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Research for Sex Work 4: Violence, Repression and Other Health Threats is a peer-reviewed publication for sex workers, activists, health workers, researchers, NGO staff and policy makers. It is available in English. All issues of Research for Sex Work can be found here.
This article focuses on the existing legal approaches to prostitution, the moral and ideological presumptions underlying the different legislative models and their impact on the working and living conditions of women and men working in the sex industry. It will also touch on the current debate on sex work, including the views of sexworkers themselves. Basically, four different legal regimes can be discerned - prohibitionist, abolitionist, regulamentarist, and labour approaches.
In this article, the author makes the case that the state's proposals for addressing trafficking enable the state to posit itself as responsible for protecting "Canadians" while carefully avoiding any responsibility for the well-being of women who are trafficked; demonize smugglers as the cause of trafficking; and override the concerns and interests of women who are trafficked by making deportation the only "solution" to their presence in Canada.