. Articles 34, 35, and 36 deal specifically with the issues of child exploitation and trafficking.
Global Child Sex Tourism: Children as Tourist Attractions by Susan Song – This paper deals with a particularly heinous form of commercial sexual exploitation: sex tourism. This paper not only defines the issue, but also spotlights the actions being taken worldwide to counter this crime.
The Male Demand
The global demand for prostitution is primarily a male driven industry and it is not uncommon for the men to be from all nationalities, races, and walks of life. Most men also tend to be married, and come from a variety of age groups.[xi] Statistics regarding male demand for prostitution can be almost impossible to determine because research is driven by self reporting males, which can be unreliable. Despite that, organizations are beginning to uncover determining factors that result in a high male demand for prostitution. A 2003 study from the Swedish Ministry of Industry found that one in eight European men uses women and children in prostitution, and in Italy the rate is closer to one in six men.[xii] A Doctoral study in Germany found that over a million transactions a day occur involving men buying women for sexual activities.[xiii] In many Asian countries, where gender imbalance is a growing problem, millions of unmarried men (an estimated 37 million in China alone) become a driving force behind the human trafficking industry. In Thailand, a study found that as many as 75% of Thai men regularly purchase sex, while 60-70% of men in Cambodia use women for sexual services.[xiv] In 2005, the Korean Times reported that the largest tourist population visiting Cambodia were men from Korea.
For more information on sex trafficking demand, please visit:
The Demand for Victims of Sex Trafficking by Donna M. Hughes – This paper begins its analysis of the sex trafficking by looking at the “demand side” of the issue. Hughes conceptualizes “the demand” to include not only the buyers but also the exploiters and the state.
Targeting the Sex Buyer—The Swedish Example: Stopping Prostitution and Trafficking Where It All Begins by Kajsa Claude–This article approaches the issue of human trafficking from the perspective that the main issue of concern for policy is the demand for sexual services which sustain trafficking.
Presence in the United States
Contrary to popular belief, trafficking is as much a problem in the United States as it is around the world. In major metropolitan areas such as New York, Chicago, and San Francisco, the sale and purchase of sex involves both US victims and trafficked victims from around the world. Women and children are trafficked in from [4] countries such as China, Mexico, and Russia to meet the growing needs of American men. Young American children are also purchased and sold as part of the growing US problem. An estimated 300,000 to 600,000 children are currently involved in prostitution in the United States, with an additional 250,000 more youth at risk of becoming victims.[xv] The average age of entry for female prostitutes in the US is [5] 12 and 14 years, and the media is consistently used as a tool for recruitment.[xvi]
For more information on sex trafficking in the United States, please visit:
The National Report on Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking: America’s Prostituted Children – This report, presented Shared Hope International, deals with the issue of domestic sex trafficking within the United States.
Trafficking of Women and Children for Sexual Exploitation in the Americas by Alison Phinney –This paper is a comprehensive study of the trafficking of women and children in North and South America.
Effects of Federal Legislation on the Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children by William Adams, Colleen Owens, and Kevonne Small — This report examines the effects of the Trafficking and Violence Prevention Act of 2000 on the prosecution of commercial sexual exploitation of children cases.
[i] Kevin Bales, President, Free the Slaves.
[ii] Patrick Besler, Forced Labour and Human Trafficking: Estimating the Profits, working paper (Geneva, International Labour Office, 2005).
[iii] The Cost of Coercion (International Labour Office, May 2009).
[iv] Kevin Bales, President, Free the Slaves.
[v] U.S. Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Report: 2007.
[vi] http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij/topics/crime/human-trafficking/welcome.htm
[vii] http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij/topics/crime/human-trafficking/welcome.htm
[viii] http://www.cpiu.us/cpiu-jobs/
[ix] http://www.cpiu.us/statistics-2/
[x] http://www.unicef.org/protection/files/CP_Trg_Manual_Textbook_1.pdf
[xi] Primer on the male demand for prostitution pg. 14
[xii] Primer 14
[xiii] Primer 14
[xiv] Brown, L. (2000). Sex slaves: The trafficking of women in Asia. London: Virago. Cited in Raymond, J. G., (October 2004). See endnote 1.
[xv] http://abcnews.go.com/US/domestic-sex-trafficking-increasing-united-states/story?id=10557194
[xvi] http://www.womensfundingnetwork.org/resource/past-articles/enslaved-in-america-sex-trafficking-in-the-united-states
