I remember my first self-organised donor panel well. It was at the Global Social Change Philanthropy Conference in Washington, DC in 2013. I had just started work as the first coordinator of the Red Umbrella Fund—the newly established fund for and by sex workers. I organised a session that would clarify the distinction between sex work and human trafficking and emphasise the need to fund sex worker organising. We had a strong panel: an awesome sex worker activist, a knowledgeable academic, a passionate service provider, and a committed funder. I was, however, in for a rude awakening: even though the line-up was great, the audience was scarce. I thought to myself, if we can’t even get funders to show up and learn about sex workers’ rights, how will we ever meet the needs of sex worker organisations fighting for their basic human rights

van der Linde, Nadia

Anti-Trafficking Review

English

Nadia van der Linde

Directory of Open Access Journals

ANTI-TRAFFICKING REVIEW 12 (2019): 194-199194Time to Turn Up the VolumeNadia van der LindeSuggested citation: N van der Linde, ‘Time to Turn Up the Volume’, Anti-Trafficking Review, issue 12, 2019, pp. 194-199, www.antitraffickingreview.orgI remember my first self-organised donor panel well. It was at the GlobalSocial Change Philanthropy Conference in Washington, DC in 2013. I had juststarted work as the first coordinator of the Red Umbrella Fund—the newlyestablished fund for and by sex workers. I organised a session that wouldclarify the distinction between sex work and human trafficking and emphasisethe need to fund sex worker organising. We had a strong panel: an awesomesex worker activist, a knowledgeable academic, a passionate service provider,and a committed funder. I was, however, in for a rude awakening: even thoughthe line-up was great, the audience was scarce. I thought to myself, if we can’teven get funders to show up and learn about sex workers’ rights, how will weever meet the needs of sex worker organisations fighting for their basic humanrights?This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY). Under theCC-BY license, the public is free to share, adapt, and make commercial use of the work. Users must always give properattribution to the authors and the Anti-Trafficking Review.Image 1: Meeting of the Programme Advisory Committee of the RedUmbrella Fund, Amsterdam, 2017. Image credit: Vera Rodriguez, Red UmbrellaFund.ATR issue 12--9.pmd 1/1/2545, 1:13194N van der Linde195Why the Need for Donor Support?Sex workers are criminalised for their means of making a living in all but ahandful of countries and jurisdictions. Addressing stigma and violence arekey priorities of sex worker groups everywhere. For most sex workers, policeare not there to protect them but perpetrate most of the violence againstthem.1 Harassment, confiscation of condoms, extortion, arbitrary arrest, andrape are common examples of police violence. Even in the Netherlands, wheresex work is regulated, most sex workers do not report cases of physical orsexual violence to the police.2 A rare exception is New Zealand, where sexwork is decriminalised and the government helps fund a sex worker organisationto provide information, services, and support to their peers. The New ZealandProstitutes Collective and police work together to prevent violence andencourage sex workers to file a report when they experience sexual assault andother violent crimes.3Sex workers across the world are organising against criminalisation, whichputs not just their livelihood at risk but their entire lives—and those of theirloved ones. They are generally recognised as marginalised and highly vulnerablein today’s societies, embodying multiple layers of  stigma because of  the workthey do, and also because they are often poor, lack formal education, belong toIndigenous or migrant populations, identify as trans or gay, or are singlemothers. However, funding to support sex worker organisations and theircommunity mobilisation efforts is scarce.4 In 2013, foundations invested ameagre USD 11 million in grants to support sex worker rights worldwide.51 M Bhattacharjya, E Fulu and L Murthy, The Right(s) Evidence: Sex work, violenceand HIV in Asia. A multi-country qualitative study, UNFPA, UNDP and APNSW(CASAM), Bangkok, 2015, retrieved 19 December 2018, http://www.asia-pacific.undp.org/content/dam/rbap/docs/Research%20&%20Publications/hiv_aids/rbap-hhd-2015-the-rights-evidence-sex-work-violence-and-hiv-in-asia.pdf.2 M Kloek and M Dijkstra, Sex Work, Stigma and Violence in the Netherlands,Aidsfonds, Amsterdam, 2018, https://www.soaaids.nl/sites/default/files/documenten/Prost i tut ie/Sex%20Work%20Stigma%20and%20Violence%20in%20the%20Netherlands%20Report%28digital%29.pdf.3 E McKay, ‘World-first partnership between NZ Police and Prostitutes’ Collective’,NZ Herald, 17 December 2018, https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12178217.4 J Dorf, Sex Worker Health and Rights: Where is the funding?, Open Society Institute,New York, 2006, https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/sites/default/files/where.pdf.5 Mama Cash, Red Umbrella Fund and Open Society Foundations, Funding for SexWorker Rights. Opportunities for foundations to fund more and better, Mama Cash/RUF,Amsterdam, 2014, https://www.redumbrellafund.org/report.ATR issue 12--9.pmd 1/1/2545, 1:13195ANTI-TRAFFICKING REVIEW 12 (2019): 194-199196Most sex worker organisations have no funding at all, but those that doreceive an institutional grant usually still have annual budgets below USD70,000 and their reliance on volunteer work remains high. At the same time,raid and rescue programmes and rehabilitation centres continue to be generouslyfunded as, supposedly, models of  supporting or ‘helping’ women in the sexindustry.Sex worker organisations call on funders to provide more funding that is longterm and covers rent, salaries, trainings, legal services, and advocacy. They alsowant funders to speak up in support of sex workers’ rights.6 A conversationI had recently with another human rights funder revealed that, while they hadgiven some grants to sex worker groups before, they had never realised thatmost peer human rights funders still do not fund such work. We clearly needto more effectively leverage our access and knowledge to educate and activateour philanthropic peers.Changing PerspectiveThe best way to educate funders is through people’s lived experiences. Weinterviewed staff  of  funding organisations who had changed their perspectivefrom assuming all sex work (or prostitution) is exploitation and trafficking torecognising sex workers as human beings who are entitled to rights, includingin relation to their work. This revealed that academic evidence, UN documents,and human rights organisations’ public support for sex workers’ rights are allhelpful, but the main lever to a more nuanced understanding comes fromdirect interactions with sex workers.7 We need to bring funders and sex workersin the same room.The international donor-activist dialogue on sex work and trafficking thattook place in 2008 was one notable success of getting funders to listen to sexworkers.8 Members of  the Global Network of  Sex Work Projects (NSWP)played a crucial role in subsequent donor education, speaking from lived6 Ibid.7 N van der Linde and S Bos, ‘Mind the Gap—What we learned about howfunders can be moved in the right direction’, Alliance Magazine, 7 September2016, https://www.alliancemagazine.org/blog/mind-the-gap-what-we-learned-about-how-funders-can-be-moved-in-the-right-direction.8 CREA, NSWP and SHARP, Sex Work and Trafficking A Donor/Activist Dialogue onRights  and Funding ,  CREA, NSWP and SHARP,  2008,  https://www.redumbrellafund.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Donor_Dialogue_Final_REPORT_December2008.pdf.ATR issue 12--9.pmd 1/1/2545, 1:13196N van der Linde197experience about the harms of many anti-trafficking initiatives on sex workers.By the end of the event, funders were united in their acknowledgement thatsex workers need funding to effectively organise and stand up for their rights.Four years later, the Red Umbrella Fund was launched.9So far, the Red Umbrella Fund has awarded 158 grants to 103 sex worker-ledgroups in over fifty countries. These investments have resulted in strongerorganisations and leadership and increased solidarity and connections withinthe movement and with other movements. This is not, however, nearlyenough to foster real change. For every grant awarded, applications by manyother groups had to be declined due to the limited money available.Self-organising for Labour RightsSince the fund was established in 2012, our grantee partners have taught ushow the conflation of sex work and trafficking plays out in their daily lives. Itis not just that anti-trafficking policies often harm them; stigma andcriminalisation also create a social climate where sex workers are at greater riskof  being trafficked and survivors of  trafficking may have few other options tomake a living than sex work. Although they hardly ever mention it in theirown publications, many sex worker groups provide crucial services and supportto people who have experienced trafficking.10 Similarly, labour unions andwomen’s organisations that stand up for domestic workers or agriculturallabourers who work in poor conditions do not force them to quit their workor support incarcerating them, but instead focus on improving their labourconditions and self-organising capacity. As one sex worker at a donor-activistmeeting organised by the Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women (GAATW)in Bangkok in February 2018 stated:We are fighting for our rights, for our labour rights, for better workingconditions. Sex workers and clients, for the most part, are againsttrafficking and exploitation. Sex workers support trafficked people,and we protect them from the police.9 Red Umbrella Fund, The Creation of  a Collaborative Fund for and by Sex Workers,2017, https://www.redumbrellafund.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Red-Umbrella-Fund-The-creation-of-a-Collaborative-Fund.pdf.10 See, for example, Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women, Sex Workers Organisingfor Change: Self-representation, community mobilization, and working conditions, GAATW,Bangkok, 2018.ATR issue 12--9.pmd 1/1/2545, 1:13197ANTI-TRAFFICKING REVIEW 12 (2019): 194-199198It is no surprise that a review of the grant applications we received over theyears shows that, although local contexts differ greatly, ending stigma, violence,and criminalisation are the key priorities for sex worker organisationseverywhere. Sex worker organisations prevent exploitation and trafficking byproviding safe spaces, information, support, and accompaniment to relevantservices.11 Their campaigns for decriminalisation of  sex work are crucial tobuild safer work environments where problems can be reported to police andjustice can be sought. And where, as is highlighted by the New ZealandProstitutes Collective, sex workers have the right to say yes, but also the rightto say no.12ConclusionA peer activist funder recently explained the evolution of their donor advocacystrategy to me, which had gone from ‘philanthro-shaming’ (highlighting theurgent need to increase funding in a particular area to avoid or address a certainproblem) to unapologetically using the popular concept of  FOMO, the fearof  missing out. Too often, he shared, we highlight funding gaps and needs,hoping it will persuade funders to fill the abyss. That may help some alliedfunders to expand their grantmaking, but it will not convince the sex workerrights funding ‘virgins’. The reality is that even many self-identified socialjustice funders still claim ‘neutrality’ on the topic of sex workers’ rights, orsimply lack the courage to speak out. Those funders need to realise that theyare not the first sheep to leap over the ditch. In the case of this peer activistfunder, their new donor advocacy strategy, therefore, intends to take a ‘jumpon the bandwagon or miss out’ approach, highlighting that funding sex workerorganising is the thing to do, and now!I don’t think this bandwagon approach alone will do the trick, but at least wehave started forming a band and developing some common tunes. Differentfunders have started coming together in a new collaborative effort to ensurethat more funding is directed to the sex worker rights movements. Now it’stime to turn up that volume and reach the right audience.11 Ibid. ; see also: W Volbehr, ‘Improving Anti-Trafficking Strategies: Whysex workers should be involved’, Open Democracy , 17 July 2017, https://www.opendemocracy.net/beyondslavery/wendelijn-vollbehr/improving-anti-trafficking-strategies-why-sex-workers-should-be-inv.12 NZPC, Our Right to Say Yes, Our Right to Say No, n.d., http://www.nzpc.org.nz/pdfs/Right-to-Say-Yes-or-No-Poster.pdf.ATR issue 12--9.pmd 1/1/2545, 1:13198N van der Linde199Nadia van der Linde is the Coordinator of the Red Umbrella Fund. Sheholds a Master’s degree in Social Geography from the University of  Amsterdamand has years of international experience, particularly in the field of sexual andreproductive rights, advocacy, and (youth) participation processes. Nadia hasworked for the Youth Coalition, the Women’s Global Network forReproductive Rights, the People’s Health Movement, Stichting Alexander, theAsia Pacific Network of  Sex Workers and the United Nations PopulationFund (UNFPA). She is the chairperson of the Prostitution Information Centerin Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Email: nadia@redumbrellafund.org.ATR issue 12--9.pmd 1/1/2545, 1:13199

Time to Turn Up the Volume

https://antitraffickingreview.org/index.php/atrjournal/article/download/386/328

Time to Turn Up the Volume

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Directory of Open Access Journals

Anti-Trafficking Review