Preventing human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation: the need for a bottom-up approach : the case-study of Brazilians trafficked to Portugal

Abstract

Masters Thesis – Academic Year 2007/2008 - European Master’s Degree in Human Rights and Democratization (E.MA) - European Inter-university Centre for Human Rights and Democratization (EIUC) -Faculdade de Direito, Universidade Nova de Lisboa (UNL)Trafficked people experience multiple processes of avoidable human rights violation in countries of origin, transit and destination. In recent years, international, regional organizations and States, have adopted an anti-trafficking hard and soft law approach based on an ‘integrated perspective’ consistent with the ‘three P’s approach’, namely prosecution, protection and prevention. However, disposals concerning prevention, meant as human-centred public policies and targeted development cooperation initiatives aimed at reducing potential victims’ vulnerability in the countries of origin, are neither legally binding on States nor concretely translated into national anti-trafficking strategies, that keep being focused mainly on reactive and protective measures. These last sets of policies, although complementary, do not contribute to the eradication of potential victims’ vulnerability. A human rights-centred perspective entails going grassroots in order to identify the daily contextual threats that make individuals likely to believe in traffickers’ promises in order to escape to hopeless living conditions. In fact, a bottom-up approach implies investing resources to eradicate the root-causes at the basis of human trafficking that go beyond the mere presence of traffickers and lie in women’s socio-economic vulnerability. The case-study of Brazilians trafficked to Portugal for the purpose of sexual exploitation shows that human trafficking turns into the mean through which many Brazilian women attempt to escape everyday socio-economic vulnerability. For this very reason, it is argued that anti-trafficking policies, carried out also in cooperation with non-traditional bottom-up stakeholders, must reach potential victims of trafficking in their own daily context and provide them with viable alternatives in order to be effective and human