Abstract
The subject and purpose of this study is to examine the trafficking in women, which is a component of the underground economy as a historical criminal activity, with its general causes, effects, and Turkey dimension. By its very nature, trafficking in women is done secretly from the state, and the state tries to control it. With the global COVID-19 pandemic, trafficking in women has not changed shape, but it continues to exist as a severe socio-economic problem all over the world. Turkey, which is integrated with the contemporary capitalist system, which is intertwined with underground economic activities, is not a country where women's trafficking is intense, but it has been a route in the Afro-Eurasian geography since she became a migration center. Trafficking in women revolves on four wheels (human rights violation, sexual exploitation, glocalization, and the sex sector). Turkey and other states have to implement both the UN's global standard struggle programs and various national economic policies in order to stop these wheels.
TopLiterature Review
There are many studies and reports examining trafficking in women from socioeconomic, political economy and feminist economics perspectives. Some of them are selected and summarized below:
Bertone (1999) emphasizes that trafficking in human beings in general and trafficking in women in particular is a threat to national security and social cohesion in many nation-states, and highlights in the capitalist market system its contemporary origins and its global phenomenon. She further argues that the international political economy of gender not only includes the supply side -women of the third world, poor states or exotic Asian women - but cannot survive without demand from men in industrialized and developing countries, who are organizers of trade.
Wheaton et.al. (2010) present an economic model of human trafficking that encompasses all known economic factors that affect human trafficking both across and within national borders: They envision human trafficking as a monopolistically competitive industry in which traffickers act as intermediaries between vulnerable individuals and employers by supplying differentiated products to employers. Using a rational-choice framework of human trafficking they explain the social situations that shape relocation and working decisions of vulnerable populations leading to human trafficking, the impetus for being a trafficker, and the decisions by employers of trafficked individuals.
Yılmaz and Vural (2007), seeing the phenomenon of trafficking in women as both a cause and a consequence of the violation of human rights, addressed the issue from the perspective of gender rights and emphasized that these rights should be strengthened.
Jeffreys (2008) examines how the prostitution and sex industry, involving millions of women, has become a highly profitable market that has been legalized and decriminalized by governments. How prostitution has become global is evident in the following developments: i- the growth of pornography and its new global reach, ii- the explosion of adult sex shops, strip clubs and escort agencies, iii- military prostitution and sexual violence in war, iv- marriage and the bride-by-mail industry, v- sex increase in tourism and trafficking in women. Through these practices, it is revealed that women are subcontracted by sexual obedience, that the states that legalize this industry act as intermediaries, and that male buyers in rich countries buy women's bodies from poor countries.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Underground Economy: It is an illegal structure, also known as the mafia or shadow economy, which is formed as a result of some free-market activities based on making excessive profits and tax evasion by inter/national organized crime organizations. In this context, the production and marketing of popular activities such as trafficking in human is completely banned or strictly controlled by the state due to its drawbacks such as illness, security weakness, immorality, and injustice.
Turkey: She is the only Afro-Eurasian country in the world at the junction of three continents, a large and liberal market with a population of 84 million, a member of the European customs union but still a candidate for full membership to the European Union, one of the most beautiful tourism destinations in the world, included in the G20 in terms of national income.
Economic Policy: The state uses various macroeconomic tools (interest rate, exchange rate, public expenditures, taxes, control, etc.) to solve economic problems (unemployment, inflation, poverty, etc.) and to achieve economic goals (optimal growth, high employment, budget balance, current account balance, etc.).
Trafficking in Women: It means the abduction and marketing of women and girls through violence, deception, and mafia so that they are employed in the prostitution sector and exploited in the labor market.