Anti-Trafficking Rhetoric and the Making of a Global Apartheid

Representations of Transnational Human Trafficking: A Critical Review

“…The stereotypical global victim of trafficking is '[a] young, naïve woman who seeks a better life away from her rural home by answering an advertisement to become a waitress or a nanny and then ends up a sex slave, repeatedly raped, brutalised, and resold to other mafia pimps' (Lobasz, 2009, p. 340): she is female (Alvarez & Alessi, 2012;Andrijasevic & Mai, 2016;Columb, 2015;De Shalit et al, 2014;de Villiers, 2016;Dijk, 2013;Duong, 2014;Farrell & Fahy, 2009;Hall, 2015;Johnston, Friedman, & Sobel, 2015;Lobasz, 2009;O'Brien, 2016;Pajnik, 2010;Plambech, 2016;Russell, 2014;Sanchez, 2016;Sanford et al, 2016;Sharma, 2005;Small, 2012;Sobel, 2016;Szörényi & Eate, 2014;Wilson & O'Brien, 2016;Yick, 2010), young (Andrijasevic & Mai, 2016;de Villiers, 2016;Dijk, 2013;Farrell & Fahy, 2009;Hall, 2015;Hua & Nigorizawa, 2010;Johnston et al, 2015;Kara, 2010;Lobasz, 2009;O'Brien, 2016;Sanchez, 2016;Sanford et al, 2016;Small, 2012;Szörényi & Eate, 2014;Wilson & O'Brien, 2016;Yick, 2010), and unwilling to per...…”

“…Alternatively, children may be identified as victims (Alvarez & Alessi, 2012;Johnston et al, 2015;Plambech, 2016;Sanford et al, 2016;Sharma, 2005;Sobel, 2014;Wilson & O'Brien, 2016); they too are portrayed as weak/vulnerable, and generally presumed blameless/trafficked against their will. Further to being common in news media and pop culture, these stereotypes are also shared by policy makers and the public (Buckley, 2009;Dando et al, 2016;Gould, 2010;Musto, 2009).…”

“…Wylie (2016, p. 5) similarly points out that many different people and institutions contribute to these figures, and each contribution is filtered through idiosyncratic understandings of what trafficking is, and who can be trafficked. Either way, men are seldom considered as victims, meaning that male victims are generally overlooked (Alvarez & Alessi, 2012;Duong, 2014;Sharma, 2005). In fact, under Thai law, it has been assumed that men cannot be victims of trafficking (Feingold, 2005).…”

“…In media reporting and legislation, structural causes that leave people vulnerable to being trafficked as well as smuggled are systematically ignored (Coghlan & Wylie, 2011;Johnston et al, 2015;O'Brien, 2016;Piper et al, 2015;Sanford et al, 2016;Sharma, 2005;Steele, 2015;Szörényi & Eate, 2014;Weitzer, 2007;Wilson & O'Brien, 2016). Wilson and O'Brien (2016, pp.…”

“…Structural push factors include local poverty (Duong, 2014;Farrell & Fahy, 2009;Feingold, 2005;Howard, 2012;Kara, 2010;Kelly, 2005;Moore & Goldberg, 2015;Sharma, 2005;Sobel, 2014), gender and economic inequality (Avendaño & Fanning, 2013;Columb, 2015;Farrell & Fahy, 2009;Hoefinger, 2016;Howard, 2012;Hua & Nigorizawa, 2010;Kara, 2010;Kelly, 2005;Moore & Goldberg, 2015;Sobel, 2014), globalisation (Avendaño & Fanning, 2013;Hoefinger, 2016;Segrave, 2009;Sharma, 2005), conflicts and violence (Feingold, 2005;Kelly, 2005;Limoncelli, 2009;Sharma, 2005) and the difficulty in obtaining work permits, which leaves migrant workers vulnerable to exploitation (Limoncelli, 2009;Moore & Goldberg, 2015).…”