On August 11, 2015, Amnesty International’s decision-making forum, the International Council Meeting (ICM) authorized the development of a policy supporting the decriminalization of prostitution. Amnesty International reports that this policy is intended to combat human rights violations against “sex workers” that take place in the process of the sex workers’ reported consensual sex work. “Sex workers are one of the most marginalized groups in the world who in most instances face constant risk of discrimination, violence, and abuse,” stated Secretary General of Amnesty International, Salil Shetty. This resolution is based on more than two years of research and development involving the World Health Organization, UNAIDS, Anti-Slavery International, Global Alliance in Trafficking in Women, and UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health, as well as interviewing more than 200 sex workers and law enforcement members in Argentina, Hong Kong, Norway, and Papua New Guinea.
The Guardian notes that much of Amnesty International’s evidence come from the Global Network of Sex Works Project, an organization whose former vice president was convicted earlier this year of sex trafficking for exploiting more than 200 women. Amnesty’s plan “relies on evidence from the very people it should be holding into account,” writes The Guardian.
In a preliminary matter important to note, CSE objects to the validity of the terms “sex work” and “sex worker,” as well as to Amnesty International’s use and promotion of these terms. CSE’s position regarding these terms is in line with an October 31, 2014 letter written to the Associated Press, published by the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, which objects to the Associated Press’ proposal to replace the word “prostitute” with “sex worker.” The letter states, and CSE’s position is: “These terms were invented by the sex industry and its supporters in order to legitimize prostitution as a legal and acceptable form of work and conceal its harm to those exploited in the commercial sex trade.”
Amnesty International calls human trafficking an “abhorrent abuse of human rights,” however the organization fails to distinguish between those it refers to as “sex workers” from those it refers to as trafficked women. Its policy claims to recognize that some members of society are “forced” into sex work because it is their only way to earn a living. According to Amnesty International, decriminalizing prostitution is a means to protect their human rights. Regarding human trafficking victims, Amnesty International posits, “We do not consider a trafficked women who is forced to sell sex to be a ‘sex worker.’ She is a trafficked woman deserves protection as such.”
The CSE Institute, along with Demand Abolition, takes the position that Amnesty International’s resolution is, as Demand Abolition terms it, “misguided thinking.” In an August 26 interview on News Radio WKOK, CSE Director Shea Rhodes asserts that with this resolution, Amnesty International has “turned its back on the women and children who are being sexually exploited.” Demand Abolition holds a similar position, stating that full decriminalization “only serves to increase the demand for paid sex and normalize a harmful practice in which someone with power and privilege can freely buy sexual access to a more vulnerable person.” While Amnesty International advocates that no one should be forced or coerced into being a “sex worker,” it also states that women and men are forced into the sex trade because they have “no other choice.” Amnesty International calls these same women and men “sex workers.” The human rights organization attempts to distinguish sex workers from prostituted women, however this mischaracterization of human trafficking protects exploiters of human trafficking, not those who are sold for sex.
Amnesty International is promoting a policy that it claims protects human rights, however, in fact, this policy supports human rights violations. Not only does Amnesty International’s policy allow traffickers to continue to exploit vulnerable individuals by decriminalizing prostitution, it serves to commodify human beings in a gross human rights violation in the form of selling human beings for sex.
This policy will be reviewed this month by Amnesty International’s Board for the purposes of drafting an official Amnesty International position on this issue.