Introduction

Problematizing the Educational Messaging on Sex Trafficking in the US “End-demand” Movement: The (Mis)Representation of Victims and Anti-Sex Work Rhetoric

“…Overall, both the definitional inconsistency and the interchangeable use among the three terms – “prostitution,” “sex trafficking,” and “sexual exploitation” – construct the “victims” in a rather unnuanced and stereotypical manner, including people in sex industries disregarding intra-group differences and the intersectional experiences of an individual as to how consent, agentic choices, and coerciveness manifest in people's lived experiences. This representational choice is a manifestation of the feminist neo-abolitionist/prohibitionist ideology that “draws an equivalence” between sex work and sex trafficking and considers both as “founded on violence and the impossibility of consent” (Ward & Wylie, 2017, p. 6). Such a definitional conflation produces and perpetuates a rather static and essentialist view of individuals in sex work industries, a view that is not grounded in the complexities and lived realities of people involved in many different sex work sectors, as documented in ample empirical work (e.g., Berg, 2021; Smith & Mac, 2018; West & Horn, 2021) and that leaves no intersectional representational room for those with experiences of both (consensual) sex work and trafficking.…”

“…Anti-trafficking groups or advocates endorsing the end-demand approach often refer to themselves as “abolitionists” or “neo-abolitionists” 1 (i.e., calling for the abolition of sex work) (Ward & Wylie, 2017). Some Christian evangelical groups and celebrity activists, although with very different ideological or practical concerns, have also joined the neo-abolitionist alliance against sex trafficking (Haynes, 2014; Heynen & van der Meulen, 2021; Ward & Wylie, 2017). For example, Exodus Cry, a Christian anti-sex trafficking group based in the US, names their end-demand anti-trafficking approach “the abolition strategy” and calls the public to join them to be “a sex industry abolitionist” (Exodus Cry, n.d.).…”

“…The core tenet of radical feminism focuses on institutionalized male dominance over women and sees sex work industries as an institution inherently violent toward women (Weitzer, 2020;Kempadoo et al, 2016). Anti-trafficking groups or advocates endorsing the end-demand approach often refer to themselves as "abolitionists" or "neo-abolitionists" 1 (i.e., calling for the abolition of sex work) (Ward & Wylie, 2017). Some Christian evangelical groups and celebrity activists, although with very different ideological or practical concerns, have also joined the neo-abolitionist alliance against sex trafficking (Haynes, 2014;Heynen & van der Meulen, 2021;Ward & Wylie, 2017).…”

The Making and Circulation of Nordic Models, Ideas and Images

“…Existing research has shown considerable global interest in the model. Many scholars conclude that the 'Swedish' or 'Nordic' model is among the international prostitution policies most often discussed and debated (Ward and Wylie, 2017;Crowhurst and Skilbrei, 2018;McMenzie et al, 2019). Moreover, the dominance of the 'Nordic' adjective suggests that this label may be more than a geographic and descriptive signifier model.…”

‘Framing figures’ and the campaign for sex purchase criminalisation in Ireland: A Lakoffian analysis

“…Informed by radical feminism, this frame casts sex work as the ultimate embodiment of male privilege, a view that translated into a strategy of silencing contrary sex worker voices (McGarry and FitzGerald, 2017), providing for them, instead, an exclusively victim script (Leahy, 2013). The campaign drew on the trafficking imaginary, an idea of sex trafficking as a huge, overwhelming and ubiquitous phenomena both globally and within the state (Ward and Wylie, 2017: 6). Moreover, the goals and values of the ToRL were already internalised by the Irish political elite (Ward, 2017) having been signed up to by all but one of the political parties in the Parliament by the time the law was up for review.…”