Resources

Despite the global trend of increasing mobility, migrant workers are still stigmatised and silenced – in politics and media alike. Additionally, migrant sex workers are painted as either victims or criminals in discourses that conflate sex work with human trafficking and deny sex workers the right to migrate. Their human rights are often ignored in favour of driving broader political agendas to restrict migration and criminalise sex work. 

Despite the global trend of increasing mobility, migrant workers are still stigmatised and silenced – in politics and media alike. Additionally, migrant sex workers are painted as either victims or criminals in discourses that conflate sex work with human trafficking and deny sex workers the right to migrate. Their human rights are often ignored in favour of driving broader political agendas to restrict migration and criminalise sex work.

Anti-rights movements pose numerous threats to sex workers, with their diverse ideologies, aims, and emerging alliances. These threats must be better understood to promote sex workers’ rights.

This resource is a Community Guide to the Briefing Paper: The Impacts of Anti-Rights Movements on Sex Workers. It provides an overview of the full Briefing Paper, and provides key recommendations for respecting and protecting sex workers’ human rights.

In recent years, movements organised against the rights of marginalised and criminalised groups have grown in influence and impact around the globe. Anti-migrants’ rights groups have lobbied for more restrictive border policies, in violation of the right to move and migrate. Anti-sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) and anti-LGBT groups have pushed back access to sexual and reproductive services and gender-affirming care for women, trans, and gender-diverse people, in violation of the right to health.

Legislation around sex work can be extremely complex and different legal models exist in different countries, and sometimes even within countries. While understanding the written laws and regulations is important, it does not provide a complete picture of the impact of sex work laws on the lives of sex workers. To understand this, it is essential to understand how the laws are interpreted, enforced, and implemented on the ground.

Misinformation about sex work and sex workers has long served as a tool for politicians, religious leaders, fundamental feminists and abolitionist groups, and anti-trafficking organisations to advance anti-sex work agendas.

Misinformation about sex work and sex workers has long served as a tool for politicians, religious leaders, fundamental feminists and abolitionist groups, and anti-trafficking organisations to advance anti-sex work agendas. The conflation of sex work with trafficking and exploitation is at the root of misinformation on sex work. ‘End Demand’ models that criminalise sex workers’ clients, ‘raid and rescue’ operations, and ‘exit’ and ‘rehabilitation’ services further deny the diverse lived experiences of sex workers while obscuring true victims of trafficking.

This resource is a Community Guide to the Briefing Paper: Sex Workers’ Lack of Access to Justice. It provides an overview of the full Briefing Paper, and provides key recommendations for policy makers and service providers. 

You can download this 5-page Community Guide above. It is now available in English, French, Russian, Spanish, and Chinese.

Sex workers around the world face a wide range of barriers to accessing justice, both as victims of crime and when charged with crimes. Since sex work is widely criminalised, most sex workers are denied access to the benefits and rights afforded to other workers under labour laws and face the risk of criminalisation, detention, deportation and legal sanction.

This resource is a Community Guide to the Briefing Paper: Shrinking Spaces and Silencing Voices. It provides an overview of the full Briefing Paper, and provides key recommendations for policy makers and service providers. 

You can download this 5-page Community Guide above. It is now available in English, French, Russian, Spanish, and Chinese.

Funding for sex worker-led organisations is shrinking, as has the space for the voices of sex workers, resulting in sex workers having less influence in programmes, policies and other decisions that affect their lives. Civil society organisations and other stakeholders now feel they have the right to funding and advocacy platforms, either because they work with sex workers and are therefore ‘experts’ who can speak for sex workers, or they wish to exclude sex workers’ voices entirely because they refuse to recognise sex workers’ rights as human rights.

Legislation around sex work can be extremely complex; different legal models exist in different countries and sometimes even within countries. NSWP published a mapping of national legislation used to regulate and criminalise sex work in 208 countries and dependencies, with sub-national legislation included for some countries.

This resource is a Community Guide to the Briefing Paper on the Homophobia and Transphobia Experienced by LGBT Sex Workers. It provides an overview of the full Briefing Paper, and provides key recommendations for policymakers and other stakeholders. 

You can download this 6 page resource above. It is available in English, Chinese, French, Russian and Spanish.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people experience targeted homophobia and transphobia at every level – including legal, political and social. For sex workers who are LGBT, discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity adds to and intensifies the discrimination they experience as sex workers. 

This is a Community Guide to the Stigma and Discrimination Experienced by Sex Workers Living with HIV briefing paper. It looks at the different types of stigma and discrimination experienced by sex workers living with HIV globally. This community guide provides recommendations for policies and practices which respect their  human rights. It uses case studies that highlight the experiences of sex  workers living with HIV and the efforts required to meet their needs, and advocate for their rights.

This briefing paper looks at the different types of stigma and discrimination experienced by sex workers living with HIV globally. Sex workers living with HIV are at increased risk of violence, criminalisation and vulnerability to other infections. This briefing paper provides recommendations for policies and practices which respect their  human rights. It uses case studies that highlight the experiences of sex workers living with HIV and the efforts required to meet their needs, and advocate for their rights. A Community Guide is also available.

This is a Community Guide to the Advocacy Toolkit: The Real Impact of the Swedish Model on Sex Workers, a collection of papers on the harmful Swedish model. It can be used to challenge the widespread promotion of this detrimental legal and political approach to the regulation of sex work.

This Advocacy Toolkit is a collection of eight evidence-based fact sheets and advocacy tools on the harmful Swedish model. It can be used to challenge the widespread promotion of this detrimental legal and political approach to the regulation of sex work. A Community Guide is also available.

This Community Guide summarises the Sex Workers Who Use Drugs: Ensuring a Joint Approach briefing paper. The community guide highlights the specific needs and rights of sex workers who use drugs.

This joint briefing paper by NSWP and INPUD highlights the specific needs and rights of sex workers who use drugs, as a community that spans two key populations. This document provides an overview of some of the most endemic and substantive ways in which sex workers who use drugs face double criminalisation and associated police harassment, intersectional stigma, compounded marginalisation and social exclusion, heightened interference and harassment from healthcare and other service providers, infantilisation, pathologisation, and an associated undermining of agency, choice, and self-determination. A Community Guide is also available.