The cheveryenge away from Trafficking

Trafficking arrived into the political schedule immediately after stress regarding feminists and you can this new national ladies policy agencies. To start with, female was trafficked out of Southeast China (somewhat Thailand as well as the Philippines), Latin The usa (Columbia additionally the Dominican Republic and Africa (Ghana); following the slide of your own Berlin Wall, trade paths managed to move on so you’re able to Central and you may East European countries. Governmental requires was in fact identifying the offense a lot more broadly in order to facilitate prosecution and increasing the punishment of 5 to 6 many years, to make article source sure that culprits will be stored in remand custody. The fresh articles throughout the penal code with the individual trafficking was basically changed in the 1993, which have a far more specific definition of brand new offence and better penalties to possess traffickers (Outshoorn 2004a: 195). Brand new blogs were framed in the a gender-basic way, and you will trafficking remained identified as forcing a person on prostitution.

In the parliamentary debates on trafficking around that period, foreign women were portrayed as victims of unscrupulous traffickers tricked into prostitution. This framing was tied into a discourse about the divide between the rich and poor countries: female prostitutes from the ‘Third World’ were driven by poverty. Gradually, a more insidious edge crept into this discourse when Christian Democrats in parliament linked trafficking to illegal migration, opening a space for ‘false’ victims, who used the loopholes in the law to work illegally as a prostitute in the Netherlands (HTK, 1991–1992, TK 81, pp. 4994, 4995, e time they also started to argue that all women from non-EU countries working in the sex industry were victims of forced prostitution. Therefore in their view, the best remedy to stop trafficking was to prevent non-EU women from working in the Dutch sex industry in the first place. This reasoning eradicated the figure of a woman migrant deciding to work as a sex worker in the West and who might make use of intermediaries to enter the country-with her consent. But then she was ‘illegal’ and ought to be deported.

Successive cabinets continued to refuse work permits on similar grounds, also arguing there was no national interest at stake which normally justifies extending work permits to non-EU persons. They were backed by a recurring majority in parliament; the parliamentary records show many references to the fear of foreign prostitutes entering the country which would subvert immigration policies. The fear resurfaced in the memorandum to the bill to lift the brothel ban, as one of the aims of the bill was to halt ‘the stream of foreign prostitutes’ (HTK 1996–97, 25437 (Opheffing Algemeen Bordeelverbod), no. 3 (Memorie van Toelichting), 1 July 1997, p. 13). The refusal to grant work permits was also generally justified by the aim of stopping the trafficking of women; permits would encourage traffickers to transport women into the country.

Categories of Sex Specialists

After that implementation of brand new act led to the building off no less than four kinds of prostitutes. First of all, you have the ethnically vague Dutch sex worker exactly who voluntarily determines to get results in the prostitution that is brand new bearer away from civil and you will personal legal rights. Next, discover brand new prostitutes from other European union regions who will disperse easily in and out of one’s Netherlands and you can work in the newest sex industry. These kinds put into a few categories following accession toward European union of the Baltic Claims, Poland, Hungary, the newest Czech Republic and Slovakia inside 2004, and come up with a third classification exactly who can just only legitimately act as prostitutes if they was in fact separate sex pros and never team. In 2007, sex pros from the the latest European union people was indeed acknowledged on the an enthusiastic equivalent ground into the elderly Eu member specialists, but the 3rd class try now full of sex professionals from Bulgaria and you will Romania when each other places entered brand new European union in this exact same seasons. Like their predecessors, this type of ladies are allowed to work as independent sex specialists, but up to now notably less team.