Part 5 - Human Trafficking: Causes, Consequences and Counter-Measures

Gender and Human Trafficking

People often think that men are smuggled and women trafficked. This is not true: Men are trafficked as well (mainly for the purpose of labor exploitation) and many women are smuggled. Nevertheless, women's experiences of trafficking often differ from those of men. To understand the trafficking of women and girls, one should:

• understand that the social status of women in many societies is inferior to the status of men;
• recognise that many women are denied ownership and control over material and non-material resources, making them reliant upon men;
• consider that employment for women, especially abroad, is often limited to low-skilled labor and isolated workplaces such as private homes.

Many women confronting unemployment, sexual harassment, or domestic violence, respond to advertisements offering well-paid work abroad. In many cases, this behavior is not naive. Women simply perceive the potential benefits of migration, such as financial rewards and improved social status, as outweighing the dangers of migration. To understand the trafficking of women, one has to take into account transformation processes and violence.

Gender-based discrimination

Poverty, unemployment and a lack of economic prospects affect women more than men, especially in patriarchal societies and in those undergoing political, economic and social transformation. The "feminization of poverty" is thus a prime root cause of labor migration and trafficking. Some countries do not have laws against gender-based discrimination. Even if they do, many women are not aware of their rights to equal treatment, and laws against gender-based discrimination have little practical effect. In labor markets, women are often hired last and fired first, and they have less access to regulated jobs than men, often working in informal sectors where risks of exploitation and violence are high.

Violence against women

There are various forms of violence against women. Domestic violence, for example, helps to explain why many women and girls leave their families and countries. Domestic violence is often not seen as a human rights violation, leading to a lack of social and state protection afforded to victims of domestic violence. Armed conflict affects women as well, both during and after conflicts. During conflicts, women are sexually abused for political purposes (for example, to humiliate the enemy) or forced to work as prostitutes. After conflicts, women work in local sex industries often under appalling conditions, being treated as commodities.

Yet gender aspects of human trafficking are even more complex. In patriarchal societies, men are expected to support their families. Many men who cannot find work migrate. Those migrant men who become victims of trafficking cannot send money home, which renders their wives vulnerable to trafficking. These dynamics show that gender inequalities can have a negative effect both on men and women. Some dynamics of trafficking affect predominantly men; especially men from low social classes and minorities working in particular industries where trafficking prevails, such as construction.