Abstract
Although male trafficking constitutes a considerable part of the human trafficking flow, men are rarely identified as victims. Victims of labor-related trafficking, mainly men, are being overlooked. The same happens with the marginal but not negligible percentage of male victims of sexual exploitation. Identification is crucial to promptly assist, support, and protect victims of trafficking. The overall objective of this chapter is to identify the causes and consequences of the invisibility of male victims of human trafficking. It aims to show the association of human trafficking with female non-citizens being trafficked for prostitution, combined with a securitarian approach to migration control, interferes with efforts to identify and protect all victims of human trafficking. As a result, male victims of human trafficking are prevented from accessing justice, thus rendering the transposition and implementation of the Palermo Protocol and the Anti-Trafficking Directive contradictory and ineffective.
TopIntroduction
Scenario: Bohdan, a young Ukrainian, was recruited in his country to travel to Spain, where he was promised a good job related to his profession. He paid for his trip. Upon arrival, his passport and mobile phone were withheld and the money he was carrying was taken from him. He lived in a cramped house with twenty other men. The organization made these men work on different farms, without registering them with Social Security or paying them for the work they did, with long working days, no weekly rest, and no vacations. The obedience of Bohdan and his colleagues was ensured through physical violence and the lack of money and documentation, as well as threats of reprisals against their relatives in their countries of origin if they did not follow orders. After discovering the existence of workers without legal residence and work permits, the labor inspectorate reported them to the immigration authorities. Bohdan was ordered to leave the country. He returned home penniless, too ashamed of what had happened to him to even tell his family.
The trafficking of human beings (THB) is a criminal activity that strongly affects people’s fundamental rights (United Nations, 2014). In the past twenty years, international and European legislators have implemented mechanisms and tools to protect victims and punish offenders. At the international level, the most relevant document is the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons Especially Women and Children, supplementing the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, of 2000 (hereinafter, the Palermo Protocol). At the European level, the Council of Europe (CoE) adopted the Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings in 2005. Furthermore, the European Union first passed Council Framework Decision 2002/629/JHA on 19 July 2002 to combat trafficking of human beings; this instrument was later replaced by Directive 2011/36/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 5 April 2011 on preventing and combating the trafficking of human beings and protecting its victims (Anti-Trafficking Directive).
It is unanimously recognized that signatory states have unevenly implemented the requirements imposed by these instruments, particularly with regard to the gender dimension of THB. Many national legislations formally comply with the international and/or European legal framework and punish all forms of trafficking discovered. However, the trafficking for labor and crime-related exploitation purposes and the trading of human organs remain hidden. Governmental action is almost exclusively focused on trafficking for purposes of sexual exploitation, which is considered as a form of violence against women. This focus impacts the identification and availability of legal protection and services for men and boys considerably, to the point that, in many countries, programs aimed at assisting male victims of human trafficking are either scarce or do not exist (Alvarez & Alessi, 2012; Smiragina, 2015).
The overall objective of this chapter is to identify the causes and consequences of this invisibility. It aims to show the association of human trafficking with female non-citizens being trafficked for prostitution, combined with a security-oriented approach to migration control and gender assumptions about vulnerability and victimhood, hampers efforts to identify and protect all victims of human trafficking. The human trafficking discourse and practice reinforce assumptions about gender, sex work, migration, and vulnerability so female migrants subjected to exploitation are often perceived as trafficked. Conversely, male migrants who face the same kind of exploitation are often depicted as smuggled migrants. This development produces a hierarchy of victimhood which depicts women and children as potential victims of trafficking for sexual exploitation, while men remain almost completely ignored and are systematically neglected when considering the implementation of anti-trafficking measures. The resulting invisibility of male victims renders the transposition and implementation of different elements of the Palermo Protocol and the Anti-Trafficking Directive contradictory and ineffective.
Chapter Objectives
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Present the existing data on the gender characteristics of victims, which vary between the different types of exploitation.
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Analyze the international and European standards on tackling THB from a gender perspective.
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Investigate causes of misidentification of male trafficking victims.
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Discuss whether the identification of male victims of THB means the de-gendering of a traditionally gendered crime.
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Propose recommendations and solutions.
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Indicate future research directions to tackle the problem.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Labor Trafficking: The trafficking of a person for the purpose of subjection to forced labor or services, slavery and servitude, peonage, and debt bondage.
Forced Labor: According to the ILO Forced Labour Convention, 1930 (No.29), forced or compulsory labor is all work or service which is exacted from any person under the threat of a penalty and for which the person has not offered himself or herself voluntarily.
Gender Perspective: According to the European Institute for Gender Equality, perspective taking into account gender-based differences when looking at any social phenomenon, policy, or process.
Sex Trafficking: The trafficking of a person for the purpose of a commercial sex act. It consists of different types of servitude, including forced prostitution, pornography, child sex rings, and sex-related occupations such as nude dancing and modeling.
Sexual Exploitation: According to WHO, sexual exploitation is the actual or attempted abuse of a position of vulnerability, power, or trust, for sexual purposes, including, but not limited to, profiting monetarily, socially, or politically from the sexual exploitation of another.
Feminism: The movement to end women’s oppression advocating women’s rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes.
Sex: Sex denotes human females and males depending on biological features (chromosomes, sex organs, hormones, and other physical features).
Access to Justice: According to the UN Institute for Peace, access to justice is defined as the ability of people to seek and obtain a remedy through formal or informal institutions of justice for grievances in compliance with human rights standards.
Labor Exploitation: This concept is not defined as such in international legal instruments, but is taken to cover, at a minimum, forced labor or services, slavery and servitude, peonage and debt bondage.
Trafficking in Human Beings: According to Article 3 of the Palermo Protocol, human trafficking is defined as ‘the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation. Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs.’
Smuggling of Migrants: According to Article 3 of the Smuggling Protocol, the smuggling of migrants is defined as ‘the procurement, in order to obtain, directly or indirectly, a financial or other material benefit, of the illegal entry of a person into a State Party of which the person is not a national or a permanent resident.’
Gender: According to the World Health Organization (WHO), gender refers to the characteristics of women, men, girls, and boys that are socially constructed. This includes norms, behaviors, and roles associated with being a woman, man, girl, or boy, as well as relationships with each other. As a social construct, gender varies from society to society and can change over time.