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2019 | Book

Constructing Human Trafficking

Evangelicals, Feminists, and an Unexpected Alliance

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About this book

Human trafficking has come to be seen as a growing threat, and transnational advocacy networks opposed to human trafficking have succeeded in establishing trafficking as a pressing political problem. The meaning of human trafficking, however, remains an object of significant—and heated—contestation. This project draws upon feminist and poststructuralist international relations theories to offer a genealogy of U.S. neo-abolitionism. The analysis examines activist campaigns, legislative and policy debates, and legislation surrounding human trafficking and the Trafficking Victims Protection Act in order to argue that the dominant US framing of trafficking as prostitution and sex slavery is not as hegemonic as scholars and activists commonly argue. In fact, constructions of human trafficking have become more amenable to reconfiguration, paradoxically in large part because of Evangelical attempts to widen the frame. This is an empirically novel and theoretically rich account of an urgent transnational issue of concern to activists, voters and policymakers around the globe.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter
Chapter 1. Trafficking Is Problematic
Abstract
This chapter establishes that human trafficking is a contested concept—that its meaning is neither straightforward nor unproblematic, and that constructions of trafficking reflect constellations of competing interests and values. The chapter ties the poor quality of quantitative data on human trafficking to its conceptual fluidity and contentious politics, and then goes on to explain why there is no technical or apolitical solution to this problem. Next, it provides an overview of the book’s aims and arguments, and a justification for the US case. Finally, the chapter introduces its methodology, and concludes with a preview of the plan for the book.
Jennifer K. Lobasz
Chapter 2. Contemporary Approaches to Human Trafficking
Abstract
Chapter two argues that sociopolitical problems such as human trafficking should be understood instead as political problematizations. It introduces five conventional problematizations of trafficking in the scholarly and policy literature: (1) trafficking as a security problem; (2) trafficking as a human rights problem; (3) trafficking as a gender problem; (4) trafficking as a migration problem; and (5) trafficking as a labor problem. This chapter demonstrates that the distinctions drawn among the various problematizations are political rather than technical or empirical, and reflect competing values, interests, and worldviews. It further contends that problematizations of trafficking drive allocations of government and NGO resources, create hierarchies of victims, participate in the production of subjects (i.e., “selves” and “others”) and re-entrenchment or challenging of stereotypes, and normalize exploitative practices deemed not to count as instances of human trafficking. Chapter two concludes with an alternative, feminist approach that seeks to denaturalize dominant constructions.
Jennifer K. Lobasz
Chapter 3. The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000
Abstract
This chapter sets the stage for a genealogy of anti-trafficking politics in the United States. From 1998 to 2000, members of Congress, senior officials in the Clinton administration, and a wide range of highly active members of civil society attempted to craft a comprehensive federal response to human trafficking both within the United States and abroad. The chapter finds that trafficking and anti-trafficking were constructed in gendered and racialized terms. Trafficking—understood primarily as the international transportation of women and children for forced prostitution—was characterized as a uniquely deplorable abuse of human rights, and allusions to the historic trans-Atlantic slave trade underscored demands for the United States to take leadership of global efforts to eradicate the problem. The resultant Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 set the parameters for the anti-trafficking initiatives of not only the next two presidential administrations, but also for the host of countries pressured by the US government and transnational civil society to improve their standing in the TVPA-mandated annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report’s ranking of international anti-trafficking efforts.
Jennifer K. Lobasz
Chapter 4. “Especially Women and Children”
Abstract
This chapter investigates radical feminists’ construction of human trafficking as a problem by asking how subjects are made intelligible and practices made possible through feminist abolitionist discourse. This chapter argues that feminist abolitionism constructs the human trafficking problem, along with its victims, villains, and liberators, through a series of gendered and racialized demarcations. It then addresses historical precursors to contemporary feminist abolitionists, situate the movement as an outgrowth of 1970s-era radical feminist theory and praxis, and explore the growth of feminist abolitionism as a transnational advocacy network. The chapter suggests that although feminist abolitionists’ adoption of the rhetoric of “human trafficking” in the place of “female sexual slavery” may have contributed to their initial political success, it has become an impediment to efforts to fix the meaning of trafficking to include all forms of prostitution.
Jennifer K. Lobasz
Chapter 5. Who’s to Bless and Who’s to Blame
Abstract
This chapter examines the construction of human trafficking as a problem by asking how subjects are made intelligible and practices made possible through the predominantly evangelical Christian religious abolitionist discourse. This chapter discusses the core tenets of the religious movement, considers its recent connections to US political life, and assesses evangelical influences on anti-trafficking advocacy. The chapter then argues that religious abolitionism is deeply shaped by (1) evangelical Christian styles of rhetoric and justification, (2) evangelicals’ emphasis on the struggle between good and evil, (3) the principle of imago Dei, and (4) evangelical beliefs regarding sexuality. This chapter compares the approach of abolitionists who see trafficking as a problem revolving around the international prostitution of women and children with those who ground a comparatively broader understanding in anti-slavery campaigns. The chapter concludes that the articulation of human trafficking to slavery creates space within abolitionist discourse for reconceptualizing human trafficking.
Jennifer K. Lobasz
Chapter 6. Victims, Villains, and the Virtuous
Abstract
This chapter returns to the importance of recognizing human trafficking as a social construct. It emphasizes that one of the reasons debates surrounding human trafficking are so contentious is to the recognition—often implicit—that the manner in which trafficking and its subjects are represented has real repercussions at the level of policy and service delivery. The chapter further elaborates on the argument that attempts to deny or ignore the social construction of human trafficking, and its inextricably political nature are themselves political acts that serve to shut down debate and delegitimate opposing viewpoints. The chapter then turns to the feminist, critical constructive theoretical perspective offered in the book, and the need for empathetic listening. Finally, the chapter concludes with a meditation on potential ways in which debates surrounding human trafficking might be reconfigured.
Jennifer K. Lobasz
Backmatter
Metadata
Title
Constructing Human Trafficking
Author
Dr. Jennifer K. Lobasz
Copyright Year
2019
Electronic ISBN
978-3-319-91737-5
Print ISBN
978-3-319-91736-8
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-91737-5