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Oliveira J, Nienaber B, Bissinger J, Gilodi A, Richard C, Albert I. Double transition of young migrants in Luxembourg: vulnerable, resilient and empowering integration trajectories in the period of youth. FRONTIERS IN SOCIOLOGY 2024; 9:1230567. [PMID: 38799208 PMCID: PMC11119283 DOI: 10.3389/fsoc.2024.1230567] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/25/2023] [Accepted: 04/19/2024] [Indexed: 05/29/2024]
Abstract
Migrant integration trajectories have become more complex, open, uncertain, and continuously changing, over time. For young migrants, their integration endeavour intersects with their process of transition to adulthood, a double transition that poses additional challenges. Recent theoretical perspectives such as "liquid integration" aim at focusing on the dynamic, processual, and temporal nature of migrant integration. The present article focuses on the dynamic interplay of obstacles and enablers that, over time, interact to construct complex, often non-linear, and open-ended integration and coming of age trajectories of young migrants (aged from 18 to 30 years) coming from outside the European Union (EU) to EU countries. Empirical results from the H2020 MIMY (Empowerment through liquid Integration of Migrant Youth in vulnerable conditions) research project in Luxembourg will be presented. In order to address the goal of the research, qualitative data were gathered by means of N = 38 interviews with young migrants with different migratory paths, characteristics and experiences, and specifically included: young migrants from non-EU Portuguese-speaking countries (N = 16), refugees living in reception centres (N = 15), migrants who since arriving in Luxembourg have become publicly visible (N = 7). Content analysis of the interviews allowed a twofold purpose: (1) capturing the unfolding of intersectional integration obstacles that over time play a decisive role in the building of conditions of vulnerability of the double transition under analysis; (2) capturing the multidimensional resources that interactively build up to give rise to resilient and empowering integration and coming of age experiences. The identification of decisive multidimensional obstacles and resources present in the integration endeavour during the process of coming of age allowed us to capture differentiated routes of vulnerability, on the one hand, and resilience/ empowerment on the other. Key ingredients of both vulnerable and more resilient and empowering integration and coming of age trajectories are identified as well as their relational dynamics, enabling to address key challenges for the resilience and empowerment of young migrants in the process of negotiating their transition to adulthood amidst their integration challenges in the Luxembourgish society.
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Affiliation(s)
- José Oliveira
- Department DGEO, University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Luxembourg
| | - Birte Nienaber
- Department DGEO, University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Luxembourg
| | - Jutta Bissinger
- Department DGEO, University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Luxembourg
| | - Amalia Gilodi
- Department DBCS, University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Luxembourg
| | | | - Isabelle Albert
- Department DBCS, University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Luxembourg
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Godoy SM, Perris GE, Thelwell M, Osuna-Garcia A, Barnert E, Bacharach A, Bath EP. A Systematic Review of Specialty Courts in the United States for Adolescents Impacted by Commercial Sexual Exploitation. TRAUMA, VIOLENCE & ABUSE 2023; 24:1344-1362. [PMID: 35001766 PMCID: PMC9262992 DOI: 10.1177/15248380211061403] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/03/2023]
Abstract
Nationwide efforts to enhance services for adolescents experiencing commercial sexual exploitation (CSE) in the judicial system have led to the emergence of specialty courts, including human trafficking and girls' courts. Given that prior research has documented competing stances on the effectiveness of specialty courts for CSE-impacted populations, we conducted a systematic review of the literature to identify key characteristics of programming, profiles of adolescents served, and effectiveness of these courts. To identify relevant research and information, we systematically searched scholarly databases and information sources, conducted reference harvesting, and forwarded citation chaining. Articles presenting primary data with quantitative, qualitative, or mixed methodologies or programmatic descriptions of specialty courts serving adolescents at risk or with confirmed histories of CSE that were published after 2004 were included. We identified 39 articles on 21 specialty courts serving adolescents at risk or with confirmed histories of CSE, including seven specialty courts with evaluation or outcome data. Across specialty courts, adolescents benefited from an increase in linkage to specialized services, improved residential placement stability, and reduction in recidivism-measured by new criminal charges. Specialty court participation was also associated with improved educational outcomes and decreased instances of running away. A lack of empirical data, specifically of evaluation studies, emerged as a weakness in the literature. Still, findings support that specialty courts can be an integral judicial system response to CSE. Multidisciplinary collaboration can help target and respond to the multifaceted needs of adolescents, encourage healthy behaviors, and promote their overall wellness.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sarah M. Godoy
- School of Social Work, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Tate-Turner-Kuralt Building, 325 Pittsboro Street, Room 400-I, Chapel Hill, NC United States, 27599
| | - Georgia E. Perris
- Department of Psychiatry, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Jane and Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, 760 Westwood Plaza, Room A8-232, Los Angeles, CA, United States, 90024
| | - Mikiko Thelwell
- Department of Psychiatry, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Jane and Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, 760 Westwood Plaza, Room A8-232, Los Angeles, CA, United States, 90024
| | - Antonia Osuna-Garcia
- Health and Life Sciences Library, UCLA Science Libraries, 12-077 Center for Health Sciences, Los Angeles, CA, United States, 90095
| | - Elizabeth Barnert
- Department of Pediatrics, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and Mattel Children’s Hospital, Los Angeles, CA, UCLA Pediatrics, Box 951752, 12-467 MDCC, Los Angeles, CA, United States, 90095-1752
| | - Amy Bacharach
- Center for Families, Children, and the Courts, Judicial Council of California, 455 Golden Gate Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94102
| | - Eraka P. Bath
- Department of Psychiatry, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Jane and Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, 760 Westwood Plaza, Room A8-228, Los Angeles, CA, United States, 90024
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From Trauma to Transformation: the Role of the Trauma Surgeon in the Care of Black Transgender Women. CURRENT TRAUMA REPORTS 2023. [DOI: 10.1007/s40719-023-00254-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/19/2023]
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Cubides Kovacsics MI, Santos W, Siegmann KA. Sex Workers' Everyday Security in the Netherlands and the Impact of COVID-19. SEXUALITY RESEARCH & SOCIAL POLICY : JOURNAL OF NSRC : SR & SP 2022; 20:810-824. [PMID: 35637773 PMCID: PMC9132353 DOI: 10.1007/s13178-022-00729-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 05/06/2022] [Indexed: 05/28/2023]
Abstract
Introduction The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare and exacerbates the existing insecurities of sex workers. This paper asks: What are sex workers' everyday experiences of (in)security? And: How has the COVID-19 pandemic influenced these? Methods We engage with these questions through collaborative research based on semi-structured interviews carried out in 2019 and 2020 with sex workers in The Hague, the Netherlands. Results Revealing a stark mismatch between the insecurities that sex workers' experience and the concerns enshrined in regulation, our analysis shows that sex workers' everyday insecurities involve diverse concerns regarding their occupational safety and health, highlighting that work insecurity is more multi-faceted than sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Widespread employment and income insecurities for sex workers are exacerbated for transwomen and male sex workers. Their legal liminality is enabled not only by the opaque legal status of sex work in the Netherlands, but also by the gendering of official regulation. The COVID-19 pandemic made visible how the sexual and gender norms that informally govern sex workers' working conditions intersect with hierarchies of citizenship, complicating access to COVID-19 support, particularly for migrant sex workers. Conclusions Sex work regulation in the Netherlands leaves workers in a limbo-not without obligations and surveillance, yet, without the full guarantee of their labour rights. Policy Implications To effectively address sex workers' insecurities, a shift in regulation from its current biopolitical focus to a labour approach is necessary. Besides, public policy and civil society actors alike need to address the sex industry's harmful social regulation through hierarchies of gender, sexuality and race.
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Benoit C, Unsworth R. COVID-19, Stigma, and the Ongoing Marginalization of Sex Workers and their Support Organizations. ARCHIVES OF SEXUAL BEHAVIOR 2022; 51:331-342. [PMID: 34811655 PMCID: PMC8608230 DOI: 10.1007/s10508-021-02124-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/30/2020] [Revised: 05/03/2021] [Accepted: 08/01/2021] [Indexed: 06/02/2023]
Abstract
Primary or first-hand stigma, associated with sex work, sometimes disparagingly referred to as "prostitution" or "whore" stigma, was a fundamental cause of social inequities for sex workers before the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, courtesy stigma, or stigma by association linked with involvement with a stigmatized group, has long limited the ability of sex worker organizations to secure adequate funds to meet the needs of sex workers in their communities. In reaction to the pandemic, sex worker organizations quickly responded and in a variety of ways have been helping to ease the impact of the pandemic on sex workers in their communities. In November 2020, we interviewed 10 members of sex worker organizations from seven different communities across Canada about how they have been dealing with the immediate and longer-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic in their communities. Three strategic actions stood out in the interviews: (1) challenging stigma to help sex workers access government emergency funding; (2) reorganizing and adapting services to provide outreach to sex workers in their communities; and (3) advocating for continuous organizational funding. The findings show that primary stigma and courtesy stigma have further marginalized sex worker organizations and their clients during the pandemic. We conclude with participants' recommendations to address avoidable harms of COVID-19 among sex workers and to better support sex worker organizations in Canada.
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Affiliation(s)
- Cecilia Benoit
- Department of Sociology, Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research, University of Victoria, 2300 McKenzie Ave., Victoria, BC, V8N 5M8, Canada.
| | - Róisín Unsworth
- Department of Sociology, Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research, University of Victoria, 2300 McKenzie Ave., Victoria, BC, V8N 5M8, Canada
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Fehrenbacher AE, Fletcher JB, Clark K, Kisler KA, Reback CJ. Social Networks and Exchange Sex among Transgender Women. JOURNAL OF SEX RESEARCH 2021; 58:743-753. [PMID: 33779427 PMCID: PMC8273090 DOI: 10.1080/00224499.2021.1892575] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/12/2023]
Abstract
Transgender women are more likely to exchange sex than cisgender individuals. This study investigated how social networks were associated with exchange sex among transgender women in Los Angeles County. From July 2015 to September 2016, transgender women (N = 271; "egos") reported their sexual and substance use behaviors and perceptions of the same behaviors among their peers (N = 2,619; "alters"). Clustered logistic and negative binomial regressions were used to model odds of exchange sex and number of exchange sex partners in the past 6 months, respectively. Transgender women who perceived that any of their peers were engaged in exchange sex were approximately four times more likely to exchange sex themselves and reported three times as many exchange sex partners as those who did not perceive any peers engaged in exchange sex. Perceived ecstasy use among peers was associated with higher odds of exchange sex and more exchange sex partners, whereas perceived marijuana use among peers was associated with lower odds of exchange sex and fewer exchange sex partners. Peer behaviors were strongly associated with both transgender women's likelihood and rate of engagement in exchange sex. Risk reduction interventions with transgender women should attend to network dynamics that are often overlooked in existing programs.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anne E. Fehrenbacher
- Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, USA
- UCLA Center for HIV Identification, Prevention, and Treatment Services, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | | | - Kirsty Clark
- Department of Epidemiology, Fielding School of Public Health, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, USA
- Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Yale School of Public Health, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
| | - Kimberly A. Kisler
- Friends Research Institute, Inc., Los Angeles, CA, USA
- Department of Public Health, Rongxiang Xu College of Health and Human Services, California State University, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Cathy J. Reback
- Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, USA
- UCLA Center for HIV Identification, Prevention, and Treatment Services, Los Angeles, CA, USA
- Friends Research Institute, Inc., Los Angeles, CA, USA
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Unfinished Decriminalization: The Impact of Section 19 of the Prostitution Reform Act 2003 on Migrant Sex Workers’ Rights and Lives in Aotearoa New Zealand. SOCIAL SCIENCES 2021. [DOI: 10.3390/socsci10050179] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/16/2022] Open
Abstract
In 2003, Aotearoa New Zealand (NZ) passed the Prostitution Reform Act 2003 (PRA), which decriminalized sex work for NZ citizens and holders of permanent residency (PR) while excluding migrant sex workers (MSWs) from its protection. This is due to Section 19 (s19) of the PRA, added at the last minute against advice by the Aotearoa New Zealand Sex Workers’ Collective (NZPC) as an anti-trafficking clause. Because of s19, migrants on temporary visas found to be working as sex workers are liable to deportation by Immigration New Zealand (INZ). Drawing on original ethnographic and interview data gathered over 24 months of fieldwork, our study finds that migrant sex workers in New Zealand are vulnerable to violence and exploitation, and are too afraid to report these to the police for fear of deportation, corroborating earlier studies and studies completed while we were collecting data.
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Anti-Trafficking in the Time of FOSTA/SESTA: Networked Moral Gentrification and Sexual Humanitarian Creep. SOCIAL SCIENCES-BASEL 2021. [DOI: 10.3390/socsci10020058] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/16/2022]
Abstract
Globally, sex workers have highlighted the harms that accompany anti-prostitution efforts advanced via anti-trafficking policy, and there is a growing body of social science research that has emerged documenting how anti-trafficking efforts contribute to carceral and sexual humanitarian interventions. Yet mounting evidence on the harms of anti-trafficking policies has done little to quell the passage of more laws, including policies aimed at stopping sexual exploitation facilitated by technology. The 2018 passage of the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA) in the U.S. House of Representatives, and the corresponding Senate bill, the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act (SESTA), is a case study in how efforts to curb sexual exploitation online actually heighten vulnerabilities for the people they purport to protect. Drawing on 34 months of ethnographic fieldwork and interviews with sex workers and trafficked persons (n = 58) and key informants (n = 20) in New York and Los Angeles, we analyze FOSTA/SESTA and its harmful effects as a launchpad to more broadly explore how technology, criminalization, shifting governance arrangements, and conservative moralities cohere to exacerbate sex workers’ vulnerability.
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Benoit C, Unsworth R. Early Assessment of Integrated Knowledge Translation Efforts to Mobilize Sex Workers in Their Communities. ARCHIVES OF SEXUAL BEHAVIOR 2021; 50:129-140. [PMID: 32737659 PMCID: PMC7394475 DOI: 10.1007/s10508-020-01778-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/03/2020] [Revised: 06/09/2020] [Accepted: 06/16/2020] [Indexed: 06/02/2023]
Abstract
Researchers have recently increased their efforts to find more effective strategies to reduce the gap between the production of academic knowledge and its uptake in policy and practice. We focus attention on sex workers in Canada who have limited access to societal resources and are hampered by punitive laws prohibiting their work. The initial aim of our study was to work with sex worker organizations and allied agencies to develop a training program for sex workers to help them understand Canada's most recent criminal justice approach to adult sex commerce. What has emerged from our integrated knowledge translation process during the first year of the study's operation has been a change to a broader focus on mobilizing sex workers around their occupational and social rights. In this paper, we first give an overview of recent changes in Canada's prostitution laws and then report qualitative findings from interviews with members of our partner organizations. Interviewees appreciated the change in research direction and the emergent collaborative process among themselves and the authors, but also noted challenges regarding shifting research timelines, balancing power between themselves and the academic researchers, and reaching consensus on research plans among community partners themselves. We discuss the findings in relation to successful knowledge translation strategies that aim to ensure the research questions we ask, and the empirical processes we engage in, are advantageous to those we aim to benefit.
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Affiliation(s)
- Cecilia Benoit
- Department of Sociology, Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research, University of Victoria, 2300 McKenzie Ave., Victoria, BC, V8N 5M8, Canada.
| | - Róisín Unsworth
- Department of Sociology, Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research, University of Victoria, 2300 McKenzie Ave., Victoria, BC, V8N 5M8, Canada
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Framing the Mother Tac: The Racialised, Sexualised and Gendered Politics of Modern Slavery in Australia. SOCIAL SCIENCES-BASEL 2020. [DOI: 10.3390/socsci9110192] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/17/2022]
Abstract
Centred on the slavery trial “Crown vs. Rungnapha Kanbut” heard in Sydney, New South Wales, between 10 April and 15 May 2019, this article seeks to frame the figure of the “Mother Tac” or the “mother of contract”, also called “mama tac” or “mae tac”—a term used amongst Thai migrants to describe a woman who hosts, collects debts from, and organises work for Thai migrant sex workers in their destination country. It proposes that this largely unexplored figure has come to assume a disproportionate role in the “modern slavery” approach to human trafficking, with its emphasis on absolute victims and individual offenders. The harms suffered by Kanbut’s victims are put into context by referring to existing literature on women accused of trafficking; interviews with Thai migrant sex workers, including Kanbut’s primary victim, and with members from the Australian Federal Police Human Trafficking Unit; and ethnographic field notes. The article unveils how constructions of both victim and offender, as well as definitions of slavery, are racialised, gendered, and sexualised and rely on the victims’ subjective accounts of bounded exploitation. By documenting these and other limitations involved in a criminal justice approach, the authors reveal its shortfalls. For instance, while harsh sentences are meant as a deterrence to others, the complex and structural roots of migrant labour exploitation remain unaffected. This research finds that improved legal migration pathways, the decriminalisation of the sex industry, and improved access to information and support for migrant sex workers are key to reducing heavier forms of labour exploitation, including human trafficking, in the Australian sex industry.
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